jp/10/mile
Holmes and Yates win Sydney road mile race
SYDNEY (Reuter): British middle-distance champions Matthew Yates and Kelly Holmes took the men's and women's events in the Australian $100,000 (US$71,000) Sydney street mile race yesterday.
Yates, 25, waved to the crowd as he beat compatriot Steve Cram to shave five seconds off the course record held by Cram.
Yates, British champion at 1,500 meters in 1991 and 1993, clocked three minutes 52.2 seconds in the men's race through Sydney's business district watched by about 50,000 people.
"I told you I would come down here and break the (course) record to make this race a real world class event," Yates told reporters after his victory.
Cram, 32, who has been sidelined because of injury for the past six months and was running his first mile race since September, broke his old record with a time of 3.52.6.
The former world mile record-holder, who won the inaugural Sydney race in 1991, said the faster time was due to the stronger field and favorable wind conditions. The field also boasted previous winner Joseph Chesire of Kenya and Ireland's Frank O'Mara.
Yates said another couple of seconds could come off the record for the Sydney race: "I think we will start seeing times of around 3.48 or 3.49 in the next year or two".
Fellow Briton Kelly Holmes pulled off a surprise victory over Olympic champion Hassiba Boulmerka in the women's race, running in the first mile race of her career. Holmes, 24, won by a clear five seconds in a time of 4.29.0.
Algeria's Boulmerka, the 1,500 meters champion at Barcelona, was hot favorite to win the women's event following the withdrawal of American Mary Decker-Slaney through a heel injury. Slaney won both of the two previous Sydney street races in 1991 and 1992.
Holmes said she only knew about the race eight days ago when the organizers phoned her to invite the British Army physical education instructor to compete.
The British 800 meters champion said she was a bit hesitant about racing as she had planned to only compete this year in the 800 meters event in preparation for the European and Commonwealth Games later in the year.
Boulmerka, who finished third in the 1,500 meters at the World Championships at Stuttgart, said she had not been feeling 100 percent before the race.