Shara Proctor leapt to within a matter of centimetres of her national long jump record as she produced the best British performance at the latest Diamond League leg in Rome.
Proctor travelled to Italy having leapt a season’s best 6.82m at the Doha Diamond League last month but managed to better that with a fourth effort of 6.89m at the Stadio Olimpico.
She then moved to 6.91m with her sixth and final jump, just four centimetres off the British record she set on the way to victory at last year’s Olympic trials at Birmingham’s Alexander Stadium.
American Brittney Reese defeated compatriot Janay DeLoach Soukup with an effort of 6.99m to her 6.97m while Hannah England clocked 4:03.91minutes for fourth in the 1500m.
England ran the distance outdoors for the first time at the Prefontaine Classic at the weekend but was just over half a second slower in Rome with fellow Brit Lisa Dobriskey tenth in the same race.
Dai Greene, the reigning 400m hurdles world champion, and Phillips Idowu, the 2009 triple jump world champion, were fifth and seventh respectively, the latter on his first outing over the distance this season.
Idowu finished with a season’s best of 16.44m while Eilish McColgan ducked under the World Championship A qualifying standard for the 3,000m steeplechase with a time of 9:41.50 that placed her tenth.
In the men’s 400m Nigel Levine was the best Brit in fourth with Michael Bingham just five hundredths of second adrift in fifth and Martyn Rooney ninth.
James Ellington was fourth in the men’s B 100m race and Harry Aikines-Aryeetey eighth while Steve Lewis failed to clear a height in the pole vault due to three failures at 5.50m.
© Sportsbeat 2013