Sawt Falasteen - Jacobs to compete in Lodz in run up to indoor worlds

Italian Jacobs, who stunned the world when he won both the 100 metres and 4x100m relay at the Tokyo Games in August, won the 60 metres at last week's Berlin indoor meet and will race the same distance in Poland on Friday.

"I can't wait to race again, starting from Friday in Poland," said Jacobs, speaking to reporters at Rome's foreign press association.

"I missed the adrenaline of racing, I hope I'm never away for that long again because I missed it."

Jacobs will race in Lodz and then in Lievin in France as part of his preparations for the World Athletics Indoor Championships, which take place in Belgrade between March 18-20.

The European indoor 60m champion said that he would be competing throughout the indoor season in the lead up to the worlds, and that once competition moves outdoors would be racing over 200 metres.

"Once the outdoor season begins I would like to start with some 200 metres, because they are useful for the 100 metres," he said.

Before winning in Berlin with a time of 6.51 seconds the 27-year-old addressed the suspicions over doping which lingered over his surprise Olympic triumphs.

"I would never do anything as an athlete competing for my country that would bring disrepute on me as a man or on my nation," Jacobs told the British newspaper Daily Telegraph last month when asked if he had ever taken banned performance-enhancing substances.

Jacobs' 100m victory in Tokyo with a European record of 9.80sec stunned athletics observers and was one of several high points of a memorable sporting summer for Italy, whose football team also won Euro 2020.

His European 60m indoor title from the previous winter had already raised eyebrows, with experts asking how his performances could have improved so quickly without the help of doping.

Jacobs argued that his rapid improvement in the 100m was down to the fact that he was new to the sprinting events, having focused on the long jump for much of his career.

R.Halabi--SF-PST