Yvonne off to World Championships

Yvonne Bennett earned another stint to the world championship after being selected as one of the two CNMI representatives to the biennial competition in Daegu, Korea.

According to Northern Marianas Athletics secretary general Robin Sapong, Bennett will be competing in the 200m racae in the 2011 IAAF World Championships that will kick off on Aug. 27 and run until Sept. 4 at the Daegy Stadium, the same venue that hosted the 2002 FIFA World Cup.

Joining Bennett in Korea is sprinter Orrin Joseph Ogumoro Pharmin and NMA president Ray Tebuteb, who will be attending the International Association of Athletics Federations general assembly in Korea. Pharmin is entered in the 100m sprint.

The tournament in Daegu will be Bennett’s third straight world championship competition. She debuted in the prestigious tournament in 2009 when she and Tyrone Omar competed in Osaka, Japan. Then in 2009, Bennett and Clayton Kenty participated in the world championships in Berlin, Germany.

In Osaka, Bennett raced against then world champion Veronica Campbell of Jamaica and set a CNMI national mark in the 100m run. The Commonwealth sprinter timed in at 13.16 seconds to break her own mark of 13.57 seconds, which she logged during a high school meet in Guam in May 2007.

In Berlin in 2009, Bennett was entered in the 100m race, but failed to join the qualifying run due to colds. She got sick in Berlin for three days and her condition worsened on the day of the race. Less than a week before the race in Berlin, Bennett competed in the Oceania Regional Championships /Micronesian Athletics Association in Queensland, Australia.

Next month in Korea, the 21-year-old sprinter is expected to have fresh legs for the 200m race, as she has about two months to prepare for the event. Bennett is currently in Boise, Idaho and will go straight to Korea. She went to Apia, Samoa last month and won one gold medal and two bronze in the 2011 Oceania Regional Championships.

The Kagman High School graduate set new CNMI and Micronesian marks in the 100m (12.52 seconds) and 200m (25.67 seconds) runs in Samoa and claimed bronze medals in these two events. Then in the last day of the Oceania competition, she notched a gold medal in the 400m race with a time of 57.66 seconds.