{"id":879,"date":"2015-10-12T15:28:53","date_gmt":"2015-10-12T15:28:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/diamond-race-review-the-throws\/"},"modified":"2015-10-12T15:28:53","modified_gmt":"2015-10-12T15:28:53","slug":"diamond-race-review-the-throws","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/diamond-race-review-the-throws\/","title":{"rendered":"Diamond Race Review &#8211; The Throws"},"content":{"rendered":"<div><b>Shot Put<\/b><\/div>\n<div>The men&#8217;s shot put saw one of the most thrilling head to heads of 2015, as David Storl and Joe Kovacs battled it out from May until September. Storl set the tone early, winning in Doha. He then lost to Kovacs in Eugene, and the precedent was set. Right up until the final the two traded blows, each winning at alternate meetings to ensure that neither ever pulled ahead in the Diamond Race. As Brussels approached, the two men were locked together at the top, each of them on 14 points with three victories. The final, though, would be the first meeting all season where neither Kovacs nor Storl managed to win. Kovacs third place meant that he snuck two points ahead of Storl to claim the Diamond Trophy, just weeks after beating the German to the world championship title.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>In the women&#8217;s event it was an entirely different story. With Valerie Adams missing most of the season through injury, Christina Schwanitz was all but unchallenged at the top of the Diamond Race table. She won all but two of the seven rounds, ending with a lead of 13 points and collecting her first Diamond Trophy.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" lang=\"en\"><p>Christina Schwanitz and <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/JoeKovacsUSA>@JoeKovacsUSA<\/link> won the <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/DiamondRace?src=hash>#DiamondRace<\/link> in the shot put. Congratulations to both of them! <link http:\/\/t.co\/wo7B17TugE>pic.twitter.com\/wo7B17TugE<\/link>\n<p>\u2014 IAAF Diamond League (@Diamond_League) <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/Diamond_League\/status\/647674484938272769>September 26, 2015<\/link><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async=\"\" src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><b>Discus Throw<\/b><\/div>\n<div>Schwanitz&#8217;s domination in the shot was nothing on Sandra Perkovi\u0107&#8217;s hegemony in the discus. The Croatian won six of the seven rounds, ending on a huge total of 30 points, with a 23 point lead over her closest challenger. Only in Lausanne did Perkovi\u0107 falter, beaten by Yalm\u00ed P\u00e9rez. She returned to claim a convincing victory in Brussels, though, securing the Diamond Trophy and reasserting her brilliant dominance in this event.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The men&#8217;s discus played out as a battle between two Poles. Between them, Piotr Ma\u0142achowski and Robert Urbanek made podium finishes at all seven Diamond Race rounds. It was Ma\u0142achowski who started better, with victories in Shanghai and Eugene. Urbanek fought back in Paris, and his consistent podium finishes meant he remained within touching distance of his compatriot right up until Stockholm, where Ma\u0142achowski&#8217;s victory saw him extend his lead to six points. Urbanek made one final bid for glory at the Z\u00fcrich final, but even victory wasn&#8217;t quite enough to pip his countryman at the last. Ma\u0142achowski&#8217;s second place at Weltklasse saw him finish with a two point lead and a Diamond Trophy.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" lang=\"en\"><p>.<link https:\/\/twitter.com\/PerkovicSandra>@PerkovicSandra<\/link> is looking forward to an &quot;exotic&quot; holiday to celebrate her Diamond Race win: <link https:\/\/t.co\/rPDjCmDUUy>https:\/\/t.co\/rPDjCmDUUy<\/link>\n<p>\u2014 IAAF Diamond League (@Diamond_League) <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/Diamond_League\/status\/642392383242530816>September 11, 2015<\/link><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async=\"\" src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><b>Javelin Throw<\/b><\/div>\n<div>Barbara Spot\u00e1kov\u00e1 had already won three Diamond Trophies prior to 2015, but she had never defended the title successfully. The defence of her 2014 title got off to a bad start, a the Czech managed to collect just one point in May and June. The field was open, though, and there was space for Spot\u00e1kov\u00e1 to move up the table if she started winning. She did so, taking victories in Paris and Stockholm and finishing second in London.That gave her a handsome lead ahead of the final in Z\u00fcrich, where yet another victory saw her complete what was, in the end, a convincing Diamond Race triumph: 19 points, a 12 point winning margin and a fourth Diamond Trophy.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Tero Pitk\u00e4m\u00e4ki took an early lead in the men&#8217;s javelin Diamond Race with victory in Doha. His success was short lived, however, as he was quickly overtaken by V\u00edtezslav Vesel\u00fd. The Czech finished in the top two of all the next four rounds, and it wasn&#8217;t until Monaco that Pitk\u00e4m\u00e4ki was able to win again. Even then, he remained six points behind Vesel\u00fd, and it looked certain that the Czech would take the Diamond Trophy in Brussels. But he faltered at the last, not even making the podium in the final. Pitk\u00e4m\u00e4ki&#8217;s superb performance saw him take all eight points and complete a dramatic late comeback to become the first Finnish athlete ever to win a Diamond Trophy.<\/div>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" lang=\"en\"><p>Two great <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/DiamondRace?src=hash>#DiamondRace<\/link> turnarounds, and 2 Diamond Trophies. Congratulations to Barbora Spot\u00e1kov\u00e1 and Tero Pitk\u00e4m\u00e4ki! <link http:\/\/t.co\/vxgeoyHt92>pic.twitter.com\/vxgeoyHt92<\/link>\n<p>\u2014 IAAF Diamond League (@Diamond_League) <link https:\/\/twitter.com\/Diamond_League\/status\/646949708213059584>September 24, 2015<\/link><\/blockquote>\n<p> <script async=\"\" src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As winter approaches, it&#8217;s time to look back on a fantastic summer of IAAF Diamond League...","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":880,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8,7,34,39,38,37,36,35],"city":[],"class_list":["post-879","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-general","tag-diamond-race","tag-diamond-trophy","tag-kovacs","tag-malachowski","tag-perkovic","tag-pitkamaki","tag-spotakova","tag-storl"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/879","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=879"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/879\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/880"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=879"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=879"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=879"},{"taxonomy":"city","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.diamondleague.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/city?post=879"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}