TOKYO : Cordell Tinch took the long road to elite athletics but capped a superb second season as a professional by winning 110 metres hurdles gold at the world championships on another sweltering Tokyo night on Tuesday.
The 25-year-old American was all control and pace as he blazed over the 10 hurdles and held off the fast finishers in the run-in to claim his first global title at his first global championships in 12.99 seconds.
Orlando Bennett ran a personal best 13.08 to win silver, while his fellow Jamaican Tyler Mason took the bronze in 13.12, which matched his previous best time.
Olympic gold medallist Grant Holloway’s six-year reign as world champion ended earlier on Tuesday when the American finished sixth in his semi-final, guaranteeing a fresh champion in the event.
Tinch could not have imagined it would be him in late 2022 when he was a cellphone salesman in his home town Green Bay, having given up first a college football scholarship and then a shot at Division I athletics.
He returned to the track at Pitt State in 2023 and impressed in the high hurdles sufficiently to turn professional last year, only mid-season surgery denying him the momentum to claim a spot on the U.S. team for the Olympics.
This season, however, he has dominated his event and Tinch’s sizzling 12.87 at the Shanghai/Keqiao Diamond League in May made him the joint-fourth fastest man of all time with 2008 Olympic champion Dayron Robles.
