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Hemmings and Graham SYDNEY:
OLYMPIC 400 metres hurdles champion Deon Hemmings is in a no-nonsense mood. She is bent on retaining the title she won four years ago in Atlanta and on Sunday issued a warning to her rivals after winning her first round heat in an effortless 55.44 seconds.
On a cold, rainy night with temperatures hovering near 55 degrees Fahrenheit, Hemmings said she had come to Sydney with a far different mindset than she did in Atlanta.
"I am very experienced now and I am hungry. My gold medal is in a vault locked away," Hemmings said. "I haven't looked at it in a long time because I don't want to remember it.
"In my mind, being here is like coming to my first Olympics. It's like I haven't won a medal as yet so I am hungry for one," she said.
Hemmings who lives and trains in Austin, Texas, said she was aware of the enormous task which she faced.
"In Atlanta there were only three of us (Kim Batten and Tonja Buford-Bailey of the United States and herself). We knew it would have been between us, it was just a matter of who would get which medal. Now there are about six of us running similar times. No-one knows who is going to be at their best on the day of the final."
There are still the semi-finals to be run (they were set for last night Jamaica time) but Hemmings, based on the first round heats, will have most to fear from former world champion Nezha Bidoune of Morocco, Cuba's world champion Daimi Pernia, Sandra Glover of the United States and Russia's Irina Privalova. Privalova looked in top shape and said after her race she loved the cold in Sydney.
"Now in Moscow it is 40 degress Fahrenheit. I like this weather. The wind was strong on the turns and then the last 100m - for me it's okay."
Bidoune had the the fastest qualifying time, 55.38 seconds, in winning heat one with Hemmings next and Pernia clocking 55.53. Privalova, a former sprinter who was second in the 200m and third in the 100m at the 1995 World Championships in Athens, hardly came out of a trot in posting 55.89 in her fifth race over the hurdles.
Hemmings was joined in the women's 400m semi-finals by another Jamaican, Catherine Scott-Pomales who was fifth in heat 2 won by Pernia and qualified as one of the six fastest place spots.
Dinsdale Morgan was the only Jamaican to get to the semi-finals of the men's 400 metres hurdles.
Morgan was an automatic qualifier after placing second in first round heat three in 49.64 but Ian Weakley stumbled at the penultimate hurdle and was last in heat 6 in 52.18 seconds. Kemel Thompson was fourth in the fastest heat, 48.98 by Zambia's Samuel Matete, but his 50.40 came up short.
In other action, Jamaica placed three athletes, two men and one woman, in the 400 metres finals (set for early this morning Jamaica time). Gregory Haughton who is now running as well as ever took third spot behind Americans Alvin Harrison 44.53 and defending Olympic champion Michael Johnson, 44.65, in semi-final one.
An incident in heat 2 could however hurt Jamaica's medal propects in the 4x400 metres. Davian Clarke who up till then had looked in perfect shape, fell to the track after 100 metres and stayed there for a long time while being treated by the medical staff at the Olympic Stadium.
The heat was won by American Antonio Pettigrew (45.25) with Jamaica's Danny McFarlane running strongly on to take second in 45.38 to put two Jamaicans in the final for the second straight Games. In Atlanta the finalists were Roxbert Martin who ended up sixth and Clarke who placed seventh.
Lorraine Graham who is bidding to add an Olympic medal to the bronze she earned in Seville last year won heat one of the women's semi-finals in 50.28 seconds beating Britain's Katharine Merry (50.32) but Jamaica's other semi-finalist, the veteran Sandie Richards, was extremely unlucky to be eliminated.
Richards, the Commonwealth champion, ran 50.42 in the second semi-final. That would have gotten her third in the first semi-final but was only good enough for fifth in her race. A very distraught Richards was consoled by some teammates as she sat in the holding area for over 15 minutes. She then left with team physiotherapist Maureen Spence-Campbell.
By Elton Tucker
Assistant Sport Editor
