Eunice Sum wins her 800m heat at the IAAF World Championships, Beijing 2015 (© Getty Images)
The defending champion Eunice Sum exuded confidence in the first round of the competition while the champion from 2009, Caster Semenya, looked ready for a major comeback.
The qualifying formula for the first round was that the top three athletes in each heat plus the six next fastest times would go through to the semi-finals.
The first heat was one for the history books and saw the 2015 Asian champion Tintu Lukka, from India, being aggressive right from the start, taking the pack through the first lap in a swift 57.06. It left the athlete, who has yet to run a sub-2:00 race this season, struggling to stay on her feet with 200 metres to go, but kept the competition on a fast pace.
Last year’s European champion, from Belarus, Marina Arzamasova and Great Britain’s Lynsey Sharp were more conservative on the first lap, and broke away from the pack, finishing first and second in 1:58.69 and 1:58.98, respectively.
Arzamasova’s time is the fastest first-round time in the history of the World Championships.
Notably, Semenya, had a killer final spurt and finished third, closing from far behind. The South African clocked her fastest time since 2013, 1:59.59.
The reigning champion, Kenya’s Eunice Sum, had a confident showing in her opening race in Beijing She led from the gun to the finish line in the second heat, clocking 1:59.67.
In the same race, Sifan Hassan, coming off of a bronze medal performance in the 1500m on Tuesday, finished third in 1:59.94 and captured an automatic qualifying spot.
USA’s 2013 world championships bronze medallist Brenda Martinez almost condemned herself to hoping to qualify by time in the third heat.
Canada’s Fiona Benson and the Kiwi Angie Pettie, the leaders through two-thirds of the race, weren’t leaving Martinez any space for manoeuvre for her finishing spurt.
The miniature Moroccan Rababe Arafi, however, found a gap and broke away, finishing first with a personal best of 2:00.37. Martinez had to work hard but took third in a blanket finish in 2:00.54, 0.01 behind Benson.
Another team USA representative, experienced Alysia Montano, had an even worse luck.
She got tangled up in competitors’ legs on the second lap of here race, while in strong contention for a top-three finish. The American fell and was nowhere near the leaders after getting back up. The victory in this heat went to Germany’s Fabienne Kohlmann in 2:01.42.
Poland’s 19-year-old Sofia Ennaoui, in her first ever world championships appearance, demonstrated an enviable composure. The teenager ran away from a group of faster rivals on the home stretch.
Ennaoui won the race in 2:01.16, followed home in a tight finish by Cuba’s Rose Mary Almanza and Slovakia Lucia Klocova, which has the effect of edging Kenya’s 2007 world champion Janeth Jepkosgei out of the three automatic qualifying spots and, eventually, the semi-final.
In the last heat of the morning, Canada’s Melissa Bishop showed her tactical prowess. She reacted to Selina Buchel’s spurt, finding the tiniest space between Switzerland’s European indoor champion and the leader Jennifer Meadows, to go past both of them and win the race in 2:00.23.
Buchel was second in 2:00.25 and although Meadows faded to fourth, Morocco’s Malilika Akkaoui splitting them, the Briton still ran a fast enough time, 2:00.70, to advance to the semi-final.
Elena Dyachkova for the IAAF
