Sydney McLaughlin Running 400 Meters at Shanghai Diamond League Meeting

By Adam Kopet

Sydney McLaughlin is scheduled to make her Diamond League debut Saturday in Shanghai, running the 400 meters.

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McLaughlin has raced sparingly since she turned pro following the 2018 NCAA Division 1 Outdoor Championships where she won the 400-meter hurdles. She ended her freshman campaign at Kentucky with the collegiate record at 52.75, which she ran at the 2018 SEC Outdoor Championships.

Also in the 400 meters in Shanghai are Bahrain's Selwa Eid Nasar, the 2017 IAAF World Outdoor Championships silver medalist, and Jamaica's Stephenie Ann McPherson. Both have run under 50 seconds in their careers.

McLaughlin's most recent race was last week. She ran her first 400-meter hurdles since winning the NCAA title last year, winning at the Oxy Invitational in 54.14. Her previous races this outdoor season have been 4x400 relays, including one where she ran in a men's relay.

Other top events in Shanghai include the men's 400-meter hurdles. Rai Benjamin will face Qatar's Abderrahman Samba. More on that matchup can be read about here.

In the men's sprints, we will see Christian Coleman and Noah Lyles race each other for the first time this season. Coleman has kept a low profile this year, skipping the indoor season and only running on relays thus far. This will be his first individual race of the year. Lyles, meanwhile, is coming off a strong performance at the IAAF World Relays where he anchored the 4x100 (the team finished second, but was disqualified due to an exchange zone infraction early in the race).

In distance events, Beatrice Chepkoech is making her season debut in the 3,000-meter steeplechase. The Kenyan set the world record last year in Monaco. She finished fourth in the flat 3,000 meters in Doha, running 8:29:83. She was also seventh at the IAAF Cross Country Championships earlier this year.

Mel Lawrence is the only American in the women's 3,000 steeplechase.

The men's 5,000 meters is full of top runners, including the Ethiopian trio of Selemon Barega, Hagos Gebrhiwet and Yomif Kejelcha. All three ran under 12:50 at last year's Diamond League final. In all, eight men in the field have broken 13 minutes in their career, including Paul Chelimo, who is making his 2019 outdoor season debut.

The women's 1,500 meters feature five women who have run sub-four, including Sifan Hassan of The Netherlands. Both Alexa Efraimson and Emily Lipari are scheduled to run.

On the field, the women's pole vault will feature an early competition for some of the top vaulters in the world. Sandi Morris and Katie Nageotte will take on the reigning world and Olympic champion Katerina Stefanidi of Greece. Kristen Leland and Annie Rhodes-Johnigan are also set to compete.

An American quartet of Chase Ealey, Maggie Ewen, Daniella Hill and Jessica Ramsey will take on reigning world champion Lijiao Gong of China in the shot put. Nine women in the field have achieved marks greater than 19.00 meters in their careers.

The men's high jump, Ukraine's Bohdan Bondarenko is set to make his return after missing all of 2018. He has a career best of 7-11.25 (2.42m). He is third on the all-time performer list.