World champ Nathan Deakes withdraws again

06/14/2009

SYDNEY — Australia’s reigning world 50km walk champion Nathan Deakes said Friday he would not defend his title at the Berlin world athletics championships in August.

Deakes, 31, said he suffered a setback this week in his comeback from hamstring surgery which forced him out of last year’s Beijing Olympics when he was the gold medal favourite.

Deakes, who won Olympic bronze in the event at Athens in 2004, said his hamstring was holding up, but a “tight hip” had forced his withdrawal from the August 15-23 world championships in Germany.

“I am not at the level I need to be or want to be at,” he said.

Deakes, a four-time Commonwealth Games champion, won 50 km gold at the 2007 world titles in Osaka, Japan.

He said his injury-enforced absences had him thinking about training for the 2012 Olympic Games in London.

“All my life I have dreamt about being an Olympic champion and I had what I foresaw as a great opportunity last year,” he said.

“It gives me a bit of a motivating factor to think about London.” AFP

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