Quicksilver Hansen jumps at her chance

World Indoor Championships: Baton blunder denies Britain's 400m relay men as Gunnell leads women to the final

Ashia Hansen, who only gained a place in the British team for this weekend's world indoor championships on appeal, proved a point here yesterday as she took the triple jump silver medal with a British record of 14.70 metres.

Hansen picked up $20,000 in prize money for her efforts, but the $50,000 top prize went to Inna Lasovskaya of Russia, whose winning effort of 15.01m was just two centimetres short of the world record - and its accompanying bonus of a further $50,000.

Until Lasovskaya produced her best effort in the third round, it looked as if Hansen - who added 12cm to her own national record at her first attempt - might win her first major international title. As it was, she performed to a consistently high standard, recording two other jumps of 14.48 and 14.56.

By rights, Hansen - who finished fourth in last summer's Olympics - should donate some of her prize money to Tony Morton-Hooper, the solicitor who helped Diane Modahl appeal successfully against a four-year doping ban.

When Hansen was left out of the British team for missing the trials - she was training in South Africa - it was the suggestion that she might mount a legal challenge claiming restraint of trade which inclined the selectors to relent.

"I came here with something to prove after not being picked," said Hansen, who confirmed that she had made initial contact with Morton-Hooper. "I was more motivated after what happened to me. The Federation cannot play with people's lives when you are talking about this sort of money. This is my livelihood."

Hansen's performance laid to rest her awful record at indoor championships - she failed to qualify here in the the 1994 Europeans, failed again in the 1995 world indoors, and did not register a mark at last year's Europeans.

But as the 25-year-old, Birmingham-based athlete jigged with delight at the realisation that she had earned her first big championship medal, such considerations seemed faint indeed. "I didn't want to think about the medal until the end," she said. "It still hasn't sunk in yet that I have done it."

Britain's hopes of a medal, or even a title, in today's 4x400m relay final disappeared in a split-second yesterday as Adrian Patrick, their last-leg runner in the semi-final, dropped the baton in transferring it from left to right hand.

As the stunned Windsor athlete waited to retrieve what he had lost from among a flurry of rival legs, the fact that Britain had Jamie Baulch and Mark Hylton to call upon in the next round became a painful irrelevance. Patrick was inconsolable afterwards, although his team-mates Guy Bullock, Richard Knowles and Sean Baldock - who had overtaken two runners to finish the third leg in second position - did their best.

"It felt like he had taken the baton, but I don't know exactly what happened," said Baldock, who sat briefly alongside Patrick on the track afterwards with his arm over his shoulder.

Although Britain have dropped the baton several times in sprint relays over recent years, similar incidents over 400m have been scarce indeed - the closest being the occasion when Alan Pascoe had the baton knocked out of his hand at the 1976 Montreal Olympics.

Knowles, like Baldock a debutant at this level, said: "It could happen to anyone. It was one of the things I was dreading might happen to me. But there are more things to life than running a relay."

His words were borne out soon afterwards when the Lebanese high jumper Jean-Claude Rabbath suffered an horrific accident attempting to qualify, falling on the back of his neck after missing the soft landing area. Rabbath, who has a best of only 2.06m, was stretchered motionless from the hushed arena but was thankfully soon moving and talking, although he was given a precautionary X-ray.

Steve Smith qualified for today's high jump final, but not without drama. After clearing his opening height of 2.15 metres at the third attempt he recorded two failures at 2.24, when his run-up was impeded by relay runners milling on the infield. It left the Olympic bronze medallist facing an early exit once again but, after an official cleared a space, he cleared the height. A place in the final was virtually assured with a first-time clearance of 2.27, but Smith then went on to jump the qualifying mark of 2.29 - at the third attempt of course. Dalton Grant also qualified. Colin Jackson looks likely to add a further medal for Britain in the 60m hurdles today after winning his heat and semi-final in 7.51sec, while Jamie Baulch reached the 400m final safely with a semi-final win in 46.02sec. And, at the age of 38, Mary Slaney of the United States qualified for today's 1500m final, where she will seek to become the first woman to break four minutes for the distance.

Wizard Wilson, page 19