The Jeter Challenge

On Sunday American Carmelita Jeter blew away Jamaica’s top two female sprinters,  Shelly Ann Fraser and Kerron Stewart at the World Athletics Finals (WAF) in Thessaloniki, Greece, to become the third fastest woman of all time.

Only Florence Griffith Joyner (10.49) and Marion Jones (10.65) have run faster.

In scorching the track in an amazingly fast 10.67 seconds, she not only took the world lead and will also finish as the number one female sprinter for 2009, but she also threw the gauntlet down to the Jamaican women who have dominated sprinting for the past few years.

Stewart (10.75), Fraser (10.73), Veronica Campbell Brown (10.85) and Sherone Simpson (10.82) have for the past few years made their mark as the world’s premier sprinters. In the last two years especially, the Jamaican women have pushed the Americans so far aside you felt as though we were going to dominate well into the next decade as the eldest of these ladies is only 27 years old. In the last two major meets, Jamaican women took five of six medals in the women’s sprints and three of six at these recently concluded world championships.

However rivalries are what make sports such a great endeavour and Jeter just created a real rivalry – 10.67s in the faces of her Jamaican rivals. Jeter has perhaps three good years left. She is 31. But providing she can stay healthy it will be a real battle royal between Jeter and the Jamaicans perhaps right up until London 2012.

Stewart, Fraser, Simpson and Campbell Brown will be faster next year and so will Jeter.

Some memorable battles await on the horizon.