Sheffield star on course for gold with two events remaining
Jess Ennis threw a lifetime best in the javelin
after a solid display in the long jump to stand on the brink of Olympic
gold with just the 800m left to run on Saturday night.
After six events Ennis leads the way and stands on 5971 points, 188
points ahead of her nearest rival Austra Skujyte of Lithuania.With just the two-lap finale to go it looks almost certain that the Sheffield superstar will be able to celebrate gold in front of a huge home crowd on Saturday evening.
Skujyte would need to finish miles ahead of Ennis, but her personal best of 2:15.92 was set in 2004, while Ennis set hers of 2:07.81 only last year.
It now seems like only an injury can prevent Ennis from picking up gold.
Brilliant day
"Today's been a brilliant day," said Ennis. "I was really anxious today having had such a good day yesterday and not knowing if the long jump and events like that were going to go the way I wanted them to.""But I was made up to have thos two performances today. I was so nervous but it does help having this crowd."
Long jump and javelin are usually not the strongest for Ennis, but a fine 6.48 metres in the pit followed by a personal best 47.49 in the javelin has all-but assured her of the Olympic heptathlon title.
"I'm not even thinking about it until I cross that line," she insisted. "I've got one more event to do and I have to make sure I get that right and hopefully we'll see what happens when I cross that line."
The long jump was the first hurdle to get over in the day, as Ennis has struggled with her run-up this season, committing seven fouls in 12 attempts during two competitions earlier this summer.
Shemanaged just 5.95m with her first attempt, but the 26-year-old then hit the board perfectly on her second attempt to soar out to 6.40m, just 11cm down on her personal best and worth 975 points.
She then went better with her final leap to leave her with a total of 5159 as Olympic champion Nataliya Dobrynska struggled. Russian challenger Tatyana Chernova produced the best jump with 6.54 metres to keep up the pressure on Ennis and slotted into third place in the overall competition with 4869 points with Austra Skujyte in second on 4901 points.
Source :SkySports.com
