Jackson just missed Florence Griffith’s record in 200m gold medal run
The Jamaican took the gold of the 200 with 21.45... eleven hundredths of the world record set 34 years ago. Silver for Fraser-Pryce, bronze for Asher Smith.
The trio of Jamaican women who took the podium of the 100m at the World Championships in Eugene arrived at the start of the 200 final with the firm intention of repeating. Aside them, three more sprinters who were looking to medal: the Brit Dina Asher-Smith, current world champion, and Americans Abby Steiner and Tamara Clark. The stands were divided in cheers. There was more of a North Americans presence, but there more noise coming from Jamaicans. After the starting gun two Jamaicans emerged and advanced at superlative speed, leaving the rest behind in their sprint for the gold medal: Shericka Jackson and Shelly-Ann Frasher-Pryce.
The petite 35-year-old sprinter (152 centimeters), 100m world champion and now with twelve world medals (ten gold and two silver) plus eight Olympic medals (three gold, four silver and one bronze) I saw that this time Jackson (28 years old) was unapproachable. The silver in the 100 and the gold in the 200 are her seventh medals in World Championships, a success she reached with a prodigious mark of 21.45, record for the championships and second best mark of all time, eleven hundredths of a second off the world record set by Florence Griffith in 1988. Eugene was close to breaking that mythical number set 34 years ago.
In addition, Jackson breaks three consecutive world championships for Europe (Schippers 2015 and 2017, and Asher-Smith 2019) to return the gold to Jamaica, the fifth in its history in the 200: 1993, 1995, 2011 , 2013 and 2022. The silver went to the aforementioned Fraser-Pryce (21.81), who runs with different colored wigs depending on her mood, and the bronze went to Asher-Smith with (22.02). There was no hat-trick like in the 100, but Jamaica continues to show that their sprinters continue to dominate. Bet on another gold for Jamaica