Edward Sarul – 1983 World Championships
PRIOR to 1983, the Pole had failed to break the 20m barrier in the shot put and even though Sarul made the European final in 1982, he performed without distinction finishing eleventh, which makes his gold medal in Helsinki even more surprising. Sarul improved the Polish record to 21.68m in the build-up but this was still some way short of Udo Bayer's world record of 22.22m but in a competition which saw many of the pre-competition favourites, such as the East German, fall short of their best form, Sarul prevailed with a put of 21.39m ahead of GDR No.2 Ulf Timmermann by 23cm.
After prevailing in Helsinki, Sarul's only other appearance at a major championships came in 1986 when he finished fifth at the European Indoor Championships.
Willi Wulbeck – 1983 World Championships
THE West German had compiled a solid championships résumé prior to the 1983 World Championships but his victory in the 800m in Helsinki was still deemed an unexpected performance, although the final was cast wide open with the absence of Olympic champion Steve Ovett and world record-holder Sebastian Coe, and 1976 Olympic champion Alberto Juantorena, who suffered a broken ankle in the heats. Wulbeck, whose PB of 1:44.66 dated back to 1979, took advantage of the brisk pace set in the final to shatter his lifetime best en route to the title. Wulbeck, who contemplated retirement after finishing eighth at the European Championships in 1982, set a national record of 1:43.65 to defeat the field by more than half a second.
Paul Ruto – 1993 World Championships
THE entry-list for the 800m at the 1993 World Championships wasn't as strong as it has been but even so, very few would have considered 33-year-old Paul Ruto a potential gold medallist. The Kenyan was eliminated in the heats of the World Indoor Championships in Toronto in March and was very much the third string from his country behind Olympic champion William Tanui and two-time world champion Billy Konchellah, even though neither had broken 1:44 in the build-up to Stuttgart. Ruto only qualified for the final as a fastest loser but he used his position as the underdog to his advantage as the rest of the field allowed him a head-start as he set the early pace. Despite a late effort from Konchellah, the Kenyan veteran held on for the title in 1:44.71. Ruto improved his PB to 1:43.92 the following week in Rieti but his success in Stuttgart was his sole appearance at a major outdoor championships.
Marius Corbett – 1997 World Championships
THE South African won the world junior title in 1994 but injuries resulted in a hesitant transition into the senior ranks. Heading into the qualifying round at the 1997 World Championships in Athens, Corbett was ranked nineteenth among the entrants for the javelin and didn't appear to be a discernible threat on paper to Olympic champion Jan Zelezny and world bronze medallist Boris Henry, who both surpassed the 90m-barrier in the build-up to Athens.
However, Corbett came to prominence in the second round of the final with an African record of 88.40m, which marked a four metre improvement on his lifetime best. Steve Backley came close to topping Corbett's mark in the final round but his throw was recorded at 86.70m, resulting in an improbable win for the South African, who won the Commonwealth title the following year, before struggling to regain any sort of competitive form.
Jong Song-ok – 1999 World Championships
PRIOR to her victory in the marathon in Seville, Jong had only broken the 2:30-barrier once and her sole performance under that mark dated back to 1996, where she finished second on home-soil in Pyongyang in 2:29:56. The North Korean's undistinguished performance at the 1996 Olympic Games where she finished twentieth in Atlanta also didn't suggest she would be a medal contender in Seville but despite her lack of pedigree and international experience, Jong executed a clever race to seal the title. In hot conditions, Jong lowered her PB to 2:26:59, defeating a field of a very high calibre including Olympic champion Fatuma Roba and multi global medallists Lidia Simon and Manuela Machado. After claiming gold in Seville, Jong was never seen again on the international circuit.
Martin Buss – 2001 World Championships
BUSS won a bronze medal in the high jump at the 1999 World Championships , clearing 2.32m to make the podium but the German failed to surpass 2.30m outdoors until the final of the 2001 World Championships in Edmonton. Having competed sparingly and without great success in the run-up to the World Championships, very few expected the German to stage a repeat of his medal-winning performance from Seville but Buss, who missed the Sydney Olympics with injury, equalled his season's best of 2.30m in the final before clearing a world-leading mark and PB of 2.36m to defeat Vyacheslav Voronin and Yaroslav Rybakov. Having missed the Sydney Olympics, the father-of-two was also forced out of the Athens Olympics with another injury and announced his retirement in 2006.
Tianna Madison – 2005 World Championships
HAVING taken silver medals in the long jump at the 2001 and 2003 World Championships and a bronze at the 2004 Olympic Games, Tatyana Kotova looked on the cusp of claiming her first global outdoor title in Helsinki. The Russian went out to 6.79m and given the cold and wet conditions which affected the overall standard of the final, it looked as though her third round mark would suffice for the gold medal. However, American teenager Tianna Madison, who set a PB of 6.83m in the qualifying round, continued in this rich vein of form as she dethroned the Russian with a fifth-round effort of 6.89m to become the youngest winner of the world long jump title since Heike Drechsler won the inaugural world title in 1983 in the same arena.
Madison won a silver medal behind Kotova at the 2006 World Indoor Championships in Moscow but hasn't showed any resemblance of the form which took her to the world title in Helsinki. Madison's tenth place finish at the 2007 World Championships in Osaka marks her only other global appearance and the American hasn't surpassed the 6.50m barrier since 2008.
Yuriy Krymarenko – 2005 World Championships
IN a championships which produced a sizeable number of upset performances on the in-field, the most improbable occurred on the final day of competition as Yuriy Krymarenko cleared 2.32m to secure the world title in Helsinki. Prior to the World Championships in Helsinki, Krymarenko finished third at the European Under-23 Championships in Erfurt which didn't invite too much optimism for a medal-winning performance but in a final where many of the medal-winning favourites faltered, the Ukrainian seized his chance as he was the only athlete to clear 2.32m in the final. Just days later, Krymarenko finished equal sixth at the World University Games and since Helsinki, the Ukrainian failed to qualify for the final at the 2007 and 2009 World Championships or the 2008 Olympic Games.
France – 2005 World Championships
THE USA failed to get the baton across the line in the heats and Jamaica were weakened in the absence of Asafa Powell, which allowed France to take a shock victory, and their first global 4x100m title. Despite lacking the same flat-speed as their rivals, the French proved to be a well-drilled outfit with a world-lead of 38.34 in the heats and their quartet of Ladji Doucoure, Ronald Pognon, Eddy De Lepine and Lueyi Dovy rose to the occasion in the final, lowering the world-lead again to 38.08 to defeat Trinidad & Tobago by two-hundredths. Even though their squad included Doucoure, who won the world 110m hurdles title, he only held a season's best on the flat of 10.52, while De Lepine and Dovy had season's bests only in the 10.2-range.
Christine Ohuruogu – 2007 World Championships
VICTORY over Olympic 400m champion Tonique Williams-Darling at the 2006 Commonwealth Games confirmed what a great prospect Christine Ohuruogu was but shortly after taking victory in Melbourne, things turned sour as the Newham & Essex Beagle missed the first-half of the summer season with injury and on the eve of the European Championships, Ohuruogu was banned for one year after missing three out-of-competition tests. The Commonwealth champion's ban expired just in time for the World Championships and even though Ohuruogu gained selection for Osaka, the Brit was very much an unknown quantity and despite a 50.56 season's best in the warm-up meeting, very few observers still tipped Ohuruogu as a possible medal candidate even though the 400m was lacking an outstanding candidate. However, Ohuruogu looked smooth in the heats (50.46) and improved her PB to 50.16 in the final.
Given her lack of competition in the run-up, many onlookers questioned Ohuruogu's race fitness but the Olympic semi-finalist from Athens improved with every race and in the final, the Brit ran to her strengths, coming through strongly off the final bend to claim the title in a substantial PB of 49.61 ahead of team-mate Nicola Sanders, who improved to 49.65. Ohuruogu was slightly jaded after her exertions in the individual 400m but helped her country to bronze in the 4x400m in a UK record of 3:20.04.
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