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• 03 / 13 / 2010

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With the well-known spectacularity that World Athletics Championships arouse, in indoor tracks this time, the city of Doha, Qatar, will first host a showcase of this magnitude from March 12-14, for which 150 nations have already confirmed participation, record for the event that celebrates its 14th birthday.

Cuba will lean again on a small delegation of 13 members, which includes top figures, led by Olympic 110m hurdles champion Dayron Robles, World triple jump champion Yargelis Savigne, and the medallists at the 2008 Valencia Championship, David Giralt (silver in triple jump) and Anay Tejeda (bronze in 60m hurdles).

Cuba’s second great hope will be two-time world outdoor triple jump champion Yargelis Savigne, who will go in pursuit of repeating her indoor crown in Valencia two years ago.

The Guantanamo jumper has a 14.84m in the current world ranking, posted in Dusseldorf, Germany, on February 3, mark that places her ahead of the list, meanwhile, her teammate Mabel Gay, world runner-up in Berlin 2009, should increase her 14.28 in Madrid if she hopes to include herself among the medallists.

Once again key pieces to climb onto the podium will be triple jumpers David Giralt and Yoandris Betanzos.

It’s good to clear up that Cuba did not decide its two representatives (the maximum fee per country) until the last minute, because though Alexis Copello was in another good season, his jumps were relatively lower than Betanzos’s 17.30 and Giralt’s 17.27.

Another trump card will be world runner-up and Olympic bronze Leonel Suarez, who improved his BP in hepthalon (5964) by five points and won the right to represent the island, ahead of his teammates Yordanis García and Yunior Diaz.

As regards the rest of the delegation, we should follow hurdler Anay Tejeda, who little by little has increased her performance —she clocked 7.95 last weekend— and can be among the medallists, because of her competitive quality, as it happened two years ago, when she surprisingly placed third in the 60m hurdles.

Although jumper Wilfredo Martinez stretched to 8.18 meters, he’ll have to do it much more if he seeks to make the podium, as well as shot putters Misleydis Gonzalez and Mailin Vargas, with more chances for the first, who accumulates a fourth place clinched two years ago.

60m sprinter David Lescay is still very far from thinking to emulate the gold of Andres Simon in 1989, but we’ll find it encouraging to see how far he can force ahead, as well as William Collazo in the 400m race, a modality of a lot of quality in the world.  

But something does look certain; Cuba won’t slip by in the upcoming world showcase.

Source: Cubasí