2005 - End of Year Reviews - HURDLES

The Hurdling highlights of 2005. Renowned statisticians A. Lennart Julin and Mirko Jalava continue their end of season event category reviews - Part Four of eight instalments - The HURDLES.

MEN - Hurdles

110m Hurdles

22-year-old Ladji Doucouré, who had been bitterly disappointed after his stumbling display in the 2004 Athens Olympics final, was a different man in Helsinki. Like in Athens, Doucouré was convincing in heats and semi-finals, but now he also managed to handle the final. In the end he beat the Olympic champion and co-World record holder Liu Xiang only by one hundredth-of-a-second, which was a bit of a surprise because Liu’s season had not been a very promising one prior to Helsinki. Doucouré suffered just one loss before Helsinki, but the mediocre performances after the championships suggested that he has not yet taken the event over as the clear number one.

34-year-old American Allen Johnson, who had won an amazing four successive World titles prior to Helsinki took the bronze this time, only missing his fifth gold by 0.05 seconds. Johnson recorded his seventh career season with a sub-13 second race, which is much better than anyone else has achieved. For example, World record holder Colin Jackson (GBR) only managed to go under 13 seconds during three seasons with one of those runs being wind assisted. Liu Xiang’s season lacked that final touch, but the Chinese was troubled by small injuries during the year. He still managed to record several fast races including 13.05s, 13.06s and 13.08s all twice. 32-year-old Dominique Arnold (USA) was the surprise in this event winning several major meetings, recording a personal best of 13.01s in the US Championships and finishing in fourth place in Helsinki.

The depth in the event went a bit downwards with 24 athletes under 13.40, in 2004 there were 29, and 19 in 2003. United States commands this event with 31 athletes in the World top-100, Germany has seven, with Brazil and China tied for the third place with five each.

Men's 110mH (50mH - 55mH - 60mH) - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points   
1. Dominique ARNOLD 73 USA 1401
1. Ladji DOUCOURÉ 83 FRA 1401
3. Allen JOHNSON 71 USA 1390
4. Xiang LIU 83 CHN 1389
5. Terrence TRAMMELL 78 USA 1357
6. Stanislavs OLIJARS 79 LAT 1317
7. Joel BROWN 80 USA 1312
8. Maurice WIGNALL 76 JAM 1310

 

400m Hurdles

USA’s Bershawn Jackson, who came to the top level last year when winning the 2004 World Athletics Final with a then personal best of 47.86, recorded a very strong 2005 season winning 12 out of his 13 competitions with his only loss being a second place finish in the US Championships behind Kerron Clement. Jackson clocked seven sub-48 second races with the last one being in the terrible Helsinki weather conditions (47.30). With a 48.05 clocking he also won the World Athletics Final.

Despite the fact that Jackson’s season was a very good one, it was Kerron Clement who produced a massive display in 2005. The University of Florida runner, who was born in Trinidad & Tobago, won the 2004 World Junior Championships with a fast time of 48.51, but had already proven himself much earlier when he clocked 49.77 in 2002 as a 16-year-old! Clement, who was 19-years-old until the end of the season, raced more than 60 times during 2005 including relays. It was no wonder that he was exhausted in Helsinki where he gifted Dai Tamesue (JPN) the bronze medal after realising he was not going to win. Clement clocked 20.40 indoors in the flat 200m, broke the World Indoor record in the flat 400m (44.57), ran 7.28 for the 55m Hurdles and 7.84 for the 60m Hurdles. Outdoors, he only raced once in the flat 400m (45.31), clocked 13.95 for the 110m Hurdles, and raced 16 times in the 400m Hurdles including heats setting the world leading time of 47.24 while winning the US Championships.

James Carter (USA), who had finished fourth in both the 2000 and 2004 Olympics finally made it to the podium taking the silver in Helsinki with a personal best of 47.43.

The reigning Olympic champion Félix Sánchez (DOM) could only race twice prior to Helsinki, where he narrowly made it to the final, but was not able to finish because of the injury which had made his whole season a very difficult one.

During the 2005 season 22 athletes clocked a time of 48.75 or faster, in 2004 there were 24 and 18 in 2003. United States is the best country in this event with 23 athletes in the world top-100 with Jamaica and Japan tied for the second at nine.

Men's 400mH - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points    
1. Bershawn JACKSON 83 USA 1408
2. James CARTER 78 USA 1377
3. L.J. VAN ZYL 85 RSA 1334
3. Naman KEITA 78 FRA 1334
5. Kerron CLEMENT 85 USA 1318
5. Bayano KAMANI 80 PAN 1318
7. Kemel THOMPSON 74 JAM 1306
8. Dai TAMESUE 78 JPN 1301

WOMEN -  Hurdles

100m Hurdles

Just as for the men, the "high hurdles" could be characterized as the most competitive of all events: There was a fairly large but capability-wise tightly bunched group of athletes that faced each other very frequently during the summer. Just look at the finishing orders at the major Golden League/Super Grand Prix/Grand Prix meets in Europe in 2005:

1.7 Paris/St Denis: 1) Hayes, 2) Felicien, 3) Ferga, 4) S Kallur
5.7 Lausanne: 1) Perry, 2) Kirkland, 3) S Kallur, 4) Foster, 5) Ennis
8.7 Rome: 1) Kirkland, 2) Perry, 3) Foster, 4) Bolm, 5) S Kallur
22.7 London: 1) Bolm, 2) Kirkland, 3) Foster, 4) Golding, 5) Felicien, 6) Ennis
26.7 Stockholm: 1) Felicien, 2) Foster, 3) Ferga, 4) Perry, 5) Kirkland, 6) S Kallur
19.8 Zürich: 1) Perry, 2) Foster, 3) Hayes, 4) Felicien
23.8 Linz: 1) Foster, 2) Perry, 3) Bolm, 4) Krasovska, 5) Kirkland, 6) Ennis
4.9 Berlin: 1) Foster, 2) Ennis, 3) Bolm
 0.9 Monaco: 1) Perry, 2) Foster, 3) Ennis, 4) S Kallur, 5) Alozie, 6) Hayes, 7) Felicien

In nine meets there were six different winners, nine different athletes shared the top-3 positions in various orders, and no two races had the same podium!

But although it seems that any athlete could end up in any position in any given race, some were slightly more consistent. Most so Michelle Perry, who in addition to the three victories above also won the World Championships, the World Athletics Final, and the highly competitive US Championships. Overall the ex-heptathlete had a 66% success rate winning 10 out of her 15 competitions, which was especially impressive in view of 2005 being her first ever season as a hurdler on the international scene.

On the other hand the two most recent previous champions – 2003 World titlist Perdita Felicien (CAN) and 2004 Olympic champion Joanna Hayes(USA) – had very much "mixed" seasons with a couple of brilliant wins but also some major failures – notably the World Championships and the World Athletics Final.

This underlines that the hurdles is a highly vibrant event where nothing is for ever and where the competitive intensity is so strong that you have to be on top of your game every day. This situation is also reflected in the fact that the statistical drop compared to the Olympic 2004 was quite marginal in this event.

Women's 100mH (50mH - 55mH - 60mH) - IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points   
1. Michelle PERRY 79 USA 1380
2. Brigitte Ann FOSTER-HYLTON 74 JAM 1357
3. Delloreen ENNIS-LONDON 75 JAM 1339
4. Kirsten BOLM 75 GER 1321
5. Susanna KALLUR 81 SWE 1311
6. Perdita FELICIEN 80 CAN 1307
7. Joanna HAYES 76 USA 1298
8. Anjanette KIRKLAND 74 USA 1293

400m Hurdles

This was an event that suffered quite strongly from post-Olympic blues - and that despite the fact that once more it had the Golden League event status. Out of the top-10 athletes in 2004, two didn't compete at all and four dropped back between 1.65 and 2.04 seconds on their yearly best marks. This is not counting Jana Pittman who due to injury was forced to cut her season short in early July.

The three "survivors" from the 2004 top-10 – Yuliya Pechonkina, Lashinda Demus and Sandra Glover – came to completely dominate the event contributing 23 out of the 26 sub-54 times run in 2005. The only newcomer under 54 seconds was Anna Jesien of Poland but she is no newcomer in the true sense of the word as she at age 26 had been a consistent 55 second performer for some years.

If one is looking for ‘new’ athletes to dip under the true barrier of excellence – 53 seconds – in the near future the obvious candidates are of course Lashinda Demus and Jana Pittman (when healthy). But history has also told us that this is an event of surprising major sudden improvements.

Remember the 1995 World Championships final where Kim Batten and Tonja Buford went from 53.72 and 53.63 respectively all the way down to 52.61 and 52.62. Or remember last year when Sheena Johnson went from 53.54 to 52.95 in the US trials, and Fani Halkia from 53.99 to 52.77 in the Olympics.

However, history has also told us that the event is much tougher to master than was assumed when it was introduced in the late 1970's. Then most pundits expected that the standards would rise quickly to make sub-53 a common occurrence. But sub-54 which was first achieved way back in 1984 has remained world class and actually around 55 flat in the semi-finals has continued to prove sufficient to reach the final at the major championships. This year in Helsinki it took 55.13.

Women's 400mH – IAAF WORLD RANKINGS - as of 12 Dec 2005
Position - Name - DOB - Country - Points   
1. Lashinda DEMUS 83 USA 1402
2. Yuliya NOSOVA-PECHONKINA 78 RUS 1378
3. Sandra CUMMINGS-GLOVER 68 USA 1374
4. Anna OLICHWIERCZUK-JESIEÑ 78 POL 1338
5. Andrea BLACKETT 76 BAR 1296
6. Ma³gorzata PSKIT 76 POL 1279
7. Tetyana TERESHCHUK-ANTIPOVA 69 UKR 1274
8. Xiaoxiao HUANG 83 CHN 1273