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Key events
Men’s 400m hurdles: We are gearing up for our first event of the evening session. Five heats with nine athletes each. The first four of each heat will go to qualifiers and the four fastest times will qualify straight to the semi-finals.
The USA’s Benjamin Rai, who won gold in this event in Paris, is in the fourth heat. GB’s Alastair Chalmers, Seamus Derbyshire and Tyri Donovan are also taking part.
Men’s 200m: Gout Gout is the name on everyone’s mind in Tokyo and the Australian said his legs are “ready to rumble” ahead of his debut at these championships on Wednesday.
“[My legs will] be ready to go, like in F1 when the cars are warming up the tyres,” he said, making a swerving gesture with his hands. “They’ll be just … ready to rumble, that’s what they’d say.”
Brit watch: Some unfortunate news from Toyko overnight as medal hopes Molly Caudery and Emile Cairess were forced out of their respective events.
Caudery sustained an ankle injury in the warmup before pole vault qualifying, while Cairess – who finished fourth in the Paris Olympic marathon – battled through heat and humidity before bowing out in the 38th kilometre as a result of the muggy conditions.
Last week, World Athletics announced that road event start times on the first three days of competition would be moved forward by half an hour, to 7.30am local time, as a response to concerns over athlete welfare after forecasts of high temperatures and humidity.
Cairess said: “I tried my best. I feel I just got too hot, simple as that really, conditions were so tough, it’s just really hot. When I stopped, I just took ages to just feel all right again. I’ve cooled down now, but it took a while.
“I used all the stations to be diligent with the ice and the sponges and while it helped, it just still got too hot. I felt pretty good the first 25km and then 30km I was still feeling good and then about 32km I just really suddenly didn’t feel very good any more.
“I did a decent amount of prep for the conditions, as much as I could balancing it with training. I’ve not known conditions like it, but this is only my fourth marathon. Paris was a hot one but it was more warm and this was very, very humid. I did the best I could.”
The temperature was already 26C with 68% humidity at the marathon’s start, rising to 28C with 54% humidity by the time the event concluded at 10.04am.
Caudery, the 2024 world indoor champion and ranked fourth heading to Japan, was seeking redemption after a disastrous Olympic debut in Paris, when she crashed out of the qualification session with a no mark.
A British Athletics statement read: “Unfortunately, Molly Caudery has been forced to withdraw from pole vault qualifying following an ankle injury sustained in warm-up.”
It will come as particularly devastating news for the 25-year-old, who vowed to learn from her Olympic mistakes. In Paris, Caudery was the only entrant who elected to skip the 4.40 metres height attempt, electing to enter at 4.55.
It was a decision that proved costly when she failed to clear the bar with her three tries, particularly after it turned out 4.40 was all it took for nine other women to advance. She cleared 4.85 metres at the British championships last month. PA Media
Men’s marathon: As we await today’s action, let’s run through what took place in the morning session/overnight. Alphonce Felix Simbu snatched gold in the first photo-finish at a major championship marathon edging out Germany’s Amanal Petros in a dramatic race to the line to give Tanzania its maiden world title.
The photo-finish showed the race was decided by three hundredths of a second as Simbu surged past the diving Petros at the line, closer than the 0.05-second gap between the gold and silver medallists in the men’s 100m final the day before.
Simbu and Petros were given the same time of two hours, nine minutes and 48 seconds, the German taking the silver despite heading the field as the leaders entered Tokyo’s National Stadium. Italy’s Iliass Aouani took the bronze in 2:09.53.
“When we entered the stadium, I was not sure if I would win,” the 33-year-old Simbu said. “I did not know if I had won. But when I saw the video screens and me on the top of the results, I felt relieved. I made history today – the first Tanzanian gold medal at a world championships.”
The finish was closer than at the 2001 championships in Edmonton, when Ethiopia’s Gezahegne Abera beat Kenya’s Simon Biwott by a single second. South Africa’s Josia Thugwane won the closest Olympic men’s marathon by three seconds against South Korea’s Lee Bong-ju at the 1996 Atlanta Games.
It was a first global title for Simbu, who won bronze in the marathon at the London world championships in 2017 and finished second in the Boston marathon in April.
Ethiopia’s Tadese Takele and Deresa Geleta, who took gold and silver at the Tokyo city marathon in March, dropped off with less than 10km to go. The race was wide open for much of the distance, with a couple of dozen runners in the leading cluster 90 minutes in. The pack then gradually thinned out as some faded in the morning heat, leaving Simbu, Petros and Aouani clear of the field coming into the stadium. Petros was in the lead to take take the title until Simbu found a late kick and ran him down at the line.
“It’s like the 100 metres,” said Petros. “Coming into the finish I was thinking about winning so a bit of me is feeling very sad. But I have to accept it. As an athlete you have to learn for tomorrow, train hard, keep going and be thankful for the silver.”
Preamble
Hello and welcome to our live coverage of the world championships in Tokyo where a gripping day three awaits us.
Four more gold medals are to be handed out in today’s evening session: men’s pole vault, women’s hammer throw, men’s 3000m steeplechase and women’s 100m hurdles.
And as always, if you have any predictions, queries or thoughts on any of the events, send me an email.
Today’s schedule
It is 6.30pm JST 10.30 am in Tokyo at the moment and here is what is scheduled for the evening session:
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11.35am BST / 7.35pm JST – men’s 400m hurdles – heats
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11.40am BST / 7.40pm JST – men’s long jump – qualification
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11:49am BST / 7.49pm JST – men’s pole vault – final
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12.23pm BST / 8.23pm JST – men’s 110m hurdles – heats
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1pm BST / 9pm JST – women’s hammer throw – final
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1.06pm BST/ 9.06pm JST – women’s 100m hurdles – semi-final
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1.30pm BST / 9.30pm JST – men’s 1500m – semi-final
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1.55pm BST / 9.55pm JST – men’s 3000m steeplechase – final
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2.20pm BST / 10.20pm JST – women’s 100m hurdles – final
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