22 August 2013

With the biennial IAAF World Championships over for another two years, the focus for athletics fans worldwide will switch back to the IAAF Diamond League, which resumes in Stockholm this evening. With three races to go in this year’s diamond race, there is still all to play for in a number of events.

One of the events which will go down to the wire is the women’s long jump, where Shara Proctor (coach: Rana Reider) currently lies in third place, just one point adrift of joint leaders Brittney Reese and Blessing Okagbare. Unfortunately for Porter, the long jump in Stockholm isn’t part of the diamond race, so she will have to wait until the finale in Zurich to try and snatch a last gasp victory.

William Sharman (Jerzy Maciukiewicz) will take on a strong field in the 110m hurdles, as he looks to close the gap on overall leader David Oliver. Sharman is currently ranked seventh in the overall standings, but after an impressive fifth place finish at the IAAF World Championships he will be looking to close the four point gap to event leader Oliver. The 110m hurdles diamond race will draw to a close at the Zurich meeting in seven days’ time, and Sharman should be right in the mix.

Off the back of her first ever sub-55 clocking, Meghan Beesley (Nick Dakin) will line up in the women’s 400mH alongside newly crowned world champion Zuzana Hejnova. Beesley is clearly in the form of her life, having run a personal best to finish sixth in her semi-final in Moscow, and will be looking to lower that even further tonight.

Nigel Levine (Linford Christie) and Shana Cox (George Williams) are both in action in the men’s and women’s 400m respectively. Levine will line up in lane seven, whilst 4x400m relay bronze medallist Cox goes in lane one.

World championships semi-finalist James Ellington (Reider) competes over 200m, while fellow Moscow semi-finalist Marilyn Okoro (Johnny Gray) will compete over 800m.

There is also GB & NI representation in the men’s middle distance events, with European Indoor 800m bronze medallist Mukhtar Mohammed (Mustafa Mohamed/John Nuttall) and Richard Strachan (Christie) lining up in the rarely run 600m, whilst British junior indoor 1500m record holder Matt McLaughlin (Ayo Falola) goes in the 1500m ‘B’ race.

Chris Tomlinson (Rana Reider) is the final British athlete in action, and he lines up in a long jump competition that features all three medallists from Moscow last week.

Tune in to BBC3 at 7pm to catch all the action, or alternatively follow @BritAthletics on twitter for live updates throughout the evening.