BEIJING — China’s top sprinter Zhang Peimeng is expected to square it off against Japanese teenager Yoshihide Kiryu on May 10th IAAF world challenge series in Kawasaki, Japan.
Although Qatar’s Nigeria-born Femi Ogunode became the fastest man on the continent in last year’s Asian Games when he clocked 9.93 seconds in the 100 meters, the duel for the best Asian-born sprinter is yet to be settled.
In the meantime, both Zhang and Kiryu are looked upon to beat the 10 second barrier as the Asian-born athletes have worked hard for years to improve Japanese Koji Ito’s 10-second record set in 1998 Asian Games.
Zhang, 28, will warm up for the event as he runs a 200m in China’s national grand prix in Jinan on Wednesday.
He will try to recover his best form which brought him a personal best of 10.00 seconds in 2013 Moscow world championships.
Kiryu also jumped into the spotlight in 2013 when he equaled the world junior record of 10.01 in Hiroshima as a 17-year-old high school student.
Last month, he ran a wind-assisted unofficial 9.87 at a meet in Austin, Texas.
via Asian top sprinters Zhang, Kiryu expected to face each other in May | Shanghai Daily.
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