Clydeen Mc Don­ald

BEI­JING Olympic sil­ver medal­list Richard Thomp­son will chal­lenge reign­ing World Cham­pi­on Tyson Gay of the USA and for­mer world record hold­er Asafa Pow­ell of Ja­maica for a place in the fi­nal of the men's 100 me­tres at the 12th IAAF World Cham­pi­onships in Ath­let­ics takes place in Berlin, Ger­many, to­day. The na­tion­al cham­pi­on over the dis­tance will face the pair in the first of two semi­fi­nal at 1.10 pm T&T time. Oth­er sprint­er, who will aim for one of the four qual­i­fy­ing spots in semi­fi­nal one are Great Britain 100m cham­pi­on Dwain Cham­bers and Michael Frater of Ja­maica.

For­mer na­tion­al cham­pi­on Marc Burns will al­so face a tough task to qual­i­fy for the medal run. Burns will line up against three-time Olympic gold medal­list and world record hold­er Us­ain Bolt of Ja­maica and his train­ing part­ner Daniel Bai­ley of An­tigua & Bar­bu­da in the sec­ond semi­fi­nal. Thomp­son, earn his place in the semi­fi­nal af­ter he clocked 10.08 sec­onds, the ninth fastest time of the quar­ter­fi­nal round, to place sec­ond to Cham­bers (10.04) in quar­ter­fi­nal heat one. Third place in the race, which was run in­to a head­wind, (-0.7 me­ters a sec­onds) went to France's Mar­tial Mband­jock (10.08), who will al­so run in the first semi­fi­nal.

Run­ning in the third quar­ter­fi­nal Burns clocked a time of 10.12 for third place in a race, which was won by Pow­ell in 9.95, while Amer­i­can Darvis Pat­ton se­cured sec­ond place in 10.05. T&T third com­peti­tor in the event Em­manuel Cal­len­der failed to qual­i­fy for the next round af­ter plac­ing sev­enth in quar­ter­fi­nal heats five with a time of 10.27. Bai­ley won the heat in 10.02 with Bolt sec­ond in 10.03 and Amer­i­can Mon­za­vous Ed­wards third in 10.15.

Gor­don sets na­tion­al record

Two-time Pan Amer­i­can sil­ver medal­list Je­hue Gor­don smashed the 22-year-old na­tion­al record in men's 400m hur­dles to se­cure a place in the semi­fi­nal of the event, which will take, place to­day at 2.15 pm. The na­tion­al cham­pi­on re­turned a time of 48.66 to sur­pass the old mark of 49.43 set by Randy Cox in 1987 as he fin­ished third in heat three.

First place in the event went to T&T born, Amer­i­can Ker­ron Clement in 48.39 with Ja­maica's Dan­ny Mac Far­lane sec­ond in 48.65. Gor­don, who now the youngest ever com­peti­tor in the event at the Cham­pi­onship, fin­ished ahead of the Do­mini­can Re­pub­lic's two-time world cham­pi­on in the event Fe­lix Sanchez, who was fourth in 48.76. Gor­don's time is al­so the fourth fastest time of all time run by a ju­nior.