But there were also international flourishes over the 60m distance at the National Indoor Arena as yet another rising Jamaican sprinter, Lerone Clarke, announced himself by beating more established compatriots Nesta Carter and former world 100m record holder Asafa Powell in the sprint, while in the 60m hurdles former world record holder Liu Xiang and current world record holder Dayron Robles produced a contest which saw the Chinese athlete win in a national record of 7.41.

For Xiang it was a small payback for the incident which occurred during the 110m hurdles final at last year's World Championships, where he was leading until being knocked out of his stride by the Cuban, whose victory was subsequently annulled but whose actions in the heat of battle meant Liu only finished with silver.

In the final he left Robles behind from the start and although the Cuban appeared to dip too soon, Xiang was already well clear.


Robles equalled his season's best with 6.50 as Dexter Faulk took third.

But Xiang had issued a warning for the rest of the season.

"I still feel I didn't do very well over the first two hurdles and there is work to be done there," he said.

"I am excited about the rest of the year now."

Clarke set a Jamaican record of 6.47sec, with Carter – who has a 100m time of 9.78 to his credit – was second with 6.49 and Powell, not normally an indoor runner, third in 6.50.

Ominous.

"I'm grateful to do it, especially to get a national record," said Clarke.

"Asafa Powell, Nesta Carter, they're all fast guys so to come here and win is fantastic."

Ennis looked superb in equalling her PB of 7.95 at the UK Championships last weekend, but she surpassed that in clocking 7.87 to knock Lolo Jones from the top of the world lists as last summer's Diamond League winner struggled to keep up.


One of Britain's relatively few disappointments occurred in the rarely-run two miles, where their wWorld 5,000m champion Mo Farah was beaten by Kenya's world 5,000m champion of 2003, Eliud Kipchoge.

Farah finished in 8min 08.07sec, with Kipchoge registering 8:07.39.

A sell-out home crowd of 8,000 saw adopted Briton Shara Proctor break the long-standing national indoor long jump record with an effort of 6.80 metres after first exceeding the record with 6.71.

"In my mind I knew I could jump 6.71m because I dreamt it last night," said Proctor.

"So I came out aiming at that.

"And then I said 'Shara you can go further'.

"So I did."

Kerin Mey of Turkey was second with 6.66, while Ennis finished third with 6.47.

"I was buzzing after my race this morning and I took that into my jumping," said Ennis.

"I've been saying for a while that I need to get some consistency in my jumping, so that's what I'm looking to do."


Britain's 20-year-old pole vaulter Holly Bleasdale (pictured), who went third on the all-time indoor rankings earlier this month with an effort of 4.87,  lived up to her billing to beat Poland's former world champion Anna Rogowska on countback with 4.70 after clearing 4.52 on her third and final attempt.

Bleasdale had almost gone out at her opening height as at first struggled to master her new longer poles.

Ethiopia's Meseret Defar smashed her own world lead to win the women's 3,000m ahead of Kenyan Helen Obiri and Gelete Burka.

The former world and Olympic 5,000m champion who is the reigning 3000m World Indoor champion led through two kilometres in 5:44.54 closely followed by Obiri and Burka before turning the screw over the last three laps to win by a large margin two seconds inside her own world lead.

Defar stopped the clock at 8:31.55 with Obiri second in her lifetime best of 8:35.35. Burka held off Meselech Melkamu for third.

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