LONDON — Tirunesh Dibaba broke away from the field with a lap and half to go to create history after she became the first woman to win back-to-back Olympic 10,000m titles on day one of track and field action at Olympic Games in London on Friday night.
The Ethiopian pulled away from a small group with 600m left in the race, and then opened the gap even further with 400m left with a big burst of speed – on her way to easing to the 30:20.75 victory.
“I’ve never been happier than today,” Dibaba was quoted as saying after the race.
“This is very special. I have worked very hard for this.
“Ethiopians gave me a lot of responsibility and I was worried about that because I was not in my best form.”
Kenyan pair of Sally Jepkosgei Kipyego and Vivian Cheruiyot, who won the 5000 and 10,000m double at last year’s World Championships in Daegu, South Korea finished second and third with respective personal best times of 30:26.37 and 30:30.44.
In the other final on the opening day of track and field action, Poland’s Tomasz Majewski became only the third man in history to win two Olympic Shot Put titles, following his achievement in London.
The 2008 Beijing champion defended his title with a final round seasonal best effort of 21.89m to become the first man since American Parry O’Brien – in 1952/56 – to successfully defend the honors.
The silver medal went to Germany’s David Storl (21.86m) and USA’s Reese Hoffa (21.23m).
Jessica Ennis had a superb day one in the women’s heptathlon and she leads the event with a score of 4158 points. She leads Lithuania’s Austra Skujyte (3974) and Canada’s Jessica Zelinka (3903).
Youngster Katarina Johnson-Thompson of Great Britain had a wonderful start after two events to the competition, but had a poor Shot Put and fell from 3rd to 14th at the end of the day.
