By Mitch Phillips
TOKYO (Reuters) -Hot favourite Leyanis Perez Hernandez of Cuba took a dominant victory in the women’s triple jump on Thursday while Yulimar Rojas, winner of the last four world titles, claimed a remarkable bronze in her first competition for two years.
Perez Hernandez has been the form jumper all season and laid down a marker with a 14.85 first effort – only her own 14.93 in March was longer by anyone this year. She improved to 14.90 in the third round and 14.94 in the fourth, which she matched in the sixth to complete a remarkable series.
Venezuela’s Tokyo Olympic champion Rojas also started impressively, all the more so as it being her first final for two years, with 14.76. That was looking good enough for silver until the final round, when Thea Lafond went past her with 14.89.
Lafond, who claimed Dominica’s first Olympic medal when she won the Olympic title last year and followed up with the world indoor crown, became the country’s first female world athletics medal winner with the silver.
(Reporting by Mitch Phillips, editing by Ed Osmond)
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