Young long jumper Jeswin Aldrin got some crucial lessons on how to handle unfavourable conditions while finishing fourth in the Spitzen Leichtathletik meet, a World Athletics Continental Tour (silver) event, in Lucerne (Switzerland) on Tuesday night.
Wet, cold conditions and headwinds spoiled the show as Aldrin — 10th in the world list this year with the 8.26m which came in the Federation Cup in April — managed a last-round 7.82m.
Switzerland’s Simon Ehammer, the bronze medallist at the recent World Championships who has a personal best of 8.45m which came in May, was the only jumper to touch 8m and won the gold while Jamaica’s former World champion Tajay Gayle (7.98) and Greece’s Olympic champion Miltiadis Tentoglou (7.94) took silver and bronze. The top five jumpers achieved their best performance in the last round.
And finishing behind the 20-year-old Aldrin were Indoor Worlds silver medallist Henry Frayne (fifth, 7.77m) and the recent Birmingham Commonwealth Games champion LaQuan Nairn (seventh, 7.62).
Many big names struggled in the adverse conditions. Jamaica’s Olympic champion Elaine Thompson-Herah, the second fastest woman in history with 10.54s, clocked 11.30s for 100m silver behind American Sha’Carri Richardson (11.29).
