15 May 2015

The first IAAF Diamond League meeting of 2015 is held tonight in Doha with many British athletes competing including double Olympic, world and European champion Mo Farah (coach: Alberto Salazar).

The 32 year-old will face a strong field in the opening stage of the 14 event series. After setting an indoor world record of 8:03.40 over two miles in February, Farah will take on the likes of World 5000m silver medallist Hagos Gebrhriwet and Yenew Alamirew over this distance in Qatar, where he will be aiming to make a solid start to his outdoor season.

Farah told the IAAF Diamond League website: “My aim is to come out here and test myself. I’m excited. It’s good to get a good early race and test yourself against these guys to see where you are at, and find out where they’re at. I want to get that racing feeling again. (The world championships) aren’t that far away.”

Fellow European champions Tiffany Porter (Rana Reider) (100m hurdles) and James Dasaolu (Steve Fudge) (100m) will also take to the track in the Middle East. After a swift 12.56 season best in Clermont last month, Porter is the second quickest in the field this year behind the American Jasmin Stowers who ran 12.39 in Jamaica last week. Dasaolu will open his season in the 100m against the reigning Diamond Race 100m champion Justin Gatlin, Nesta Carter and Kim Collins who went unbeaten during the indoor season.

Britain is well-represented in the long jump with 2012 World Indoor bronze medallist Shara Proctor (Rana Reider) making only her second appearance of the season after jumping 6.77m in Clermont last month. Lorraine Ugen (Shawn Jackson) also joins the strong field which contains 2014 Diamond Race winner in the event, Tianna Bartoletta and Olympic champion Brittany Reese.  

Commonwealth 200m bronze medallist Bianca Williams (Lloyd Cowan) competes over 200m after running 11.61 over 100m at the Great CityGames in Manchester last weekend. Jack Green (Loren Seagrave) continues his comeback over the 400m hurdles. Isobel Pooley (Fuzz Ahmed) and Max Eaves (self-coached) will contest the high jump and pole vault respectively at the Hamad Bin Suhaim Stadium. 

Among the international contingent competing in Doha are reigning Olympic 400m champion Sanya Richards-Ross in the 400m taking on a strong field including fellow American Francena McCorory and Jamaican Novlene Williams-Mills. World 1500m Champion Abeba Aregawi and European 1500m Champion Sifan Hassan go head-to-head over the distance and reignite their duels during the 2014 season. 

2014 Diamond race winners Sandra Perkovic and Reese Hoffa will begin their campaigns to defend those titles in the women’s discus and men’s shot put respectively. 

You can find live coverage of the meet on British Eurosport 2 from 17:00 today. You can also watch highlights on BBC One from 13:00-14:00 on Saturday 16 May. Follow live updates this evening via the British Athletics Twitter feed @BritAthletics