Gatlin struggles to victory in Japan

KAWASAKI, Japan: American Justin Gatlin, so often the pantomime villain of men’s sprinting, returned to winning form with a pedestrian 100 metres victory here on Sunday.

The veteran 35-year-old, a two-time doping offender, recovered from a poor start in Kawasaki to win the Golden Grand Prix in 10.28 seconds into a slight headwind as he pipped Japan’s Aska Cambridge by three hundredths.

Japanese hope Abdul Hakim Sani Brown struggled home in fourth in 10.42 behind Shuhei Tada (10.35), while China’s Su Bingtian failed to build on victory in Shanghai earlier this month as he slumped to fifth.

Canada’s Aaron Brown won the men’s 200 metres in 20.62 with American Dedric Dukes runner-up in 20.71 and Japan’s Kenji Fujimitsu third in 20.93.

London Olympic bronze medallist Timothy Kitum took gold in the 800m with a time of 1:47.03 while Kenya’s Paul Tanui, who took silver behind Mo Farah in the 10,000m at last year’s Rio Olympics, won the 3,000m in 7:52.67.

Rio champion Thomas Rohler eased to victory in the men’s javelin, the German producing a best throw of 86.55 metres to beat Taiwan’s Huang Shih-Feng (82.57) and Czech Jaroslav Jilek (82.46).

Former European champion Ivet Lalova-Collio won the women’s 100m in 11.40 seconds, edging out Americans Tawanna Meadows (11.44) and Tianna Bartoletta (11.47).

Bartoletta won the women’s long jump — in which she took gold at the Rio Olympics and the 2015 world championships — with a best effort of 6.79 metres on her second leap.