Felix Sanchez, Dominican Republic?s best hope for a gold medal at the Athens Summer Olympics, extended his winning streak to 29 consecutive finals by clocking in at 48.44 in the 400-meter hurdles in the Ostrava, Czech Republic Grand Prix yesterday. A two-time world champion, Sanchez deflected the challenge of Joey Woody, who was second with a time of 48.77. Sanchez? entire athletics career has been developed in the United States, and is more specifically a product of the California sports system. Sanchez chose to compete for the Dominican Republic, by making a first appearance in the Sydney Olympics. In August 2003, he took the gold medal in a hurdles event at the Santo Domingo Pan Am Games.
As reported by the International Association of Athletics Federations, Sanchez said upon completing the race: ?I?m happy with the start of the season ? This is the first step towards the Olympic Games.?
http://www.iaaf.org/GP04/news/Kind=2/newsId=25542.html
Meanwhile, Juana Arrendell, another gold medalist in the Santo Domingo Pan Am Games, who unlike Sanchez is a product of the Dominican sports system, is posting a distance of 1.80 meters in the women?s high jump event, far below her score at the Pan Ams where she won with 1.97 meters. Hoy newspaper reports that the Ministry of Sports has not paid Arrendell?s Russian coach Nathalia Korotoeva for the past six months. Arrendell traveled alone to Europe to participate in an Olympic Games site-testing competition and said she would remain training in Europe on her own, given the financial difficulties that plague athletes in the Dominican Republic. Rather than focus on the athletes themselves, the Mejia administration gave priority to building world-class sports facilities, many of which are today closed or abandoned.