KINGSTON, Jamaica- Olympic Games silver medalist Shanieka Ricketts and Andrenette Knight were winners at Friday’s Golden Gala Pietro Mennea in Rome, Italy, the fifth stop on the Wanda Diamond League series.
Both women produced season’s best performances as Ricketts won the women’s triple jump and Knight took the women’s 400m hurdles, while Olympic Games shot put bronze medalist Rajindra Campbell and high jumper Romaine Beckford both took third place in their events.
Ricketts jumped 14.64m (-0.7m/s) in the first round, bettering her previous seasons best 14.54m, set in Croatia on May 24, to set the pace on Friday.
Cuba’s world leader Leyanis Perez Hernandez was second with 14.46m (-0.8m/s) and Olympic champion Thea LaFond of Dominica was third with 14.30m (-0.1m/s).
After a good weekend at the third Grand Slam stop in Philadelphia last weekend, Knight moved into fifth place in the world as she ran a well measured race to win with 53.67 seconds, under the 53.90 seconds she had run at Rabat, Morocco at the previous Diamond League meeting.
Rushell Clayton who led at the three-quarter stage of the race, was third in 54.21 seconds, also her best this season while Shiann Salmon was seventh with 55.47 seconds.
Beckford cleared a season best 2.26m to take third in the high jump, while World Indoor bronze medalist Raymond Richards was 11th with only 2.12m.
Korea’s Sanghyeok Woo won with a season best 2.32m with Ukraine’s Oleh Doroshchuk second with 2.30m.
Campbell made up for a slow start with 21.64m in the final round of the men’s shot put to claim a second straight Diamond League podium spot.
New Zealand’s Tom Walsh won with a season’s best 21.89m with Italy’s Zane Weir second with 21.67m.
Orlando Bennett was fourth in the 110m hurdles with 13.29 seconds (0.9m/s) and Omar McLeod was eighth with 13.58 seconds as Switzerland’s Jason Joseph edged world leader Cordell Tinch of the USA with both men running 13.14 seconds.
Carey McLeod was fifth in the men’s long jump with 8.01m (-0.4m/s) as Australia’s Liam Adcock produced a personal best 8.34m (-0.2m/s) to win; Italy’s Mattia Furlani was second with 8.13m (-0.5m/s) and Greece’s former Olympic Games and World Champion Miltiadis Tentoglou was third with 8.10m (-0.3m/s).