Eugene (United States) (AFP)

For the first major meeting since the Tokyo Olympics, the Eugene meeting, counting for the Diamond League, will hit hard on Saturday (10:40 pm French, 8:40 pm GMT) with the eagerly awaited duel between the Jamaican queen of the sprint Elaine Thompson -Herah, three-time Olympic champion in Tokyo, and American Sha'Carri Richardson, revenge after her suspension for testing positive for cannabis.

Thompson-Herah, crowned Olympic champion in Tokyo in 100m, 200m and 4x100m, could consolidate her domination a little more on the straight line, after having broken the Olympic record (10.61), approaching the world record of the sulphurous Florence Griffith-Joyner (10.49).

The women's 100m plateau will be raised, with the presence of six Olympic finalists, including the podium of the Tokyo Olympics, Thompson-Herah and her compatriots Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Shericka Jackson, as well as the Ivorian Marie-Josée Ta Lou, the Swiss Mujinga Kambundji and the American Teahna Daniels.

One year before the 2022 Worlds which will take place on this same Eugene track, Thompson-Herah, already adorned with gold in Rio in 2016 over 100 m and 200 m, will have Richardson as his main threat, whom she does not have. never faced before.

Jamaican Elaine Thompson-Herah savoring her triumph in the 200m final of the Tokyo Games, August 3, 2021 JAVIER SORIANO AFP / Archives

Returning to competition after being suspended at the end of June for thirty days for consumption of cannabis and deprived of the Olympic Games, the 21-year-old American confided in an interview broadcast on Friday by the NBC channel "to be impatient and delighted to start doing this again. that (she) likes to do ".

"Coming back is a form of thank you, because I made a mistake, but it does not detract from my talent or who I am," also said the sprinter who told NBC in early July that 'she had used marijuana after learning of her birth mother's death.

"I know what I have done. I know that I am responsible. And I am here to take what I have to take after the choices I have decided to make," she said during the Friday interview.

The American says she has experienced the Olympics in front of her television with "bitterness", but the situation has also "given her more time", she believes.

"To show the whole world that I'm here to last (...) Watching (on TV) made me want to move forward and grow because of it."

- Hassan for the world record -

Richardson was unknown to the general public until April and her time of 10.72 at a meeting in Florida, which made her become the sixth-fastest woman in history.

"She will be focused on having the best race possible, no matter who is competing," her agent Renaldo Nehemiah said in an interview with The Wall Street Journal.

Richardson is also listed in the 200m where she will face her illustrious compatriot Allyson Felix who, at 35, brought her collection of Olympic medals to Tokyo at eleven.

In the men's 100m, in the absence of the Italian Olympic champion Lamont Marcell Jacobs, who ended his season, the American Fred Kerley, his runner-up in Tokyo and the Canadian Andre De Grasse, crowned in the 200m, do office favorites.

Among the other stars of the meeting, the Dutch Sifan Hassan, returned from Tokyo with two gold medals (5,000 m, 10,000 m) and one bronze (1,500 m), who announced on social networks that she was aiming for the record of the 5,000m world of the Ethiopian Letesenbet Gidey (14 min 06 sec 62 / 100th).

Dutch cross-country skier Sifan Hassan victorious in the 10,000m at the Tokyo Games, August 7, 2021 Jewel SAMAD AFP / Archives

“A long time ago, I decided to come to Eugene to tackle the 5,000m world record, it's going to be tough after all the races in Tokyo,” she wrote.

Over the 800m, the Olympic champion, the 19-year-old American Athing Mu, also crowned in the 4x400m relay in Tokyo, will meet her compatriot Raevyn Rogers and the Briton Keely Hodgkinson.

The Norwegian Jakob Ingebrigsten will have to resist over the 1,500m to the Kenyan Timothy Cheruiyot, whom he had beaten at the Olympics, while the American Ryan Crouser, two reigning Olympic champion in the shot put, will return to the stadium where he beat in June. last Randy Barnes' old world record (23.37 m).

© 2021 AFP