Great Ethiopian Run (GER) - No record for Defar, but triple Ethiopian triumph in Stuttgart

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No record for Defar, but triple Ethiopian triumph in Stuttgart

8 February 2010- Ethiopia's triple world indoor 3000m champion Meseret Defar came tantalizingly-close to smashing her own world record at the event on a night of two other Ethiopian victories in the 2010 Sparkassen Cup- IAAF Indoor Permit meeting- in Stuttgart, Germany on Saturday night.

The 26-year old, who held four of the five fastest times in the history of indoor 3000m running before the meeting, was chased throughout the contest by Sentayehu Ejigu, but clocked 8:24.46 to take her fifth consecutive victory in Stuttgart. The biggest victor from the race was Sentayehu Ejigu who run a lifetime best of 8:25.27 ahead of Kenyan Sylvia Kibet. Defar and Ejigu's finishing times are now to second and fourth in the all-time lists for the women's 3000m indoors.

Defar will hope for better fortunes on Wednesday when she attempts the world indoor 5000m mark in Stockholm, Sweden.

Ethiopia's hopes of becoming the top nation in the middle distances received yet another boost when Gelete Burka and Deresse Mekonnen clocked world leading times in the women's and men's 1500m in Stuttgart.

Mekonnen, who is the world outdoor silver medallist and reigning world indoor champion, opened his season with 3:34.17, a time which now makes him the twelfth fastest over the event as he came within a second breaking the national 1500m record held by Haile Gebrselassie.

In the women's race, Burka, who had opened her season last weekend with victory in Karlsruhe; improved her world leading time to 4:03.44. The 24-year old was awarded the world indoor gold after Russian duo of Yelena Soboleva and Yuliya Fomenko were sanctioned for a doping offence and will hope to win gold this year in Doha outright.

The other top Ethiopian performance on the night came from world indoor 3000m champion Tariku Bekele as he finished second in the men's 3000m behind Kenya's Eliud Kipchoge.

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