It was an encouraging start to the championships for Britain's heptathletes as Ennis and team-mate Kelly Sotherton both recorded lifetime bests in the hurdles. Ennis sliced 0.07 seconds off her PB while Sotherton achieved her fastest-ever mark of 13.21. In her favourite event, the high jump, Ennis went over at 1.89m while Sotherton managed 1.86m. After two events, Ennis lies 51 points behind Sweden's defending champion Kluft, who showed her class with a personal best of 13.15 in the hurdles and 1.95m in the high jump.
Sotherton, the Commonwealth champion, is fourth - 72 points behind third-placed Ukrainian Lyudmila Blonska. The shot put and 200m are still to come on the first day of competition in Osaka. The new track at the Nagai stadium got the approval of American Tyson Gay as the world's leading 100m runner eased into the quarters in 10.19. "It's the fastest track I've ever been on," Gay, 25, said. "I just couldn't really run slow, it was kind of hard. "I tried to run 10.3 but the track wouldn't allow me to do it." Jamaican's world record holder Asafa Powell slowed down after 60m to finish second in his heat in 10.34. Britons Mark Lewis-Francis (10.21) and Craig Pickering (10.24) both made it through to the next round with no problems. There was an upset in the early round as Portugal's Olympic silver medallist and European champion Francis Obikwelu was disqualified for a false start. Kibet , a 24-year-old prison guard, overcame stifling heat to win in two hours 15 minutes 59 seconds for Kenya's first world marathon gold in 20 years. Mubarak Hassan Shami was over a minute behind in second with Switzerland's Viktor Roethlin winning bronze. Britain's Dan Robinson finished in 11th with a time of 2:20.58, but there was disappointment for the home fans as Japan's Tsuyoshi Ogato was fifth.
Source: BBC Sport
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