Anthony Foster, Freelance Writer
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SINCLAIR
KENIA SINCLAIR broke the Central American & Caribbean (CAC) 800m record again, but placed second to Mozambique's Maria Mutola on her way to handing Jamaica its only medal at the World Indoor Championships, which ended in Moscow, Russia, yesterday.
Sinclair's medal placed Jamaica joint 16th with eight countries. At the last Championships in Budapest, Hungary, Jamaica won one gold (men's 4x400m), two silver (Davian Clarke - 400m, James Beckford - long jump) and two bronze (Germaine Mason - high jump, Maurice Wignall - 60m hurdles).
In breaking her own CAC record mark of 2:00.06 set in Saturday's semi-final, Sinclair's time of 1:59.54 was the first 800m medal for Jamaica at the world level.
She is the first Jamaican to run under two minutes indoors and also to run under one minute, 59 seconds outdoors, and has now broken the CAC record for the third time in 13 months.
Inez Turner, who was Jamaica's dominant female runner over this distance a few years back, reached the final at the World Indoors once.
In yesterday's final Sinclair, who won Saturday's semi-final over Mozambique's Maria Motula, attempted a repeat over the African but the Olympic gold medallist turned the tables by running an impressive season best time of 1:58.90 for victory.
Other Jamaicans Davian Clarke, Novlene Williams and both 4x400m relay teams also failed to medal.
The women's 4x400m relay team of Shellene Williams, Novlene Williams, Moya Thomp-son and Allison Beckford was timed in a national record 3:29.54 seconds, but that was only good enough for fifth, beaten by Russia (3:24.91), the United States (3:28.63), Belarus (3:28.65) and Poland (3:28.95 - national record).
The men's quartet of DeWayne Barrett, Ricardo Williams, Sanjay Ayre and Lansford Spence failed to finish in semi-final one as they dropped the baton.
In the men's 400m, despite running a season best 45.96, Clarke, the silver medallist from Budapest, had to settle for fourth in a race won by defending champion Alleyne Francique of Grenada who ran a season best 45.54. Carlifornia Molefe of Botswana was second in 45.75 while Bahamian Christopher Brown was third in 45.78.
In the women's event, Williams finished fifth in 51.82 seconds.
The race was won in a championship record of 50.04 by Russian Olesya Krasnomovets. Bulgaria's Vania Stambolova was second in a national record 50.21, while Bahamian Christine Amertil (50.34) finished third.
Russia topped the three-day championships with 18 medals (eight gold, five silver and five bronze) ahead of the United States - 13 (seven gold, four silver and two bronze) and Ethiopia - two (two gold).
