NATIONAL POST
(Photo: Perdita Felicien, left, and Priscilla Lopes-Schliep, right, will start their quest for the podium on Tuesday with the 100m hurdle heats. Brett Gundlock/National Post)
The Canadian team at this year’s world track and field championships in Berlin has been the victim of a few too many bad breaks.
Kevin Sullivan (1,500 metres) is nursing an injured Achilles tendon, while heptathlete Jessica Zelinka took time off to have a baby.
Medal hopeful Tyler Christopher (400 metres) surprisingly failed to achieve the qualifying standard and has noticeably struggled after both of his coaches defected to United Kingdom Athletics this year.
Canada won’t field a female athlete in the middle distances as 1,500 specialist Malindi Elmore couldn’t make the cut. Nonetheless, head coach Alex Gardiner is optimistic Team Canada can capture at least two medals in Berlin.
Here are the likely candidates:
Priscilla Lopes-Schliep
Event: 100-metre hurdles (Tuesday, heats; Wednesday, semis and final)
Hometown: Whitby, Ont.
Lopes-Schliep’s performance is peaking at a good time; the Olympic bronze medallist ran a personal best of 12.51 in Sweden two weeks ago. She has three times in the year’s 10 best, and appears to be well-ahead of teammate Perdita Felicien. Lopes-Schliep is the biggest threat to America’s Lolo Jones gold-medal run, but she might need to break the Canadian record to get there.
Perdita Felicien
Event: 100-metre hurdles
Hometown: Pickering, Ont.
Felicien is no stranger to the podium at the worlds. In 2003 in Paris, she became the first Canadian female to win a world gold medal in track and field. She returned in 2007 to win silver in Osaka. However, this is her first major international meet since injuring her foot last year, an injury that also kept her from competing in the Olympics. Felicien did beat Lopes-Schliep when they raced at the Festival of Excellence in June in Toronto.
Dylan Armstrong
Event: Shot put (Saturday)
Hometown: Kamloops, B.C.
At the 2008 Olympics, Armstrong set the Canadian record with a throw of 21.04 metres and just missed the podium in Beijing, finishing fourth. If he can push himself to outdo Andrei Mikhevich of Belarus, who took bronze by only a centimetre last year, he will have a chance to medal for Canada in Berlin. But in 2009 so far, Armstrong has yet to throw more than 21 metres.
Gary Reed
Event: 800 metres (Thursday, heats; Friday, semis; Saturday, final)
Hometown: Kamloops, B.C.
Reed, 28, won his event at the London Grand Prix in July and ran a near personal-best of 1:43.95 at the meet in Athens. He is one of Canada’s two medal winners from the last world championships and is a seasoned veteran when it comes to international competition. But youth may not be on his side — two of the race favourites recently turned 20. Like Armstrong, he finished fourth in the Olympics and is looking for redemption.
COMMENT
Alex Gardiner is not surprisingly, showing optimism in his role of head coach of “Maple Leaf ” squad in Berlin. Not many sites predictive of the World Championships results, agree with him. Some predict one medal but most feel Canada will be without any medal. I think the public should judge our athletes on whether they improve on their ranking on the start list. This is a so called +/- system. If you rank 25 on the start list and you finish at 20th , you have gained 5 spots. Your score would be +5. If another Canadian is rank 12th and ends up 16th,his or her score would be -4. If this is done for every Canadian on the team, we get an accurate indication as to whether our team performed above or below expectation. Our team’s performance is not judged by medals alone, but whether held their ranking or performed below their ranking. i.e. is our accumlative +/- score a positive or negative number ?
I personally would be ecstatic with any medals or if an athlete can move up from their ranking!
Doug Clement
PS
Is LoLo Jones on the US? I do not think so!
