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NEW YORK CITY (May 24) – Two-time Olympic medalist Bernard Lagat and Craig Mottram, the World Championship bronze medalist at 5000 meters, will face each other in the Mile at the Reebok Grand Prix on June 2, organizers announced today.
Among other contenders in the top field will be Americans Chris Lukezic, the 2006 US Indoor 1500m Champion, and Alan Webb, who holds the 2-Mile American Record; and Nick Willis of New Zealand, the 2006 Commonwealth Games gold medalist at 1500 meters.
Joining them on an international roster that includes two dozen Olympic and World Championships medalists will be Ethiopia’s Tirunesh Dibaba at 5000 meters. Dibaba, a 2005 double World Champion at 5000m and 10,000m, broke her own World Indoor Record at 5000m at the Reebok Boston Indoor Games in January and is ranked #1 in the world. Last year, countrywoman Meseret Defar broke the World Record for 5000m here in what was named the Performance of the Year by any woman in the sport.
The Mile will serve as a rematch between the men who finished an exciting one-two at the 100th Millrose Games, where Lagat and Mottram dueled for the win until Lagat took control on the final lap for his fifth Wanamaker Mile victory. Lagat is the American Record-holder at 1500m outdoors, as well as 1500m and the Mile indoors. Mottram, the Australian National Record-holder at the Mile, 3000m and 5000m, is also well-known in New York as a two-time winner of the Healthy Kidney 10K and champion of the 2005 Continental Airlines Fifth Avenue Mile.
The third-annual Reebok Grand Prix, named one of the two top international track-and-field events in the country, will begin at 5 p.m. on June 2 at the state-of-the-art Icahn Stadium, on Randall’s Island. It is the third stop of USA Track & Field’s Visa Championship Series. Tickets, at $20, $30 and $40 each, are available by calling 1-877-TIX-TRAC. For more information and event updates, visit the event website at www.ReebokGrandPrix.com.
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