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| June 24, 2005 | Friday | Jumadi-ul-Awwal 16, 1426 |
Gatlin gears up for Powell clash
CARSON (California), June 23: Olympic champion Justin Gatlin is looking forward to a July 8 rematch with new 100 metre world record holder Asafa Powell, the first time the pair will meet since the Jamaican set the 9.77 second mark.
“I know I am going to meet him in Rome,” Gatlin told reporters at a news conference on the eve of the four-day US championships in suburban Los Angeles.
“There are two things in sport all kids want to do,” the 23-year-old Gatlin said.
“Break the world record and be an Olympic champion.
“I have the Olympic gold, he has the world record, so it is going to play out very well, hopefully at the worlds (in Helsinki in August).”
The two have already met once this year with Gatlin coming from behind to edge Powell in the June 4 Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon.
Both were clocked at 9.84 seconds in the wind-assisted race.
“I am the Olympic champion and I had to show everybody I am the greatest,” Gatlin said at the time.
Now, however, Gatlin is the one doing the chasing after Powell became the world’s fastest man in Athens on June 14.
“It was a very great race,” Gatlin said. “From 40 metres out, he took control and that’s how you should run the 100 metres.”
After the Rome rematch, the two are likely to meet again in London on July 22 and maybe in Stockholm on July 26.
According to his agent Renaldo Nehemiah, Gatlin has London and Stockholm on his racing schedule.
“Asafa will run Rome, London and one other meet, perhaps Stockholm, before the world championships,” Powell’s agent Paul Doyle said by telephone.
Gatlin also felt that Powell could fail to perform under pressure, like he did when flopping at last year’s Olympics after lining up for the final as favourite.
“Can he do it in a race where Maurice Greene, Justin Gatlin and Shawn Crawford are in the same race?” Gatlin asked, adding that he hoped the season would bring an opportunity for the four to meet again.
The Athens 100 metres gold medallist and 200 metres bronze medallist will first attempt to secure a spot on the US world championships team in both events this weekend, before turning his attention to the European circuit beginning on July 5 with a 100 metres race in Lausanne.
Also on his mind is the world record, which he believed was within his grasp at the Olympic final had he not began celebrating internally about 20 metres from the finish.
He wound up with a lifetime best of 9.85 seconds despite having the slowest reaction time in the race.
Powell finished fifth in 9.94.
The season has started slowly for Gatlin.
He literally did not have a track to train on for more than two months because of a dispute between his coach, Trevor Graham, and North Carolina State University, where Graham’s group had previously trained.
Then recurring hamstring problems slowed Gatlin’s progress and he did not run his first individual race until the Prefontaine Classic.
His only 200 metres came in Monterrey, Mexico, a week later.
Now Gatlin has a bigger challenge, making the US team.
Two years ago, he ranked among the favourites in the 100 metres at the US trials for the Paris world championships but failed advance beyond the first round.
It is a moment Gatlin has not forgotten, even as he thinks of ways of breaking Powell’s world record.—Reuters
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