Womens 800m - Womens 800m v Without Jelimo

17 August 2008

Preview By Tipster CYellow (England)

We may as well hang the gold medal around the neck of Kenyas Pamela Jelimo now. She has been the find of 2008 dominating every 800m race she has run and winning them all in very fast times. She has run every race in qualifying for the final from the front and i really like this. No risking getting boxed in or tripped up, she just front runs and no-one can keep up. Its highly likely to be a repeat scenario in the final as Jelimo becomes Kenyas first female athlete to win a gold medal.

We wont get very rich backing her to do so tho as she is a red hot favourite so lets look instead at the betting without Jelimo.

Now its safe to assume this is going to be a fast race so the main thing we need to look at is runners who have run fast times rather than runners who have sprinted home in style.

Last years world champion, commonwealth champion and favourite (without Jelimo) is fellow Kenyan Janeth Jepkosgei. She looked like she would be the Kenyan to dominate the 800m when winning in Osaka last year. However she has watched Jelimo take all before her in 2008 including Jepkosgei's African record. She won her semi in 1:57:28.

She beat a very shocked Yuliya Krevsun, no suprise she looked shocked having taken two big bumps and still running a PB. Can she repeat that? We shall see but for me she ran her final today. That said if she can muster that sort of finish almost stopping twice she is one i want on my side.

Kenia Sinclair will be happy just to have made the final and while i hate labelling Maria Mutola as an also ran she is not at all likely to feature in the medal shake up altho you can be sure she will be in the way at 200m because she always runs to give herself a chance. She just does not have the speed any more.

Hasna Benhassi had her big chance in Athens when she failed to beat Dame Kelly Holmes in the 800m finishing 2nd. She ran a seasons best in qualifying for the final but was no match for Jelimo. Without a doubt a class athlete but i think she is on the downturn in her career.

Svetlana Klyuka won the first semi final but in truth it was by far the weakest of the semi finals. She does have a very fast time to her name and that was run in the final of the Russian championships when she was 3rd behind another of the finalists...

...Tatyana Andrianova. Andrianova ran 2nd in that Russian Championships is a time only Soboleva (banned for tampering with a drug test sample) and Jelimo have bettered in 2008. Andrianova only qualified as a fastest loser in the semi-final being outsprinted by Krevsun in the final 100m. Now given Krevsun is 5.0 and Kyluka is 6.0 Andrianova has been totally dismisssed based on a quote of 34.0. Based solely on her time and performance back in July in the Russian Championships that has to be a bit of value.

The quote on Jepkosgei suprises me too. VC have her at 2.63 which has to be backed. She is no bottler in major finals. My only concern with her is she tries to run with Jelimo and blows up in the final 100m to someone who has run a more even paced race.

How you choose to take this info is up to you

Back Jepkosgei 2.63 (VC Bet)

Back Andrianova @ 34.0 (VC Bet)

Back Benhassi @ 8.0 (Bwin)

Back Krevsun @ 7.0 (Bwin)

Dutching the top 2 works out at 2.44

Dutching the top 3 works out at 1.87

Dutching all 4 works out at 1.47 (Outstanding bet in my opinion)

So by backing all 4 you are simply opposing no hopers Mutola, Sinclair and taking on Klyuka. Seems a very good 1.5 chance to me.

Conclusion

========

For me Jepkosgei alone is a decent enough bet and if you are not into backing odds on chances then a bet of around 4-5 units on her is more than reasonable. The longshot gamblers may chance 1 unit on Andrianova. However with the enormous discrepancy amongst the bookmakers the bet has to be as follows:

Jepkosgei 5.61 Units @ 2.63 (VC Bet)

Andrianova 0.43 Units @ 34.0 (VC Bet)

Benhassi 1.85 units @ 8.0 (Bwin)

Krevsun 2.11 units @ 7.0 (Bwin)

Total units staked 10

Any winner returns 14.76 units.