Track and field absolutes, Marcell Jacobs wins 100 but is half happy

Success without shining for Olympic champion

Marcell Jacobs, back from injury, won the 100-meter flat race of the Italian Absolute Championships in Rieti, thus becoming national champion for the fifth consecutive time. 10″12 was the time clocked by the reigning Olympic champion, rather far from his best standards but still enough today to get ahead of Chituru Ali (10″16) and Filippo Tortu (10″24).

At the end of the race, Jacobs seemed half happy: from the U.S. came the challenge of Fred Kerley (9″77 at the U.S. Trials a few hours earlier), and doubts about the physical condition with World Championships in Eugene getting closer and closer are not completely washed away: “I’m not really satisfied with the time but the important thing was to get back to running, now I have to think about Stockholm and then the Worlds – the words gathered by reporters at the end of the race -. I needed to start competing again after the injury. During the batteries it had gone so-so, in the final the feelings were better.”

“Kerley and the other Americans? They did very good times but I have to think about me and finding my set-up again, I’m still not able to run a full 100 meters: today I wanted to avoid forcing from a physical point of view.”