Usain Bolt wins Diamond League Paris 200m in fastest time of year

Usain Bolt recorded the fastest time of the year as he won the 200m at the Diamond League meeting in Paris.

The six-time Olympic gold medallist clocked 19.73 seconds to beat fellow Jamaican Warren Weir (19.92) and France's Christophe Lemaitre (20.07).

Olympic champion Greg Rutherford pulled out of the long jump, little more than a month before the World Championships, after sustaining a hamstring injury.

The Briton later wrote on Twitter there was "plenty of time" to recover.

Rutherford initially said: "Looks like bad news people. The old injury strikes. Hamstring pull."

But the 26-year-old added: "Just realised worlds is still five and a half weeks away. Plenty of time for this old hand.

"Flash back to 2009. I tore my hamstring three weeks before worlds in Berlin. First round of the qualification I broke the British record."

Rutherford jumped 7.99m in round three before withdrawing from the event, which Jamaican Damar Forbes (8.11) won from Briton Chris Tomlinson (8.08).

Bolt, meanwhile, showed there was no reason to be concerned about his slow start to the season.

This was the Jamaican's second outing over his favoured distance this year after clocking 19.79 in Oslo on June 13.

"I'm happy with myself," said the 26-year-old, the world record holder in both sprint events.

But he added: "I still need to work on a few mistakes."

American Tyson Gay, Bolt's main sprint rival, won the US World Championships trials in 19.74 last month.

He was also victorious in the 100m at the Diamond League meeting in Lausanne on Thursday in the second fastest time of the year.

Britain's European indoor 400m champion Perri Shakes-Drayton clocked 53.96 seconds to finish second in the women's 400m hurdles behind Olympic bronze medallist Zuzana Hejnova (53.23).

Shakes-Drayton, 24, ran 53.82 in her victory in Birmingham last week, and was disappointed with her performance in Paris.

"I have two more races to go," the Londoner told the BBC as she continues her preparations for the World Championships in Moscow.

"I am going to the trials next weekend, I have not made the team yet so that will be important, then I have the Anniversary Games in London."

Another Briton, Marilyn Okoro, achieved the World Championship A standard in the 800m, her one minute 59.76 seconds enough for fifth place behind winner Francine Niyonsaba (1:57.26) of Burundi.

"I am really happy," Okoro said. "It has been an interesting few months, but my coach said I was ready.

"A tremendous amount of pressure comes off now ahead of the trials. Now I have got the A standard, I just have to focus on finishing in the top two."

Okoro's Great Britain team-mate Steve Lewis finished sixth in the pole vault, equalling his season's best of 5.60m, with France's Olympic champion Renaud Lavillenie (5.92m) claiming victory.

World and Olympic champion Kirani James, from Grenada, won the head-to-head with American Lashawn Merritt in the 400m, clocking the first time under 44 seconds in the world this year.

James (43.96) was followed home by Merritt, who finished second in a season's best 44.09, with American Tony McQuay (44.84) in third.

Reigning 10,000m Olympic champion Tirunesh Dibaba, of Ethiopia, won the 5,000m in 14 minutes 23.68 seconds, the fastest time in the world this year, while Britain's Stephanie Twell (15:18.60) ran a season's best to finish 11th.

Jamaican double Olympic champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce also ran her best time of the year, 10.92 seconds, to win the 100m, while Olympic champion Robert Harting, from Germany, claimed victory in the discus with a throw of 67.04 metres.