Tobi Amusan [Credit: X | World Athletics]

Nigeria’s Tobi Amusan recorded her fastest 100m time of the season with an 11.18s (1.8m/s) finish at the Racers Grand Prix, a World Athletics Continental Tour Silver meeting, in Kingston, Jamaica, in the early hours of Sunday, PUNCH Sports Extra reports.

Amusan placed fourth in the highly competitive women’s sprint final in front of 15,000 spectators that saw the top four athletes set season-best marks, with the top two also meeting the qualification standard for the 2025 World Championships in Tokyo.

Running in lane two and representing Racers Track Club, Amusan reacted to the gun in 0.198s and crossed the line behind three Jamaicans and an American, but showed marked improvement from her previous outings this year.

The 11.18s performance shaved a tenth of a second off her season’s best of 11.28s set at the Velocity Fest in March.

This was only her second 100m flat race of the season and third in the last 14 months, as she continues her gradual transition into sprinting from her specialist 100m hurdles event.

The race was won by Jamaica’s Tina Clayton, who clocked 10.98s from lane three with a reaction time of 0.179s.

“I was looking for a good performance,” Clayton said.

“The last time I was this nervous, I ran 10.9, so I knew the performance would have been good.”

Looking ahead to the rest of the season, Clayton said her focus is on maintaining consistency.

Clayton was closely followed by Jacious Sears of the United States, who ran from lane four and recorded an 11.04s finish, also inside the World Championship qualifying standard.

Sears had the quickest reaction time in the field, leaving the blocks at 0.158s.

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Alana Garren Reid, another young Jamaican prospect born in 2005, took third place with 11.16s from lane one, ahead of Amusan, who held her own against the younger sprinters despite entering the event primarily as a hurdler.

Tia Clayton, the twin sister of the race winner, completed the top five with a time of 11.24s, having started in lane five with a reaction time of 0.187s.

Amusan’s steady improvement since her move to Jamaica in November 2024 to train under Glen Mills at Racers Track Club is beginning to bear fruit with her switch from the United States reportedly motivated by a desire to expand her sprinting range and better integrate speed into her hurdling technique.

She opened her sprint campaign with a modest 11.41s in the heats of the Velocity Fest before going on to clock 11.28s in the final.

At the Tom Jones Memorial in Gainesville, Florida, last April, she ran 11.26s for third place.

Saturday’s 11.18s finish now stands as her best since setting a personal best of 11.10s in 2023 on the same Florida track.

Olympic silver medallist Kishane Thompson produced an emphatic run to win the men’s 100m in 9.88 (0.0m/s) ahead of his compatriot Oblique Seville , who finished with a flourish to clinch second place in a season’s best of 9.97 with South African pair of Gift Leotlela (10.04) and world U20 champion Bayanda Walaza (10.06) finishing third and fourth, respectively.

In the men’s 110m hurdles, Olympic bronze medallist Rasheed Broadbell defeated the red-hot US athlete Trey Cunningham in a tight contest – 13.06 to 13.08 (0.7m/s). It was Broadbell’s third win against Cunningham in five finals.

USA’s Alia Armstrong clocked 12.54 (1.1m/s) to equal the meeting record in the women’s 100m hurdles.

Following in Armstrong’s wake was world indoor champion Devynne Charlton of The Bahamas in a season’s best of 12.65.

World champion Shericka Jackson won the women’s 200m in a season’s best of 22.53 (1.0m/s).

The men’s 200m lived up to its billing as one of the most highly anticipated events on the night, with Jamaican champion Bryan Levell bursting the tape at 19.79.

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