News22 Feb 2005


South American athletes are ready for World Cross Country Championships

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Peru’s Yessica Quispe winning the 2005 South American Junior Women's Cross Country title (© Consudatle)

Last weekend with one month to go to the 33rd IAAF World Cross Country Championships in Saint-Etienne/Saint-Galmier, France, South America staged the 20th edition of its Area Cross Country Championships, at the Golf Club in Montevideo, Uruguay (19 - 20 Feb).

The course was tough, and so was the heat in the capital of Uruguay, but Colombia, with a small team managed to take 3 individual gold medals, all in the men’s races. Brazil and Peru won 2 golds, and Chile took the other event.

In the team classification, Brazil won 3 events, Peru 2, Argentina, Chile and Ecuador 1 each.

Junior star emerges

Every champion, individual or team, will represent South America at the World Championships, and perhaps the main hope will be Peru’s Yessica Quispe, who last year revealed her great running talent when winning 3 events at the Area Youth Championships in Guayaquil.

Quispe, born in Cusco on 21 June 1987 has personal bests of 2:07.38 (800m), 4:13:53 (1500m) and 9:19.92 (3000m). Last year she only managed to finish 10th in her heat in 1500m at the World Junior Championships, so now, with more experience under her belt, she feels confident.

“I’m very happy because I came here looking for the gold medal. The race went as planned, but I suffered the heat. Now I will go to France with high expectations”, said Quispe.

The only champion to repeat their win from last year was Chile’s Susana Rebolledo in the Women’s short race. Rebolledo was beaten by 1 second by Brazil’s Lucélia Peres in the long race, which proved to be one of the most exciting competitions of the weekend.

Eduardo Biscayart for the IAAF

Results

Men Short (4Km) – 19 Feb
1 Israel dos Anjos BRA 12:07
2 Gernán Schiell ARG 12:11
3 José Alejandro Semprúm VEN 12:13
Teams: 1 BRA, 2 VEN, 3 ARG

Men Long (12Km) – 20 Feb
1 William Naranjo COL 38:50
2 Gílson da Silva BRA 38:53
3 Silvio Guerra ECU 39:13
Teams: 1 ECU, 2 BRA, 3 VEN

Junion Men (8Km) – 20 Feb
1 Jhon Tello COL 27:11
2 Alison Gonçalves BRA 27:34
3 Pablo Mena CHI 27:52
Teams: 1 BRA, 2 URU, 3 ARG

Boys Sub-18 (4Km) – 19 Feb
1 Mauricio González COL 12:55
2 Joaquín Varas CHI 13:00
3 Nahuel Luengo ARG 13:01
Teams: 1 CHI, 2 ARG, 3 URU

Women Short (4Km) – 20 Feb
1 Susana Rebolledo CHI 14:02
2 Sandra Amarillo ARG 14:23
3 Karina Córdoba ARG 14:24
Teams: 1 ARG, 2 CHI, 3 BRA

Women Long (8Km) – 19 Feb
1 Lucélia Peres BRA 29:23
2 Susana Rebolledo CHI 29:24
3 Maria Lúcia Alves Vieira BRA 30:19
Teams: 1 BRA, 2 URU.-

Junior Women (6Km) – 20 Feb
1 Yessica Quispe PER 21:53
2 Inés Melchor PER 22:19
3 Sabine Heitling BRA 22:49
Teams: 1 PER, 2 BRA, 3 ARG

Girls Sub-18 (3Km) – 19 Feb
1 Karina Villasana PER 11:20
2 Tatiane da Silva BRA 11:29
3 Carmen Mamaní PER 11:32
Teams: 1 PER, 2 ARG, 3 URU

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