ATHLETICS – Bahrain's Paris 2024 Olympian Nelly Jepkosgei raced to an impressive victory in the women’s 1,500 metres at the Folksam Grand Prix Sollentuna in Sweden.
The meeting was a bronze-level event on this year’s World Athletics Continental Tour.
Jepkosgei was the star amongst the high-quality 13-runner field. She triumphed in a time of four minutes 09.26 seconds, narrowly beating out Claudia Hollingsworth of Australia, who finished in 4:09.43.
Soukaina Hajji from Morocco took third place in 4:11.51, while the Swedish pair of Wilma Nielsen (4:11.62) and Yolanda Ngarambe (4:11.87) followed in fourth and fifth, respectively.
The top eight was completed by Kristiina Sasinek Maki (4:12.37) from Czechia, Bahiya El Arfaoui (4:12.94) from Morocco, and Anne Gine Lovnes (4:13.27) from Norway.
Jepkosgei competed for the third time this season in the 1,500m. She clocked her second-fastest time of the year over the distance after she ran her season’s best of 4:04.01 in a meeting in Rabat, Morocco, last May. Her times are still far from her personal best of 4:00.99, which she set in 2018 in Doha, Qatar.
The 34-year-old middle-distance specialist has also run the 800m this outdoor athletics season as well as a cross country race. Her season’s best in the 800m is 2:02.66, while her personal best is the national record of 1:57.69, which she set last year in Trier, Germany.
Jepkosgei has yet to meet the entry standards for either the 1,500m (4:01.50) or 800m (1:59.00) for this year’s World Athletics Championships 2025 in Tokyo, Japan, but has until August 24 to try and do so.
She is also currently ranked 83rd in the 800m world rankings and is out of the top 100 in the 1,500m.
patrick@gdnmedia.bh
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