30 January 2015

Lawrence Clarke (coach: Malcolm Arnold) executed the perfect dip to snatch victory from a stellar field at the PSD Bank Meeting in Dusseldorf on Thursday evening. After safely booking his spot in the final with a 7.74 clocking for third in his heat, Clarke was in the mix all the way in the final, eventually prevailing after a photo-finish. His winning time of 7.63 is not only a personal best, but inside the British Athletics European Indoor Championship qualifying mark of 7.65.

In the closest event of the evening, European 100m champion James Dasaolu (Steve Fudge) ran 6.52 in the 60m for second place, his time was the same as winner Kim Collins but they were separated by just thousandths of a second.

Earlier Dasaolu advanced to the final with ease despite a very slow start. He sat in the blocks after a faulty start saw the field awarded the green card, but came through strongly for second in 6.59. In the first of the two heats, Danny Talbot (Dan Cossins) also got left in the blocks, but again moved through the field for fourth in 6.71. It wasn’t enough for a final spot but brought the European Indoor Championships qualifying time of 6.60 into sight.

In a messy 800m race that saw two early fallers, Andrew Osagie (Craig Winrow) finished strongly to take third place, although he may be slightly disappointed with his 1.49.21 time.

The men’s 1500m was arguably more chaotic than the 800m, with the pacemaker going off quickly and leaving the pack to run a cagey race with numerous changes in pace. In the end, Charlie Grice (Jon Bigg) ran into heavy traffic and pushing with 300m to go but still closed strongly to finish seventh in 3.43.61, just short of the British Athletic European Indoor Championship qualifying mark.

Jonny Hay (Mick Woods) placed eighth in a very strong men’s 3000m race, running a time of 8:04.65 as Kenyan Nixon Chepseba took the victory in a world leading 7:44.72.