Williams mines surprising gold while Thompson, Parchment and VCB claim medals

André Lowe, Special Projects Editor - Sports

BEIJING, China:

There was half an hour of heaven for Jamaica inside the Bird's Nest stadium as the nation's athletes added four medals to the pile, taking the bounty to nine (four gold, two silver, three bronze) at the IAAF World Championships in Beijing, China.

Danielle Williams surprised, Hansle Parchment delivered, Elaine Thompson excited, and Veronica Campbell-Brown - well she pulled a 'Veronica Campbell-Brown', defying the odds and stepping up when it mattered, keeping the Jamaicans in third place in the medal table behind Kenya (11 - six gold, three silver, two bronze) and the USA (14 - four gold, four silver, six bronze).

Williams knocked on the door in the semi-finals of the women's 100m hurdles, lowering her personal best to 12.58, beating medal favourite Sharicka Nelvis (USA) into second place with the fastest time going into the final.

In that final, she took a sledge hammer and tore it down, again shaving her personal best to 12.57 (-0.3) getting out of the blocks, sticking with and out-hustling German Cindy Roleder, 12.59, and Alina Taley (Belarus), 12.66, to the line to claim Jamaica's fourth gold medal.

She was also part of history along with her sister Shermaine, who finished seventh in 12.95 as the Williams became the first siblings to compete in a 100m hurdles final at the World Championships.

"I so wanted her to get on the podium as well," said Danielle.

"I'm so happy and proud of her. She definitely deserves this," Shermaine said smiling.

Williams- Danielle that is - is now only the second Jamaican to win gold in the 100m hurdles at the World Championships after Brigitte Foster-Hylton did so in 2009 and the fourth to medal in the event after Michelle Freeman (1997), Foster-Hylton (2003, 2005), and Delloreen Ennis-London (2005, 2007, 2009).

Born 13 days apart and clearly the two form athletes here in the 200m, Thompson and Dutch star Dafne Schippers seemed destined for a head-on collision. Despite the Jamaican digging deep to produce a blistering 21.66 effort - the second-fastest time ever by a Jamaican and the sixth fastest in history Schippers' superior strength came up trumps as the towering Dutchwoman clocked 21.63 to take a close win at the line.

Campbell-Brown found her first sub-22 seconds time since 2010, posting 21.97 for the bronze. Sherone Simpson ran a season's best 22.50 but had to settle for eighth-place.

Parchment - the Olympic bronze medal winner - was hardly a factor this season, and he turned up in the 110m hurdles final, clocking 13.03 for second place behind Russian Sergey Shubenkov, 12.98 with world record holder Aries Merritt, 13.04, finishing third. Omar McLeod was sixth in 13.18 seconds.

Fedrick Dacres will be looking to have his say when he lines up in the men's discus final. Dacres enters the event with the leading qualifying mark - 65.77m. The event gets started at 6:50 a.m.

The men and women 4x100m relay teams are also expected to push for medals, with the women favoured to beat their American rivals to the gold and the men eager to make up for a loss suffered at the World Relays earlier this year.