Jessica Ennis-Hill leads heptathlon after day one at World Championships
Last Updated: 23/08/15 10:04am
Jessica Ennis-Hill is in a strong position to win heptathlon gold after impressing on the first day at the World Championships in Beijing.
The 29-year-old Olympic champion, in her first major championship since London 2012 and 13 months after the birth of her son Reggie, was on 4,005 points, with British team-mate Katarina Johnson-Thompson 80 points back in second.
The pair finished an impressive day in emphatic fashion with season's bests in the 200m, the fourth event of the competition.
World No 1 and favourite Canada's Brianne Theisen-Eaton, is fourth overall on 3,865 points.
Ennis-Hill said: "I had that feeling of slight disappointment because I'm always comparing myself to my best, but I'm really pleased with the scores I have.
It's definitely going to be a battle and hopefully we'll get a couple of medals
Jessica Ennis-Hill
"I had some solid events, I feel there's a lot more to come, which is frustrating, but generally really, really happy."
Ennis-Hill began a scorching morning at the Bird's Nest stadium by clocking 12.91 seconds over the 100m hurdles and equalling her season's best of 1.86m in the high jump.
Ennis-Hill's time over the barriers was 0.12secs down on that which she ran at the Anniversary Games in London in her last outing, but it was still a decent return to the world stage.
Having only returned to competition three months ago, she looked smooth in the high jump with first-time clearances all the way to 1.86m before going no further.
She then threw 13.73m in the shot. It was the Sheffield athlete's most disappointing result of the three, 22cm below her best throw of the year.
But her 200m time of 23.42s was second best only to Johnson-Thompson's 23.08.
Johnson-Thompson raced to a personal best of 13.37 in the hurdles, but lived dangerously in the high jump, one of her strongest events, before finally clearing 1.89m, the only athlete to do so.
Her high jump was rather erratic, needing third and final attempts to get past 1.89m after struggling to get the timing of her run-up to the bar right. Her 12.47m in the shot was just 2cm down on her PB.
"Kat's doing amazing, she's doing PBs, so it's definitely going to be a battle and hopefully we'll get a couple of medals," Ennis-Hill added.
"Gosh, the thought of it. It depends on the long jump and what the javelin goes like but it will probably be quite close in the 800 I would imagine. It is going to be a bit nerve-wracking."
The pair are going head to head over seven events for the first time since London 2012 and have the long jump, javelin and 800m to come on Sunday.
Laura Muir, a medal contender in the 1500m, cruised through her heat, finishing second to Ethiopia's Besu Sado in 4:05.53.
Laura Weightman, silver medallist at last summer's Commonwealth Games, also progressed, finishing sixth in her heat in 4:06.13 and fortunately appearing to emerge relatively unscathed from a heavy fall just after crossing
the line.
The news from the 800m was less positive, though, as Michael Rimmer and Kyle Langford both crashed out, but Ireland's Mark English scraped through as a fastest loser.
Nick Miller qualified second for the final of the hammer, but Mark Dry went out.
