Jason Richardson of the US in the heats of the 110m Hurdles (© Getty Images )
They are the three fastest men over 110 metres hurdles in history, the three fastest men in the world in 2011 and they will meet in the final later on Monday night.
But Dayron Robles, Liu Xiang and David Oliver are not the three fastest men in Daegu – not yet at least. Indeed, none of them is yet the fastest man at the World Championships.
That mantle rests on the shoulder of the challenger, Jason Richardson, who had the fastest time of a semi-final round run into moderate headwinds.
Richardson ran 13.11 seconds to win the second semi, beating Oliver clearly into second place. Oliver’s 13.40, incidentally, was his slowest run for the year.
The first semi was a strange affair, the first two automatic qualifiers running slower than they had in Sunday morning’s heats. Perhaps the 1.4 metres per second headwind was to blame.
Olympic champion Dayron Robles had a metre lead over Liu Xiang and Aries Merritt until the last two hurdles when the other two closed the gap.
Liu just grabbed the Cuban at the line, wining in 13.31 seconds. Merritt just failed to get past so he took third behind Robles, with both timed at 13.32.
Suddenly, the big three might become the big four. Interestingly, Richardson is the only one of the four to have run a personal best this year – his 13.08 at the London Samsung Diamond League where he split Robles and Oliver.
Britain’s William Sharman took third in the second semi-final and his teammate, 2010 European champion Andy Turner and Jamaica’s Dwight Thomas joined him in the final as the two fastest non-automatic qualifiers.
Len Johnson for the IAAF
