BRAIMA SUNCAR DABO was a hero in Doha after sacrificing his own time to help stricken Jonathan Busby in the men’s 5,000m heats.
With one lap to go, the Guinea-Bissau athlete stopped running after noticing that Aruba’s Busby was struggling and could barely stand up.
He put his arm around his opponent’s shoulder and carefully guided, sometimes dragged, him to the finishing line along the final lap – with the crowd cheering him home.
The pair finished five minutes after the race winner and Busby collapsed to the floor at the end.
After the race, Dabo said: “I hope he would have done the same.
And the commentator added: “What a moment. They didn’t travel here to drop out. They travelled here to finish.”
It was a wonderful moment of sportsmanship and reminiscent of the famous moment from the 1992 Barcelona Olympics.
Dad Jim sprinted on to the track and past security to help his son Derek Redmond, who had snapped his hamstring during the 400m semi-final.
The touching gesture came after Czech athlete Diana Mezulianikova dramatically collapsed to the floor during a punishing 800m race.
The 27-year-old had no energy left after finishing in sixth place in her seven-woman heat on day one of the IAAF World Athletics Championships in Doha.
Temperatures reached 35 degrees during the day, with incredibly high levels of humidity.
It is much cooler in the Khalifa International stadium due to impressive, state-of-the-art cooling technology that eases the conditions in the arena for the athletes.
However, Mezulianikova was still suffering after two laps of the track.
And she made the dramatic fall after finishing in a time of 2:03.48 and failing to qualify for the semi-finals on Saturday.
Aftet the race, she said: “It was pretty fast for me, but unfortunately I was fighting with my opponent in the corner, which took me quite hard.
“It seemed to me that I still had the strength, but there it slowed me down.
“I almost stopped and had to start running again, so it was a bit uncomfortable in this. I cannot be completely satisfied.”
The 800m is not normally Mezulianikova’s speciality as she usually runs in the 1500m.
Scot Lynsey Sharp, one of the dark horses for a medal in the 800m, also bombed out, finishing fourth in her heat in a slow time of 2:03.57.
Source: Athletics - thesun.co.uk
