Over the final, topsy turvy 30 minutes of running at the Olympic track on Saturday night, both Americans came away with prizes they’d been wishing for all along.
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Emerging victorious in the intense rivalry with Jamaica, the US women’s team retained the 4×100-meter relay title and Allyson Felix won a record fifth gold medal in the Olympic games in Rio on Friday. They have won seven gold medals and four silvers – a medal in every Olympic Games except 1980, when the US team boycotted the Moscow Games. Britain’s time of 3:25.88 saw them take the final spot on the podium.
The conclusion of her fourth Olympics – she made her debut at the Athens 2004 Games – left Felix reflecting on her career with satisfaction.
“I can look back at the things I’ve accomplished and be really proud and really be grateful for what track and field has brought to my life”, she said. They now have 27 medals with two days to go, including 10 gold.
Centrowitz was considered a contender in the 1,500 and in this case, contending meant winning a race in a leisurely pace of 3 minutes, 50 seconds for a.11 margin over Taoufik Makhloufi of Algeria.
An International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) rule limiting the amount of naturally occurring functional testosterone for female athletes appeared to have limited Semenya’s prospects but the rule was quashed by the Court of Arbitration for Sport past year. Canada was elevated to the bronze medal.
Felix has now won a total of eight Olympic medals, and with five being gold she’s won more than any American female track and field athlete. She had been through injury, the inability to defend her 200-meter title because she didn’t qualify at the USA trials and, almost, a DQ in the relay heats.
At the 2012 Olympics, the USA ran the fastest time ever, 40.82 seconds. The Americans won the appeal, but then hours later they had to run a relay by themselves to meet the qualifying time.
“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 toughest, without a doubt, Felix said of her 2016. “This year, you make plans and want everything to go according to schedule”.
Arman Hall, Tony McQuay, and Gil Roberts set up Merritt in men’s relay. 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.
In the women’s pole vault, Greece’s Ekaterini Stefanidi captured the gold medal with a vault of 4.85 meters. Indeed, this time, the handoffs went off without incident and as the final runner Akinosun sprinted across the finish line, the timer read 41.77 seconds which beat out all times from the morning heats inspiring a team hug.
It didn’t bother the Americans as they brought it home in 41.01 seconds, 0.35 seconds ahead of the Jamaicans.
It wasn’t all ideal for the red, white and blue, however.
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She won the long jump on Wednesday.
