Veteran Welsh star Colin Jackson won a thrilling 110 metre hurdles race in tonight's Honda Golden League meeting in Rome's Olympic Stadium.
Mastering the conditions better than his younger rivals 34-year-old Jackson made a brilliant start coming out of his blocks like a bullet to snatch the early advantage.
Then, when strongly challenged at the eighth and ninth hurdles, the world record holder drew on the experience which has earned him 22 major championship medals to keep the opposition at bay.
It was a marvellous run from Jackson whose time of 13.37 seconds shaded Olympic finalist Dudley Dorival of Haiti and third-placed Shaun Bownes from South Africa who were both given the same time of 13.38sec.
After finishing fifth in last year's Olympics Jackson immediately insisted his glittering championship career had come to an end and claimed he would not defend his world title in Edmonton in five weeks' time.
After scoring his third - and most impressive - win in eight outings this summer, Jackson again insisted he will not be in Edmonton.
He said: "It's always nice to go out there, run well and win. But I am knocking the World Championships on the head. "Instead I'm concentrating on late season - the Goodwill Games and Grand Prix final in Australia."
Paula Radcliffe could only finish fifth in a star-studded 3,000m race - although she did smash her two-year-old British record. Victory went to Olga Yegorova who caught the field flat-footed with 150m remaining and finished in eight minutes 23.96secs - the fastest time in the world this year.
Russia dominated the podium with Yelena Zadorozhnaya - who beat Radcliffe for the European Cup 5,000m title last weekend - finishing runner-up and Tatyana Tomashova third.
Battling to her fastest ever time of 8mins 26.97secs Radcliffe, knowing she lacked the finishing pace of most of her rivals, hit the front with 1,000m remaining but could not hold on.
The 27-year-old world half-marathon champion said: "I'm disappointed I came only fifth after running so fast. "I ran 10 times better than I did last week." Meanwhile, the Irish team for the World Championships in Edmonton when he recorded a qualifying time of 13 seconds at the Golden Gala Grand Prix in Rome last night. Unfortunately, that time was good enough for only 17th place in a race dominated by the Africans.
