The innagural Youth Olympics Games were hosted by Singapore last week. In the hammer throw, America was represented by just one athlete: Shelby Ashe (St. Pius X, Atlanta, GA). Ashe, who ranked first among the entrants, easily qualified for the finals with a throw of 58.00m (190'03") with the third best mark of the day. In the finals, she ended up placing eight with a best throw of 49.16m (161'03"). The gold medal was one by a familiar name to hammer throwing: Alexia Sedykh. Sedykh, throwing for France, is daughter of world record holder Yuri Sedykh and women's shot put world record holder Natalya Lisovaskaya. In the Hammer Throw both the top boy's and girl's qualifiers were far down on the yearly top lists (eleventh and ninth respectively) although the furthest pre-YOG performers will be in the finals. Sedykh had a best throw of 59.08m (193'10") in the finals.

The boy's competition was won by Liu Binbin of China, who threw the 5-kilogram hammer 73.99m (242'09"). While Binbin's mark was a personal best, the final took it's toll on some other competitors. Sebastion Dobkowski of Poland had the best mark entering the meet with a throw of 77.73m (255'00"), but only managed 69.54m (228'01") and fourth place in the final. Eslam Ahmad Taha of Egypt placed sixth with 63.75m (209'02") after qualifying in top position with a throw of 73.42m (240'10") a few days earlier.

HSHammer.com is a published by the non-profit Evergreen Athletic Fund and edited by Martin Bingisser. National performance lists are compiled by Bob Gourley.  Please consider donating to help support the site.