Athlete: Winnie Nanyondo
Event: 1500m Final
Date: Tuesday, July 19
Time: 05:50am
TV: SuperSport Variety 3 (and SS Select 1 on GoTV), KBC
Uganda’s middle distance Winnie Nanyondo will go all out for a medal in the 1500m final at the 2022 World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon (US).
Nanyondo was given a second bite at the cherry after she failed to finish the semifinals.
But that second chance was deserved because she was twice shoved by Gaia Sabbatini towards the home stretch, and the Italian was later disqualified.
Her work is however cut out against a classy field led by Kenyan icon Faith Kipyegon who clinched Silver in Doha in 2019, just behind Siffan Hassan of Netherlands.
Kipyegon won gold last year in Tokyo in 3:53.11.
Ethiopia’s Gudaf Tsegay who is a World Indoor record holder qualified from the semis in the fastest time of 4:01.28.
Laura Muir of Great Britain who won Silver in Tokyo and Jessica Hull are the other favourites.
Nanyondo might be required to run a sub-four minute race to have a chance on the podium.
In the heats, she qualified to the semis with the next fastest time of 4:03.81 while she finished fourth in the world indoor final in Belgrade with a time 4:00.25.
This will be her third World Championships after London 2017 and Doha 2019, and she is most remembered in Doha where she dance with Halima Nakaayi who won gold in 800m.
Last year, Nanyondo finished seventh at the Olympics finals in Tokyo.
This year, she ran her season best of 4:00.25 at the Fontaine Classic at this very track but came eighth.
Her Personal Best is 3:59.56 which came in June 2019 in Rabat, a National Record time that still stands to date.
