Kelly White, the Queen of the Women’s 100m

A new queen of woman`s sprint is born.

At the finals of the 100 meters at the 2003 World Championship held in Paris on Aug. 25, Kelly White (American, 26) sprinted to victory, boasting her acceleration after passing the 50 m mark.

As her starting response time ranked 6 among 8 players with 0.184secs, she fell behind Torri Edwards (response time 0.133secs) until the mid point of the race, but afterwards, she raced with an explosive speed, leading to victory.

While won in 10.85 seconds, the quickest time in the world this year. Torri Edwards, her team colleague, was second in 10.93and Zhanna Block (Ukraine), the defending champion, was third in 10.99. It is the first time for While to win in major International games, such as the World Championship and Olympic games.

She could grasp the victory, even though she is only 1m63 tall and weighs just 57kg, thanks to her explosive capacity to accelerate, using short pitch running with short strides. The average steps taken to run 100m distance is 44∼46 strides for man and 48∼52 strides for woman. White finished the course with 48 steps at the preliminary and with 49.5 steps at the finals. It means that White added on to her acceleration power after passing the 50m-point with short pitch. Average sprinters run with wide stride after running 50 m, and it is very hard to instantly convert to short pitch.

White says, “I don`t have a good start. So I practiced hard on accelerating by the midpoint. I was quiet exhausted when I passed the 50 m mark but I wasn’t worried.”

White is from California which is also home to ‘the empress of Sprint’ Florence Gripies Joinner. She made a grand entrance into the field by setting a junior record (23.80 seconds) in the U.S. in the 200 m in 1994. Yet, she had a bumpy road. In her debut year, she was stabbed by a jealous competitor and had to put about 300 stitches near her left eye. After she joined the adult games, she was always overshadowed by Marion Jones and other super stars.

Jones, the best player in the women`s sprint, did not play in the contest due to pregnancy. Her best record is 10.65 seconds, set in 1998, but her best record of last year was slower than that of White, with 11.01seconds.

After winning the victory in the 100 m, White tightened her shoes lace to get a triple crown, saying that she would overcome the challenge that Jones poses by achieving victories in the 200m and 400m relays as well.

Jong-Koo Yang yjongk@donga.com