Bolt led Jamaica to victory in the 400-meter men’s relay Friday night, winning a third gold medal for the third consecutive Olympics.
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In what may yet prove to be her final Olympic appearance Allyson Felix led the U.S. 4x400m relay team home in style to become the most decorated athlete in United States track and field history, overcoming their Jamaican rivals easily in the process.
“Wonderful experience. My first Olympics”.
Friday’s race brings Felix’s Olympic medal count to eight – five of them gold. It sounded and away she went alone in a first-of-its-kind Olympic relay race against the clock. I can think of nothing else to say but bad luck. It is nice to go home with a medal. His time was three minutes and 50 seconds, the slowest winning time in decades.
The U.S. quartet won the relay from Lane 6 in a time of 3:19.06.
Hagos Gebrhiwet of Ethiopia won the bronze medal. Her gold as part of the relay is the second in as many nights for Ducks, as Ashton Eaton emphatically repeated as decathlon gold medalist Thursday. Both men’s and women’s US relay teams have been plagued with issues with passing the baton in the last several Olympics, according to ESPN.
Felix was joined by her teammates Natasha Hastings, Phyllis Francis and Courtney Okolo in making history in Rio de Janeiro.
“This completes my set”, the sprinter said after anchoring the the United States team to the title in the women’s 4×100-meter relay. The U.S. win gives the 30-year-old Felix a fifth career Olympic gold medal. Just more than 10 minutes before the team was to report to the call room, she prepared to practice hand-offs with Allyson Felix. “You make plans and you want things to go to a certain schedule – and nothing went according to the schedule, but that’s okay, it’s about growth and character and I think I learned a lot of lessons throughout this Olympic Games”.
Merritt looked equally relieved. He was caught in the tail wind of South African Wayde van Nierkerk’s world-record 400 run earlier in the week and settled for bronze. Tony McQay made the difference for the USA, running the second leg in 43.2 seconds after taking the baton from Arman Hall.
As Felix had done minutes earlier, Merritt took a narrow lead and opened it way up.
She said she told Bowie before the race: “Don’t worry, I’m going to clean up anything that is left on the third leg”.
Jamaica’s silver was their fifth straight medal in the event, following silver in 2000 and bronze in 2004, 2008 and 2012 while Britain claimed their first medal since 1992.
It wasn’t all ideal for the red, white and blue, however.
Chaunte Lowe finished fourth in the high jump, which was won by Ruth Beitia of Spain with a top jump of 1.97 meters (6 feet, 5 inches).
History says that she has blessed U.S. track and field more than any woman in history. Margaret Wambui of Kenya took bronze in 1:56.89.
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Semenya’s breakthrough title at the world championships seven years ago pushed the IAAF to introduce rules limiting testosterone in female athletes.
