Qualified Hooker doubtful; Radcliffe out of marathon

Berlin - Olympic champion Steve Hooker of Australia remained doubtful for the world championship pole vault final despite qualifying while British star Paula Radcliffe said she won't run the marathon. Radcliffe said in a statement issued by the British federation that she did not consider herself fully fit to go for gold on Sunday in the wake of foot surgery. Radcliffe is the world record holder and won the world title in 2005. 'I am devastated that I wasn't able to be ready in time to represent Britain here in Berlin, especially having got so close in such a short time frame,' she said. 'However, after having the surgery to successfully put the years of injury behind me it is very important to me that I come back to racing often and winning at 100 per cent and continue strongly and successfully through to (the Olympics in) London 2012.' Radcliffe was joined on the sidelines by American pole vault title holder Brad Walker, who withdrew shortly before the day's qualifying round with a hip injury he sustained at a recent meet in Monaco. Hooker was doubtful over a hamstring problem sustained in training last week, but he did compete and qualified for Saturday's final with one jump over 5.65m. However, he said he was unsure whether he will be fit to compete. 'I was not great, I was just looking for a clearance,' said Hooker. 'I felt my thigh when I landed on the mat. I am not sure about my appearance in the final. 'I am jumping well. It is just that I am not healthy. I don't know whether there are more than one or two jumps in me.' French sensation Renaud Lavillenie, the world leader with 6.01m, also made it as 15 vaulters advanced. The 2004 Olympic silver medallist Toby Stevenson of the US was the most prominent casualty as 5.40m were not good enough. The heats were held in a wide open men's 800m, with Sudan contender Abubaker kaki into the semis along with Kenyan holder Alfred Kirwa Yego and the 2004 Olympic champion Yuriy Borzakovskiy of Russia. American Trey Hardee regained the decathlon lead from overnight frontrunner Oleksiy Kasyanov and has 6,334 points from seven events to the Ukrainin's 6,275. Alexandr Pogorelov is third on 6,163, just 12 points ahead of Cuban Yunior Diaz. Czech holder Roman Sebrle, who is the only man to score more than 9,000 points with a 2001 world record of 9,026, ranks sixth with 6,036 and is not expected to medal this time after getting silver 2003 and 2005 before a 2007 gold. Sebrle was furious on Wednesday night, saying he was not given enough time to rest ahead of the day's final event, the 400m, after a seemingly endless high jump round (in which he cleared 2.11m). 'I think it's an international shame. This is just madness. I had a perfect high jump and I was among the last athletes to finish that event and they made me run the first heat at 400 just 20 minutes later,' he fumed. But competition director Paul Hardy told the German Press Agency dpa on Thursday that the break was 30 minutes according to the rules and that Sebrle declined an offer to run in a later 400m heat. 'We gave him the choice to run later,' Hardy said. The 400m races took place more than one hour later than originally scheduled. Hardy said that 'the high jump went on way longer than we anticipated because of the large number of entries.' The decathlon was scheduled to continue throughout the day until the concluding 1,500m race in the evening. However, the 200m final with Jamaican superstar Usain Bolt and a women's high jump duel between local Ariane Friedrich and Croatian holder Blanka Vlasic were expected to steal the headlines.