Wayde van Niekerk produced the fastest time in the world for eight years to win an incredible world 400m gold on Wednesday but was then taken to hospital with severe exhaustion. Wayde van Niekerk blasted out of the blocks and never looked back to finish in 43.48 seconds and become the fourth best performer of all time.
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The South African collapsed onto the track exhausted at the end of the race and was taken straight off for medical treatment.
Behind him, LaShawn Merritt, the defending champion and 2008 Olympic champion, set a personal best of 43.65 but it still was only good enough for silver.
“I can’t dwell on it that too much”, Yego said.
Yego led the 2015 world rankings with the 91.39m in Birmingham which was initially ruled outside the sector and a foul.
It marked an astonishing rise for the 23-year-old, whose previous best result was a silver medal at last year’s Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
Behind Yego, Egypt’s Ihab Abdelrahman El Sayed also made a breakthrough as he took silver with 88.99, with bronze going to 2007 world champion Tero Pitkamaki with 87.64.
Meanwhile, the stage is set for a dramatic rematch between Usain Bolt and Justin Gatlin as both the of the two favourites for the 200m qualified for the final easily. Zakary ran a national record in the women’s 400 but the 29-year-old Kenyan did not start in the semifinals.
“I think that I have a lot left in the tank”, the 33-year-old American said. “I was just trying to run as easier as possible…”
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In Bolt’s heat, GB’s Dan Talbot took three hundredths off his PB with 20.27 as he finished fifth and failed to progress.
