John Godina of the United States on Saturday won his third world championship shot-put gold medal, and Roman Rasskazov led a trio of Russian medallists in the 20-kilometre walk.
But the two finals were upstaged by other events. Two-time defending 100m champion Maurice Greene sent a warning to his rivals with a supersprint of 9.88 seconds as he geared up for a title hat trick after earlier wins in 1997 and 1999. Then the IAAF world governing body embarrassed itself by having to reinstate Russian runner Olga Yegorova because its examination method that revealed a positive doping test last month was not a valid one.
Yegorova will run in 5,000m, which might prompt reigning world and Olympic champion Gabriela Szabo to boycott the event. In the medal events, the veteran Godina shocked the opposition with a put of 21.87m in his first of six attempts, which proved to be good enough to add a third gold and $ 60,000 to his titles from 1995 and 1997.
Adams had 21.24m for silver and $ 30,000, and Olympic champion Arsi Harju of Finland had to settle for bronze and $ 20,000 with a personal season best of 20.93. The former junior world champion Rasskazov added the regular world title in the IAAF with 1:20:33 hours. He beat defending champion Ilya Markov for the gold by two seconds, with Viktor Burayev grabbing bronze five seconds behind the winner.
Bureau Report