Hailu to battle Meshesha in Czech Indoor Gala's first women's mile race

Ethiopia’s world indoor 800m silver medallist Freweyni Hailu and her compatriot Hirut Meshesha, the world indoor 1500m bronze medalist, will go head-to-head as the Czech Indoor Gala hosts a women’s mile race for the first time.

Hailu, who claimed silver in the mile at the World Athletics Road Running Championships Riga 23 in October, has a track mile PB of 4:14.79 set outdoors in Monaco last year, while Meshesha clocked 4:20.00 in Oslo in June.

Both have experience of racing in Ostrava having previously competed at the city’s outdoor Golden Spike meeting.

Joining them on the start line at the Atleticka hala will be Belgium’s 2021 European indoor 1500m champion Elise Vanderelst, Romania’s Claudia Bobocea, Sofia Thogersen of Denmark and Czech record-holder Simona Vrzalova.

The men’s 1500m features Portugal’s Isaac Nader and Czech record-holder Filip Sasinek, while the men’s 800m entries include Czech athletes Filip Snejdr and Jakub Dudycha, the European U20 champion.

They go up against Poland’s 2021 European indoor silver medalist Mateusz Borkowski, Italy’s Catalin Tecuceanu, British champion Daniel Rowden and Botswana’s world sixth-place finisher Tshepiso Masalela, making his short track debut.

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In other events, the women’s 60m meeting record will be under threat when Polish record-holder Ewa Swoboda returns to the Czech Indoor Gala.

The 2019 European indoor champion, who won in Ostrava in 2018 and set her national record of 6.99 in 2022, ran a world lead of 7.04 in Lodz on Saturday and a similar performance would see the eight-year-old meeting record of 7.10 tumble.

he’s not the only one who could attack the record, however. The in-form Patrizia van der Weken of Luxembourg ran a national record of 7.09 last weekend and the field also features Jamaica’s Remona Burchell, Belgium’s Rani Rosius and joint Czech record-holder Karolina Manasova.

Swoboda’s compatriot Pia Skrzyszowska also heads to Ostrava off the back of a win.

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The 2021 winner in Ostrava clocked 7.85 in the heats and the same in the final to triumph in Lodz and this time faces another athlete who will be buoyed by recent results – Ireland’s Sarah Lavin, who set PBs of 7.93 and then 7.91 in Astana.

They are joined in Ostrava by Nadine Visser of the Netherlands, who holds the meeting record of 7.86, plus USA’s Alaysha Johnson, who clocked 7.87 to win the Czech Indoor Gala in 2023 and went on to set a PB of 7.82 and win the US indoor title.

Jess Whittington for World Athletics.