Tori Bowie, Asbel Kiprop, Ameer Webb Put on a Show in Doha

Tori Bowie, Asbel Kiprop, Ameer Webb Put on a Show in Doha

The 2016 Diamond League circuit kicked off in Doha with stunning results. Tori Bowie defeated Dafne Schippers in the women’s 100m to wow the stadium with a b

May 6, 2016 by Meg Bellino
Tori Bowie, Asbel Kiprop, Ameer Webb Put on a Show in Doha
The 2016 Diamond League circuit kicked off in Doha with stunning results.

Tori Bowie defeated Dafne Schippers in the women’s 100m to wow the stadium with a blistering 10.80 (+0.7). 

Bowie, the reigning World bronze medalist, defeated Schippers (who took silver in Beijing) by .03 seconds. The mark is the fastest 100m ever run this early in a season and tied her personal best. Though early, the win over Schippers certainly inserts Bowie’s name into the Olympic conversation. She finished third at the world championships last summer in the 100m behind Schippers and Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, the 2008 and 2012 Olympic champion. Fraser-Pryce has yet to debut in the 100m in 2016 but has not opened up her outdoor season with a sub-11.00 mark since 2011. If she's able to replicate today's performance later this summer, the 25-year-old Bowie could make Rio her first of many golds. 

Asbel Kiprop made 3:32.15 look easy. Video evidence of this claim below.

The pacemaker took the reigning world champion through 800m in 1:51.34 and by 1200m Kiprop had moved into the lead. He slowed down to wave at the fans, so don’t let the seemingly close runner-up time of 3:33.67 make you think this was anything but a massive victory. It will be very hard to defeat this man in 2016.

Omar McLeod, 22, won the men's 110m hurdle race in a blazing 13.05 (+1.4) over fellow Jamaican Hansle Parchment (13.10) and Spain's Orlando Ortega (13.12). McLeod has been on a tear since winning the 60m hurdles at Portland's World Indoor Championships. The former Arkansas NCAA champ recently ran a wind-legal 9.99 in the 100m, making him the first man to ever break 10 seconds in the 100m and 13 seconds in the 110m hurdles. Will youth trump experience this summer in Rio? McLeod also defeated David Oliver (13.16) and World record-holder Aries Merritt (13.37). Merritt's time is promising, however, as he underwent a kidney transplant on September 1. He debuted at the Drake Relays last weekend in 13.61, a quarter second slower than what he ran in Doha.

McLeod was one of two former Arkansas Razorbacks who grabbed a Diamond League victory in Doha. Sandi Morris leaped to a new outdoor PB in the pole vault with a jump of 4.83m. With that mark she broke the Doha meeting record and tied the overall Diamond League record set by Nikoleta Kiriakopoulou in 2015. ​

Morris' only losses of 2016 come from the World Indoor Championships (where Morris took silver behind reigning Olympic champion Jenn Suhr) and the Millrose Games, where she fell to third behind Katerina Stefanidi and Demi Payne. Considering that she defeated each of these three women at last summer's World Championships, Morris continues to make a case for herself as an Olympic contender.

The men's 200m dash wasn't a terribly deep field, but the results proved impressive. Ameer Webb, the 2013 NCAA Indoor and Outdoor 200m champion while at Texas A&M, won in 19.85 (+1.9). In 2015, Webb only finished sixth at the U.S. Championships and had yet to break 10 seconds in the 100m or 20 seconds in the 200m. Since moving to Phoenix to join the group at ALTIS, he set a massive PB and World lead at the Mt. SAC Relays (19.91) and grabbed his first major victory today in Doha.

Watch Ameer Webb run 19.91 at the Mt. SAC Relays