Tirunesh Dibaba wins 5000m and makes history; Defar takes bronze
BEIJING, China - Moving to the front with three laps to go, Tirunesh Dibaba exploded at the bell to win the gold medal at 5000 meters tonight, becoming the first woman in Olympic history to win the distance double following her 10,000-meter triumph earlier in the Games.
No man has won the distance double in 28 years, either.
Her winning time - 15:41.40 - was more than a minute and a half off of her World Record after a slow pace in the early going, but Dibaba's last lap was run in a scorching 59.54 seconds.
"I am very happy," said Dibaba afterward of the win and the milestone. "I like Beijing very much. I will remember the Beijing Games forever because I won two gold medals here." The last athlete to win the Olympic distance double was Dibaba's countryman, Miruts Yifter, in 1980.
Meseret Defar, the defending Olympic gold medalist, hung on to win the bronze medal after she appeared to be spiked from behind with four laps to go that looked for a moment as if it might send her sprawling to the track. "Today was a bad day for me," she said. "Someone hit my right leg with four laps to go, and it hurt." Defar grimaced and limped as she began a lap of honor with Dibaba. "Sometimes things just happen."
With nine laps to go, Turkey's Elvan Abeylegesse took the lead and upped the pedestrian pace, with Defar and Russian Guinara Galkina-Samitova following. Dibaba soon joined them and took the lead with three laps remaining. The Ethiopian-born Abeylegesse ended up with the silver, just as she did behind Dibaba at 10,000m.
"It is a big achievement for me," said the 23-year-old Dibaba of the double. She is no stranger to achievements: Dibaba holds the 5000m World Record and in 2005 became the first athlete, man or woman, to win at both 5000m and 10,000m in the World Championships.
As Abeylegesse herself said afterward: "Tirunesh Dibaba is a hard-working girl."
|
