Olympic champion Bryan Clay also held on to his heptathlon title Saturday, adding to a great day for the US team.

Christian Cantwell won his third shot put title and Debbie Dunn added gold in the 400 meters.

The United States failed to win the 60-meter dash for the second time in a row when Dwain Chambers beat Mike Rodgers in the 60 meters in a world leading 6.48 seconds for an edge of .05 seconds over his American rival. It was the first global title for the Briton after coming back from a two-year drug suspension in 2006.

The comeback story of the day though belonged to Jones, who is now only behind world record holder Sweden's Susanna Kallur of Sweden and Ludmila Engquist in the all-time list.

She seemed as good as out of the championships when she hit the second hurdle hard in the semifinal and almost veered out of her lane to regain composure. Somehow she got her act together and scraped into the final by .01 seconds.

She immediately left the Aspire Dome, had a good cry and screamed at her coach "What do I do, what do I do?" She came back and, with gold on the line, was flawless and lightning fast in 7.72 seconds. Beating the field by .14 seconds, Jones was just .04 seconds short of Kallur's world record and 0.3 behind Engquist's best.

"I said 'keep everything tight and don't you dare hit a hurdle' and that is what I did." "I can't just believe what I just did here. I've broken the American record, the world championship record and first female in history to win back to back titles in the hurdles," she said.

It eased the pain of the Beijing Olympics where she hit one of the last hurdles to lose an almost certain gold.

"I had many times I doubted my confidence," Jones said.

"Not only did I mess up the Olympics but I got hurt most of last year. So I had two years where I said 'come on' can I get back on track." "This meet shows that I can come into competition, be number 1 with the spotlight on me and deliver a medal." She was not the only one who delivered. Others made it much more straightforward though.

Blanka Vlasic was flawless clearing five heights up to two meters to take gold ahead of Ruth Beitia of Spain and American Chaunte Howard Lowe. Both cleared 1.98 but the Spaniard was second on a countback.

In the pole vault, Australia's Steve Hooker added the world indoor title to the Olympic and world outdoor golds.

He entered the competition at 5.70 and cleared it on his first attempt. It would have been good enough for gold already, but he added 5.80 to make sure and with the gold wrapped up, he jumped a championship record of 6.01 meters.

He failed three times at 6.16 in his attempt to beat the 18-year-record held by Sergey Bubka.

Australia got a second gold when Fabrice Lapierre upset defending champion Godfrey Khotso Mokoena on his penultimate long jump to take the title with 8.17 meters.

Mokoena only got to 8.08 on his last attempt.

Britain and Ethiopia also got two golds Saturday.

Chambers finally won his first big one. He dominated the heats and semifinal and never left any doubt who would cross first in the sprint.

"That was probably the hardest six seconds of my life," he said. Like many indoor events, it was weakened by no-shows. Neither Usain Bolt or Tyson Gay competed in the winter circuit.

In the women's pentathlon, Jessica Ennis led from start to finish to take gold ahead of Olympic champion Natallia Dobrynska and Russia's Tatyana Chernova.

Ennis, the outdoor heptathlon world champion, finished with a championship record of 4,937 points, while Dobrynska set a Ukrainian record of 4,851. Behind Chernova's 4,762, US athlete Hyleas Fountain set a North American record of 4,753.

For Ethiopia, Meseret Defar won her fourth 3,000 meter world indoor title in a row, beating Kenya's Vivian Cheruiyot in a sprint to the line. Defar's teammate Sentayehu Ejigu took the bronze.

Shortly afterward, another Ethiopian added more gold when Deresse Mekonnen successfully defended his 1,500 title.

Still the day belonged to the US team with four gold and eight medals overall to take a big lead in the medal standings.

Clay limited finished the seven events with 6,204 points, 20 ahead of outdoor world champion Trey Hardee. Russia's Aleksey Drozdov had 6,141 for bronze.

Cantwell won his third world indoor title in the shot, saving his biggest shot till his sixth and final attempt of 21.83 meters to overcome Belarussian Andrei Mikhnevich's 21.68. German Ralf Bartels took bronze with a personal best of 21.44.

Dunn added to the US party mood when he took charge in the 400 early on and never let off to finish in 51.04.

Jamaica's Novlene Williams-Mills stumbled off the track early on in a slight clash with Tatyana Firova but the Russian went on to claim silver a full 1.07 seconds behind.