Mariya Abakumova

World champion Mariya Abakumova was a comfortable winner of the women’s Javelin at the Russian Winter Throwing Championships in Adler, while the men’s equivalent – won by Dmitriy Tarabin – saw three men break 82 metres.

Abakumova, who owns the second-best mark in history with her 71.99m winning throw from the Daegu World Championships, launched her spear out to 63.10m on her second attempt. She had just one other valid throw, a 59.73m effort in the final round, but she had done more than enough to win. Oksana Gromova finished second with 58.00m.

Abakumova’s winning throw was just 26cm shy of the world-leading mark set by European champion Vera Rebryk two weeks ago in Yalta, Ukraine.

The men’s event was a much closer affair. World finalist Dmitriy Tarabin opened with 81.77m while European silver medallist Valeriy Iordan threw 81.36m. Tarabin improved to 82.89m in the second round, then 2004 World junior champion Aleksey Tovarnov applied the pressure with a throw of 82.54m, adding more than a metre to his PB.

Iordan then snatched the lead with a throw of 83.56m, a PB for the 21-year-old, but Tarabin responded straight away with a PB himself, throwing a world-leading 85.63m.

source:iaaf.org