Chambers, Ennis enjoy golden day for Britain

By Gene Cherry

DOHA (Reuters) - Dwain Chambers claimed his first global sprint title and Jessica Ennis posted the fourth-best pentathlon score of all-time on a golden day for Britain at the world indoor championships on Saturday.

Chambers, banned for doping for two years in 2003, won the 60 meters with the year's fastest sprint time, an impressive 6.48 seconds.

American Mike Rodgers took second in 6.53 with Antigua's Daniel Bailey third at 6.57.

"I will enjoy this moment for a while and will work hard," said Chambers, who hopes to win the European 100 meters title this summer. "I'm so grateful to be here."

World heptathlon champion Ennis won the pentathlon with 4,937 points.

Only world record holder Irina Belova of Russia and Sweden's Carolina Kluft have posted better scores than the 24-year-old Briton. She topped Kluft's championship record by four points.

"I know the world record is within reach," said Ennis, who had victories in the 60 meters hurdles and high jump, a season's best in the shot put and personal bests in the long jump and the concluding 800 meters.

Olympic heptathlon gold medalist Nataliya Dobrynska of Ukraine was second with 4,851 points and Russia's Tatyana Chernova third at 4,762.

Australian Olympic and world pole vault champion Steve Hooker collected the only global title he was missing, the indoor title, with a championship record 6.01 meters. He then took three unsuccessful tries at adding a centimeter to Sergei Bubka's world record of 6.15 meters.

Ethiopian Meseret Defar also added more gold, claiming her fourth successive women's 3,000 meters title. She sprinted home in 8:51.17 to edge Kenyan 5,000 meters world champion Vivian Cheruiyot.

Another defending champion, Croatian Blanka Vlasic, won her second successful high jump title with a clearance of 2.00 meters.

A powerful U.S. team claimed four golds on the second-day of the three day meeting.

Defending champion Lolo Jones was perhaps the happiest, celebrating wildly after winning the women's 60 meters hurdles in a championship record 7.72 seconds. Only two women, Swedish world record holder Susanna Kallur and Russia's Ludmila Engquist, have run faster.

The Americans went 1-2 in the heptathlon with shot put defender Christain Cantwell and women's 400 meters runner Debbie Dunn also winning.

Olympic decathlon gold medalist Bryan Clay scored 6,204 points to edge world champion Trey Hardee, who had 6,184. Russia's Aleksey Drozdov was third with 6,141.

Cantwell took the shot put with a last-throw toss of 21.83 meters to overtake Andrei Mikhnevich of Belarus. Mikhnevich threw 21.68.

Dunn clocked 51.04 seconds for her 400 meters.

(Editing by Justin Palmer)