White Makes Huge Strides on Paris Stage

Even though U.S. sprinter Kelli White crossed the finish line first Thursday night in the 200-meter final at the track and field world championships, there was one woman she couldn’t run fast enough to escape.

Casting a long shadow from her home in North Carolina, her duties here as a television commentator completed, Marion Jones is seldom out of the minds of the sprinters she left behind or anyone who is watching them.

“I think a lot of the women here feel unappreciated,” White said.

That is not as true of White, 26, of Union City, Calif., as it might have been before she first stepped onto the Stade de France track last Saturday.

She won the 100 final a day later in 10.85 seconds, the best time in the world this year. Then, Thursday, she won the 200 in 22.05, also the best time in the world this year. Anastaslya Kapachinskaya of Russia was second in 22.38, and Torri Edwards, the former USC sprinter who finished second to White in the 100, was third in 22.38.

White’s double gives her a distinction that not even Jones can claim. Only two other women, Germans Silke Gladisch (1987) and Katrin Krabbe (‘91), have won the 100 and 200 in the same world championships. Jones won both in the 2000 Summer Olympics, but she won only the 100 in 1997 and ’99 and only the 200 in 2001.

Still, Jones, who has not competed this summer because of the birth of a son in June, remains the favorite, barring some unforeseen circumstance, in both events for the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens.

Perhaps White’s rapid improvement could be one of those unforeseen circumstances.

Since 2000, Jones hasn’t run as fast as White did here in the 200 and has run only once faster in the 100.

“As I’ve said before today, things can change from month to month,” White said. “There will be a while before we all step on the track together. Things can happen, and things do change.”

Things changed dramatically for White this year. She lost twice earlier to Allyson Felix, a 17-year-old senior from North Hills L.A. Baptist High, and, unable to overcome a lingering foot injury, she told her coach in the spring that she didn’t believe she’d be able to complete a full season.

Her coach in the Bay Area, Remi Korchemny, who coached great Ukrainian sprinter Valeri Borzov in the former Soviet Union, told her otherwise.

“He’s been coaching longer than we’ve been running, so we trust him,” said White, who also won the 100 and 200 in the national championships in June.

“This is a great accomplishment. It shows how much courage I have, to put everything together.”

Her finals here couldn’t have been more different. She didn’t start well in the 100, which isn’t unusual for her, but prevailed because of her strength. But she had an exceptional start in the 200, extended her lead with an exquisite turn, then faltered down the stretch.

Coming off the curve, she said, “I was just hoping they weren’t coming.

“That’s all I had left. The first 12 to 15 steps gave me enough oomph to get down the track.”

Edwards, 26, a Pomona native who now lives in Los Angeles, couldn’t hold off Kapachinskaya for second place, having exerted so much energy on the tight curve of lane two.

“Of course, I would have liked to have come out with a better medal,” Edwards said. “But, overall, I feel pretty good.”

The United States won its 10th medal of the championships, its third of the night, when Sandra Glover of Sugarland, Texas finished second to Jana Pittman of Australia in the 400-meter hurdles.

White, whose mother is a former Jamaican Olympian and whose father ran in college for California, never won a California high school title or NCAA title at Tennessee. Now she has two world titles.

“I’m not disappointed with that,” she said about her inability earlier to win big races. “This is where it counts. I’d rather have [success] now than when I was 16 or 17.”

Now, she might be more than a pretender in races against Jones.

Not that she is getting cocky.

Scott Davis, director of the Mt. San Antonio College Relays, is trying to put together a 300-meter race next April involving White, Jones and world 400-meter champion Ana Guevara of Mexico. None would be risking ranking, or ego, because the 300 is not run in the Olympics.

“That would be fun,” White said.

Asked how she thought the race might go, she said, “I’m sure I would be third.”