While Rose Chelimo competed in Doha on 27-Sep as the defending marathon champion (’17 London), she had endured a sub-par ’19 season in which her only other marathon result (9th at Tokyo in 2:30:35) kept her from being mentioned among the favorites in this year’s championships. However, Chelimo positioned herself in the lead group from the get-go and remained there throughout the race. When she finally lost contact with eventual champion Ruth Chepngetich between 36 km and 37 km, she had also distanced herself for good from eventual 3rd placer Helalia Johannes. In the extreme heat (30 Celsius) and humidity (75%) of Doha, Chepngetich winning time was 2:32:43, ahead of Chelimo’s 2:33:46 and Johannes’ 2:34:15.
Gesa Krause‘s presence in Doha constituted the 5th time she competed at the IAAF world championships, and by the time everything was said and done, she not only reached her fifth steeplechase WC final, but also won a second medal (bronze, ’15 Beijing). After auto-advancing to the final by placing 3rd in her heat (9:18.82) on 27-Sep, another podium finish in the final held 30-Sep seemed improbable, as the field included defending champion and runner-up Emma Coburn and Courtney Frerichs, respectively, as well as world record holder Beatrice Chepkoech, all with personal bests significantly faster than Krause’s 9:07.51 (’19 DL Zurich). In the final, Krause started out near the back of the pack, but had moved to 8th by 2000m, to 5th by the bell lap, to 4th on the final back stretch, before finally passing Personae teammate Winfred Yavi coming out of the final water jump to move into 3rd place. Up ahead, Chepkoech went on to win in 8:57.84, with Emma Coburn 2nd in 9:02.35. Krause’s finish time of 9:03.30 was yet another new German record, as well as advancing her to 3rd on the ’19 world chart and to 9th on the all-time steeple performers chart.
For veteran Ferguson Rotich, Doha was his fourth time around at the IAAF championships, his previous best result being 4th place in the ’15 Beijing 800m final. After comfortably advancing out of his heat on 27-Sep (1st in 1:45.98) and semi-final on 29-Sep (2nd in 1:44.20), Rotich surprisingly was the only entrant from Kenya in the final held on 1-Oct. In that final, Rotich stayed well back in the pack that followed Wesley Vasquez‘s torrid pace on the opening lap (48.99). After passing the bell in 6th place, Rotich began to steadily move through the field, finally catching and overtaking Vasquez down the home stretch to take 3rd place in a time of 1:43.82 behind champion Donovan Brazier (1:42.34) and Amel Tuka (1:43.47).
Other Personae-managed athletes who reached their event final in Doha included Winfried Yavi (4th – steeplechase in 9:05.58 PB and ’19 world no. 6), Claire Orcel (11th – High Jump with 1.89m), and Youssouf Hiss Bachir (12th – 1500m in 3:37.96). Also noteworthy was Amina Seyni‘s 200m national record of 22.58 set in her 4th place semi-final race.