Ostrava Golden Spike Preview: Christian Coleman's First 200m In Two Years

Ostrava Golden Spike Preview: Christian Coleman's First 200m In Two Years

Christian Coleman in 200m and Shaunae Miller-Uibo in the 300m highlight the 2019 Ostrava Golden Spike meet this Thursday.

Jun 19, 2019 by Lincoln Shryack
Ostrava Golden Spike Preview: Christian Coleman's First 200m In Two Years
While the Diamond League takes a week off before the Pre Classic on June 30, there is still elite track and field to be found as a bounty of stars will compete on Thursday in the Czech Republic at the Ostrava Golden Spike. Christian Coleman will run his first 200m since 2017, while Shaunae Miller-Uibo will chase a 300m world best.

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While the Diamond League takes a week off before the Pre Classic on June 30, there is still elite track and field to be found as a bounty of stars will compete on Thursday in the Czech Republic at the Ostrava Golden Spike. Christian Coleman will run his first 200m since 2017, while Shaunae Miller-Uibo will chase a 300m world best.

Here are the five events to watch in Ostrava:

Men’s 200m: Christian Coleman’s First 200m In Two Years

100m world leader Christian Coleman insists that he plans to double in the 100m and 200m at the World Championships, and that bold proclamation will become a lot more legitimate if the 23-year-old can run close to his 19.85 PB on Thursday in Ostrava. The 60m world record holder hasn’t run a 200m in nearly two years, his last a runner-up finish at USAs in 2017, but he should be in line to post a good mark after dropping a 9.85 world lead last week in Oslo.

Coleman’s top competition in Ostrava will be Olympic silver medalist Andre de Grasse, who won the Rabat 200m on Sunday in a 20.19 season’s best.

Women’s 300m: Shaunae Miller-Uibo Goes For Off-Distance World Best

Olympic 400m champion Shaunae Miller-Uibo has yet to compete in the Diamond League this season, but that hasn’t prevented her from running fast early and often in 2019: the Bahamian sprinter has already clocked two sub-50 400m performances, including the 49.05 world lead on April 27. No one else has cracked 50 seconds this season. In Ostrava, Miller-Uibo will step down to the rarely run 300m in an attempt to crack Ana Guevara’s 35.30 world best that has stood since 2003.

As a 200m-400m dual-threat, Miller-Uibo is perfectly suited for this in-between distance. The 25-year-old owns a 35.45 PB that is tied for the indoor world best, so logic goes that she should topple Guevara’s mark on Thursday.

Men’s 400m: Kenny B Takes On World Medalist Steven Gardiner

Although his Diamond League debut in the Rabat 200m on Sunday was sluggish, 20-year-old breakout star Kenny Bednarek will hop right back up on the horse by competing in the Ostrava 400m against 43.87 man Steven Gardiner of the Bahamas. Bednarek’s fitness is a question mark right now after he only produced a 20.51 in Rabat-- a far cry from the 19.82 he ran in mid-May at the junior college championships-- but he’ll have a shot to win if he comes close to his 44.73 best. Gardiner has raced sparingly thus far in 2019, his last outing a modest 20.46w 200m. Thursday will mark the 23-year-old’s 400m season opener.

Men’s Mile: Marcin Lewandowski Looks To Stay Hot Against Da’Vall Grice, Blankenship

32-year-old Marcin Lewandowski of Poland enters Ostrava fresh off two rousing mile victories in two separate continents last week, as he first out-kicked a loaded field in Oslo, Norway, on Thursday before winning the adidas Boost Games in Boston on Sunday. His 3:52.34 time in the Bislett Games Dream Mile was good for a Polish record, a mark he could certainly eclipse in this race against Olympians Charlie Da’Vall Grice and Ben Blankenship.

Da’Vall Grice, a 25-year-old Brit, has run well over the last couple weeks with a 1:46 800m in Portland on June 9 and a 3:54 mile win at Adrian Martinez four days later. The American Blankenship quietly ran a 3:37.80 1,500m in Prague two weeks ago, a race in which he was beaten by another man in this Ostrava lineup, Kenya’s Hillary Ngetich.

Field Events: Stars Are Out In Ostrava

The number of big names in the Ostrava running events pales in comparison to the star-studded field event lineups that will include five 2017 world champions: Anita Włodarczyk (hammer), Sam Kendricks (pole vault), Mariya Lasitskene (high jump), Tom Walsh (shot put) and Barbora Spotáková (javelin), plus 2018 world indoor champion Juan Miguel Echevarría (long jump).