By Gilbert Wandera and IAAF

World silver medalist Silas Kiplagat continued with his great post-Olympic performance with victory in the 1,500m event at the 42nd edition of the Rieti meeting on Sunday.

It was Kiplagat’s third consecutive win in a row after a poor performance at the London Olympic Games where he finished seventh.

In Rieti, Kiplagat won in 3:31.86. He broke away from fellow Kenyan Collins Cheboi with 300m to go and ran an impressive last lap.  Cheboi finished a distant second in 3:33.97.

Double World champion Vivian Cheruiyot, who won the silver in the 5,000m and bronze in the 10,000m at the Olympics, scored another win in a tactical women’s 3,000m race after clocking 8:49.17.

Cheruiyot won with a powerful final sprint over double world silver medallist Sylvia Kibet, who settled for second position in 8:49.38.

Mary Kuria won the women’s 1,500m in 4:08.76 for her second consecutive victory this week after the Palio della Quercia in Rovereto.

Kenyan runners lost in both 800m events and their traditional race the 3,000m steeplechase.

19-year-old Francine Niyonsaba of Burundi, seventh at the Olympic Games and African champion in Porto Novo, Benin scored her second win in the women’s 800m clocking a superb 1:57.65.

The victory came two days after her great display in the Brussels Samsung Diamond League meeting where she set a new PB of 1:56.59. Kenyan Winny Chebet lowered her PB clocking 1:59.17 for third place.

This year’s surprise Olympic 1,500m champion Taoufik Makloufi narrowly missed his 800m PB by 0.03 with a 1:43.74.

The race was launched by pacemaker Nicholas Kipkoech who went through the first 400m in 50.08 before dropping out 100m later.  Makloufi took the lead at 600m and came off the bend in the lead.

In the final straight the Algerian middle-distance runner had to hold off the desperate sprint by 17-year-old World Junior bronze medallist Edwin Melly Kiplangat, but the Algerian managed to save the win by 0.06.

Melly smashed his PB from 1:44.32 set in Stockolm to an impressive 1:43.81.

Australian Collis Birmingham produced a major surprise by taking the victory in the men’s 3,000m in 7:37.77. Birmingham pulled away with 800m to go.