{"id":817,"date":"2015-07-29T14:54:28","date_gmt":"2015-07-29T14:54:28","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/stockholm-press-conference-highlights-2\/"},"modified":"2015-07-29T14:54:28","modified_gmt":"2015-07-29T14:54:28","slug":"stockholm-press-conference-highlights-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/stockholm-press-conference-highlights-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Stockholm: Press Conference Highlights"},"content":{"rendered":"
The 28-year-old double Olympic champion, who has said all year she intended to concentrate on the 100m and sprint relay at the IAAF World Championships in Beijing next month, told a press conference that her coach, Steven Francis, had indicated she could still compete at both sprints in the Bird\u2019s Nest stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was down to do the 100 and relay, but the 200 is still possible!\u201d Fraser-Pryce said with a sidelong grin.<\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cMy coach did say earlier that I was not running the 200, but last week I was in practice and he said I should do a 100, a 200 and a 250.<\/div>\n
\u201cI said: \u2018Why am I going all that way? I\u2019m not running 200 at the world champs?\u2019 And he said: \u2018Who says you\u2019re not running?\u2019 so I said: \u2018You did!\u2019 and he said: \u2018I\u2019ve changed my mind. I\u2019m not sure.\u2019 The thing is, I\u2019ve already earned a spot in the 200 as champion, so I wouldn\u2019t be taking it away from anybody else.<\/div>\n
\u201cThe 200 for me is definitely more strategic. When I get to the start line I am thinking \u2018Do I go hard for the first 50, do I go 80 per cent and then blast the last 100?\u201d<\/div>\n
But her answer to the question of whether she therefore felt it was more satisfying to run the longer distance was emphatic.<\/div>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d she said with another grin. \u201cI like the 100!<\/div>\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t come out of the blocks very well in Paris but my transition from 30 to 70 metres was the best part of my race.<\/div>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve been training hard since and running some longer distances over 200m, which I don\u2019t like. I\u2019m looking forward to getting my racing started again tomorrow.\u201d<\/div>\n
Smiling aggression<\/b><\/div>\n
Asked whether she had now grown used to being the one every other female sprinter wanted to beat, she responded:  \u201cYes, that\u2019s natural because I am the world and Olympic champion.  But when I line up to race I don\u2019t think of myself as that, I am just trying to execute my race. I smile when I\u2019m at the line but deep down I am really aggressive!<\/div>\n
\u201cIf my opponents want to bark like a dog or skip up and down, then that\u2019s what gets them going. For them, it\u2019s OK. I stay smiling. I tend not to worry what the person down next to me is doing because deep down I know we are all nervous.\u201d<\/div>\n
It is a feeling with which David Oliver, the reigning world 110m hurdles champion, concurs.<\/div>\n
Despite having competed at top level for more than a decade, the 33-year-old admitted: \u201cMy heart is always in my throat every time I get on the start. It doesn\u2019t matter whether it\u2019s here or running in Gainesville, Florida, I\u2019m always incredibly nervous when I come out onto the track.<\/div>\n
\u201cMy first objectives this year were to win the US Championships and the Pan Am Games, and I\u2019ve been able to do that. I\u2019m leading in the Diamond Race at the moment, so that\u2019s another big goal, and of course I want to defend my world title in Beijing.\u201d<\/div>\n
Oliver added that he had run his first sub-13 seconds time since 2011 in following home the man that was sitting alongside him, Orlando Ortega, at the IAAF Diamond League meeting in Paris on 4 July, clocking 12.98. Ortega\u2019s winning time of 12.94 in the French capital leads this year\u2019s world lists.<\/div>\n
Ortega, who turned 24 today, is in the process of transferring his allegiance from Cuba to Spain and will not be a rival Oliver will have to contend with at the World Championships next month.<\/div>\n
Ortega eyes Rio<\/b><\/div>\n
<\/b>\u201cI knew from beginning it would be impossible to compete in Beijing,\u201d commented Ortega. \u201cBut I know I can compete at the Rio 2016 Games, and I am going to try for the world indoors. For now, though, my world championship is the Diamond Race; that would be my gold medal for the year.\u201d<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
This would require an upset, however, given that Oliver leads with 11 points, and Ortega is back on six points along with 2011 world champion Jason Richardson and France\u2019s European indoor 60m hurdles champion Pascal Martinot-Lagarde, both of whom are in the Stockholm field.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Meanwhile, 2014 world indoor 1500m champion Ayanleh Souleiman is planning an extra-swift outing in what will be his last big race before Beijing.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\u201cTomorrow I want a very fast time, 3.28, 3.27\u2026\u201d said the man from Djibouti, who set a personal best of 3:29.58 at last year\u2019s IAAF Diamond League meeting in Monaco.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Souleiman, who won bronze over 800m in the last World Championships plans to double up over 800m and 1500m in Beijing. \u201cThere is a day in between the 800 and 1500 events, so it will be easier to do,\u201d he said.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Great Britain\u2019s Olympic, European and Commonwealth champion Greg Rutherford has a one-point lead in the long jump Diamond Race but faces strong local opposition in the form of Michel Torneus and Andreas Otterling, respectively European indoor gold and bronze medallists this year.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\u201cI know myself from the London 2012 Games and last year\u2019s Commonwealths in Glasgow how much having home advantage and support can give you,\u201d said Rutherford.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
Torneus commented: \u201cAfter the Europeans I was highly motivated but then I got this problem with my hamstring. It keeps going away, then coming back.  I\u2019ve only done two jumps off a full approach run since the beginning of June.<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\u201cBut I\u2019ll give it 100 per cent tomorrow night and see where I land. I still have a couple of weeks left before the World Championships.\u201d<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n

Mike Rowbottom for the IAAF and the IAAF Diamond League<\/i><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, who competes tomorrow for the first time since winning the 100m in...","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":818,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"city":[],"class_list":["post-817","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/817","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=817"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/817\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/818"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=817"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=817"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=817"},{"taxonomy":"city","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/city?post=817"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}