My Olympic Report (2020): jumps and throws

The men's high jump was a great competition with a moving finale. Both Tamberi and Barshim reached 2.37 m without having lost any attempt. Nedasekau also reached the same height but he had two missed tries and since everyone missed out at 2.39 m (there were 6 jumpers going for that height) Tamberi and Barshim tied at the first place. And then they looked at each other and decided that there wouldn't be a jump-off: they would share the gold medal. 

It was a great moment for both jumpers but even more so for Tamberi who was the favourite for the Rio Olympics but got injured just before the Games. I was really shocked when I read the comments of Isinbayeva on the decision of the two athletes not to break the tie. She was really critical saying that she did not know "if it is possible according to the rules for two athletes to agree [not to break the tie]". And she added "in technical disciplines there should be a fight until the very end". This is totally ridiculous. There is no rule which obliges the athletes to jump: if they declare that they feel some pain and cannot jump that's it. So Isinbayeva should have kept her disparaging comments to herself.

J. Harisson finished 7th in the high jump (after having obtained a 5th place in the long jump). I must say that I did not understand why having jumped 2.33 m he passed 2.35 m. After all his PB is 2.36 m and the olympic final with its stress is not the best place for experimentation. Still I like the idea of somebody specialising in the two disciplines. We haven't seen this since the mythical J. Thorpe's time, more than a century ago.

Women's high jump was another great moment. M. Lasitskene had missed the 2016 Olympics since Russia was not allowed to participate. She had dominated women's high jump winning World and european titles but the olympic medal was missing from her collection. But, Lasitskene was not in great shape in the months leading to the Games and she had given everybody a scare in the qualifiers needing three tries at 1.95 m that gave access to the final. And the final did not start well for her. She had to take three jumps at 1.96, two at 1.98 and two at 2.00 m. N. Mcdermott was leading at this point having jumped 2.00 m at her first try, a point at which I. Gerashchenko had exited). Y. Mahuchikh, the pre-competition favourite, was not in her best day, having taken two tries at 1.96, three at 1.98 and two at 2.00 m. At that point the medals were decided with Lasitskene and Mahuchikh tying at second place. And then Lasitskene disrupted the event: she passed 2.02 m at the first try, taking the lead. McDermott needed two tries and Mahuchikh having missed once decided to continue at 2.04 m. And Lasitskene passed that height at her second try. Mahuchikh missed twice and was definitely third while McDermott had a great third try but she grazed the bar and it fell. 

N. McDermott was keeping track of her jumps 

systematically grading all  of them

Lasitskene was Olympic champion. And it is the first time I saw her expressing her feelings beyond a token smile for the photo. Incredible though it may sound, she did cry after her victory.

The men's pole vault was a bizarre competition with S. Kendricks sidelined (having tested positive just before the Games), R. Lavillenie injured and P. Lisek in a definitely off year. Seven athletes were still present in the competition at 5.80 m With A. Duplantis, E. Karalis and K. Lightfoot sharing the first place. And then T. Braz had a lucky jump at 5.87 m which was enough to secure him the third place. C. Nilsen went on to with silver with 5.97 m and Duplantis having jumped over 6.02 was alone at the competition. He could have decided to take a jump at 6.07 m breaking the olympic record but opted to go for the world record at 6.19 m. He had a fantastic attempt (his first) where it looked as if the bar would stay (unfortunately it didn't). Karalis finished fourth in his first olympic appearance but, oh, how I would have liked to see him come back with an olympic medal. 

Karalis was more than happy with his results in Tokyo

I was a little bit disappointed by two athletes I am following, E. Sasma and E. Obiena who could not go higher than 5.70, Obiena even needing three tries for this.

The final of the women's pole vault took place without S. Morris who could not get past the qualifiers. She did hurt herself when her pole snapped but I am not convinced that she was in the greatest of shapes. The final did not start great for K. Stefanidi: she need three tries at the initial, 4.50 m, height. (In fact, the same was true for the future winner, K. Nageotte). Then the bar was raised to 4.70 m, a good 20 cm higher! Most jumpers including Kyriakopoulou, Peinado, Silva, Bengtsson etc. exited at that height. Stefanidi, again, had to jump thrice in order to pass that height. Nageotte and Bradshaw need two tries and only Sidorova cleared the height at the first attempt. Then Bradshaw succeeded at 4.85 m (together with Nageotte and Sidorova) leaving Stefanidi out of the medals. Stefanidi let two tries for 4.90 m (but they were unsuccessful) and Nageotte went over that height at her second try. Sidorova had one attempt left and she raised the bar at 4.95 m but she could not make it and Nageotte was the winner. That was the first time I saw Sidorova cry: she is usually quite cold not expressing any feeling but losing the olympic title that was hers up to the very last moment was apparently too much for her.

I have already written a separate article on men's long jump. The women's long jump was, just like the men's one, decided on the last jump. I. Spanovic jumped 7.00 m in the qualifiers but could not go beyond 6.91 m in the final ending just outside the medals (a slight disappointment for me who is an unconditional Spanovic fan). E. Brume was leading with 6.97 m up to the 5th jump when B. Reese who had already jumped 6.97 m improved her second best jump to 6.95 m taking the first place. But in the last jump M. Mihambo who had a best of 6.95 m up to that point had a 7.00 m jump clinching the gold medal. T. Davis who had jumped 7.14 m in spring and 7.04 m in the US Trials was 6th with 6.84 m. J. Sawyers, another athlete I follow, improved her PB this season to 6.90 m and jumping 6.80 m in the final obtained the 8th place (just as in Rio).

I have written time and again on the style of Y. Rojas which I find awful to look at. However in Tokyo I detected a slight progress: her second jump in no more just a perfunctorily executed step but something that (remotely) resembles a skip. Saying that she dominated the competition is an understatement. Three out of her four valid jumps would have sufficed for the victory. She had a humongous foul over 15.80 m and in her final attempt she jumped a world record 15.67 m. Since her style has started improving I believe that 16 m can be a reasonable objective for her. I. Pedroso, Rojas' coach, had a double success since his second athlete, A. Peleteiro obtained the bronze medal with 14.87 m. In between was an athlete I appreciate a lot, P. Mamona, who joined the 15 club, with a jump at 15.01 m, obtaining the silver medal. The Tokyo Olympics were most probably the swan's song for the great champion C. Ibargüen. She managed to make it to the final but then she could not go beyond a 10th place. I was really disappointed by V. Papachristou. Not only did she have an abysmal performance, her attitude was that of someone who does not care any longer. 

The men's triple jump was a hidden (indirect) vengeance. Eight years ago at the Moscow, 2013, World Championships, T. Tamgho beat P. Pichardo (jumping for Cuba at that time) in the final 18.04 to 17.68 m. Tamgho has put an end to his career due to repeated injuries and is now a coach. His most brilliant disciple is H.F. Zango who was participating in the olympic final. And Pichardo, who now participates under the colours of Portugal, did beat Zango roundly 17.98 m to 17.47 m (Zango obtaining in fact the bronze medal). And, to tell the truth, after having seen the qualifiers, where Zango managed barely to qualify at the 12th position, I was not expecting him to raise to the challenge and go for a medal in the final. Perhaps we'll have to wait for the Paris Olympics in order to see the (last?) act of the drama.

Dame V. Adams participated in her fifth Olympics. Coming back from serious injuries and after giving birth to her second child, she managed to be in shape just in time for the Tokyo Olympics obtaining her fourth medal, this time a bronze, with 19.62 m. The women's shot put was won by L. Gong with 20.58 m followed by R. Saunders 19.79. Saunders created a sensation by protesting on the olympic stand, crossing her arms over her head. As she explained later she did this in order to shout our for all the black people and those of the LGBTQ community. Podium demonstrations are forbidden at the Tokyo Olympics and the IOC confirmed that they "looking into" the incident. But my estimate is that she will not receive anything beyond a token reprimand.

R. Crouser is a class of his own. He appears to have at last mastered his technique. In an interview he pointed out that "there have been very few tall shot putters who threw with rotation so I didn't really have a model to copy. But I came up with a technique that's kind of my own and which works well for me". The fact is that he has substantially progressed while the two other Rio and Doha medallists, J. Kovacs and T. Walsh have just maintained their level. Crouser flirted with the world record unleashing a huge 23.30 m at his last throw. Kovacs was second with 22.66 m and Walsh third with 22.47 m. 

The women's discus was contested under taxing conditions. At some time after the first throw the downpour started and the event was interrupted. I still have the images of the athletes trying to throw in the slippery throwing circle, skidding and falling. I cannot understand why it is so difficult to have self-draining throwing circles with a non-slippery coating. Anyhow, V. Allman secured her win with a 68.98 m throw at her first attempt and I must say that her throwing style is a unique combination of strength with grace. The silver medal went to an outsider, K. Pudenz, with 66.86 m and Y. Perez obtained bronze with 65.72 m. Double olympic champion S. Perkovic could not do better than 65.01 m and a fourth place. The qualifiers saw the elimination of ex-world champion D. Caballero a 70+ m thrower, as well as the world leader J. Van Klinken who threw 70.22 m in May but could do no better than 61.15 m in Tokyo. 

The men's discus saw a double swedish victory. D. Stahl was first with 68.90 m, followed by S. Petterson, 67.39 m. The bronze medal went to L. Weisshaidinger with 67.07 m, while one of the pre-event favourites, 21 years old K. Ceh, finished 5th with 66.37 m. Once more I was disappointed by F. Dacres, Doha silver medallist, who was 13th in the qualifiers missing the final for a mere 2 cm. P. Malachowski, Rio silver medallist, did not make it past the qualifiers as well. I confess that I did not notice the presence of E. Hadadi, silver medalist in the 2012 London Olympics, until I started compiling this report and perusing the detailed results: he was qualified for Tokyo thanks to his 2019 results, but in Tokyo he could not do better than 58.98 m, a very poor performance indeed.

Andrejczyk and Vetter, a slight and a major disappointment

The javelin competitions were a pure let-down. M. Andrejczyk was the logical favourite for the women's event, having thrown 71.40 m in May. And then she registered the longest throw in the qualifiers with 65.24 m. Now this is a bad sign. She lad the longest throw, 67.11 m, in the qualifiers in Rio and could not do better than 4th in the final. In Tokyo things were slightly better. With 64.61 she was 2nd behind S. Liu who won the event with a, to my eyes, lucky throw of 66.34 m at her first attempt. The other Liu, Huihui, who is in my opinion the best asian javelin thrower, went home medal-less for the third Olympics in a row. The legendary B. Spotakova, could not make it this time past the qualifiers, but it was a close thing since, with 60.52 m, she ended up at the 14th position. 

The men's javelin throw started in a catastrophic way. World and Olympic champions, J. Yego, A. Peters and K. Walcott found themselves out of the final. World (2015) silver medallist I. Abdelrahman was also out finishing 13th. J. Vetter gave a foretaste of what was to come needing three tries in order to qualify for the final. Ditto (as far as the foretaste is concerned) for the future champion N. Chopra who qualified with a massive 86.65 m throw on his first attempt. In the final we discovered a Vetter who had nothing to do with the 90+ m thrower. Complaining of the run-up surface that did not allow him to brake efficiently and afraid of injuring himself he had some timid throws and ended up 9th. Meanwhile Chopra took the control of the competition of his very first throw and did not relinquished it, winning with 87.68 m. The one athlete I noticed for the first time in the final was A. Nadeem of Pakistan who threw 85.16 in the qualifiers and 84.62 m in the final finishing 5th. I am going to keep an eye open for him.

There were three polish and three american throwers in the women's hammer throw. All three polish girls made the final 8 (Wlodarczyk first, Kopron 3rd and Fiodorow 7th). From the americans on D. Price made (barely) the final 8. This is probably another harmful effect of the US Trials. To tell the truth I was somewhat disappointed that G. Berry did not obtain a medal (she finished 11th). I would have been really interested to see how she would have manifested on the podium. She had said that, were she to win, she would do what she has been doing whenever the spotlight shines her way, representing the oppressed people.

G. Berry throwing at the qualifiers in Tokyo

A. Wlodarczyk made history by becoming the first woman to win a third consecutive olympic gold (succeeding where Perkovic failed). At this point it appears preposterous that World Athletics had never recognised officially her outstanding quality, passing her over when it came to the annual prizes. Poland had two athletes on the podium also in the men's event. However this time it was W. Nowicki who was first, P. Fajdek contenting himself with the bronze medal. Their performances were 82.52 and 81.53 m respectively. In between, in the second place was the astonishing norwegian E. Henriksen who improved his PB by almost three metres obtaining silver with 81.58 m. 

A great site (that you should visit)

During the Tokyo Olympics I started visting regularly the Inside the Games site.

They are not focusing on Athletics but cover a (very) wide range of sports. However their articles on athletics are most informative and I have used the infortmation they provide on many of my own posts.

They even publish (online) a quarterly magazine of great quality both visually and content-wise. They also hold regular polls. Their latest one was about the Olympics. The question "were the Tokyo 2020 Olympics a success?" garnered close to 90 % positive answers. This majority reflects, more or less, my own feelings (although I will address, in a future post, the question of the usefulness of the Olympics).

My Olympic Report (2020): middle and long distance events

As soon as I saw A. Mu winning the US Trials I knew that we had a winner for the olympic 800 m. And I was right. What was less predictable at the time was the second place of K. Hodgkinson. They ran in 1:55.21 and 1:55.88 respectively and although the U20 world record of P. Jelimo (1:54.01 from 2008) still holds I am sure that both 19 year old olympic medallists have a bright future ahead of them. Reigning world champion H. Nakkayi exited at the semis together with her compatriot W. Nanyondo who, to be fair, is more of a 1500 m specialist (where she finished 7th in a season's best 3:59.80).

The men's 800 m was a tactical race won by E. Korir in 1:45.06. Throughout the race I was keeping an eye open for P. Dobek and he clinched the bronze medal. Dobek had started his career as 400 m hurdles specialist. He was a finalist of the 2015 World's and of the 2018 Europeans with a respectable 48.59 s. However today there is no future in the low hurdles unless you have a below-47 s potential. There are already four athletes at this level with a fifth not very far. So Dobek decided to switch to the 800 m. And that was a great decision. He won the european indoors over that distance, improved his PB to 1:43.73 in June and with a clever race obtained the olympic bronze. There were several disappointing performances in Tokyo, among them that of ex-world champion P.A. Bosse who exited at the semis, after having been the last to qualify on time after the heats.

T. Cheruiyot tried the same tactic as in Doha, imposing a very fast pace to the men's 1500 m. But Cheruiyot of 2021 is not the Cheruiyot of 2019 and since 2019 J. Ingebrigtsen has acquired two years worth of extra maturity. So, the result of Cheruiyot's pace was to push Ingebrigtsen to an Olympic and European record of 3:28.32. All of a sudden the world record of H. El Guerrouj looks within reach of the young norwegian prodigy.

S. Hassan had announced that after the 1500-10000 m double in the Doha, 2019, World Championships, she was going for a treble 1500-5000-10000 m in Tokyo. It sounded crazy and it was. All the more so, since the heats for the 1500 m were on the same day as the 5000 m final. And Hassan managed to further complicate the situation by a fall at 300 m from the finish line of the 1500 m. 

Well, she managed to pick herself up and she even won the heat. And the very same evening she won the 5000 m final with 14:36.79 ahead of H. Obiri, 14:38.36, and G. Tsegay 14.38.37. That was on August 2nd. On the 4th Hassan ran the 1500 m semi-final and then the final arrived on the 6th. Hassan hoped to beat F. Kipyegon just like she did in 2019 at the World's. But in 2019 Kipyegon had just come back to competition after giving birth to her son. This year Kipyegon was in top shape: she had improved her PB to 3:51.07 in July. And so when she accelerated on the back straight there was nothing Hassan could do. Kipyegon won with 3:53.11 and L. Muir managed to pass Hassan winning silver in 3:54.50. 

Hassan, 3:55.86, had to content herself with bronze. Two days later she went on to win the 10000 m in 29:55.32 in a race where the first three were ethiopians, with Hassan running for the Netherlands, K. Gezahegne (second in 29:56.18) running for Brunei, and only L. Gidey (third in 30:01.72) running for Ethiopia. F. Niyonsaba was 5th in 30:41.93 another proof that, contrary to Sir Sebastian's claims, the testosterone rules are not working.

J. Cheptegei had come to Tokyo with the objective to win 5000 and 10000 m. On the last day of the track events he did win the former, with 12:58.15, in a tactical race, which he controlled perfectly, ahead of canadian (but somalian born) M. Ahmed, 12:58.61, and american (but kenyan born) P. Chelimo in 12:59.05. However on the very first day of the athletics events he lost the 10000 m making an elementary mistake. While reaching the final lap he had let S. Barega take the lead with a few metres with the second ethiopian B. Aregawi just behind. At the bell the two ethiopians launched their attack, the two ugandans (Cheptegei was accompanied throughout the race by J. Kiplimo) but they had to first pass Aregawi. On the final stretch Barega was two-three metres ahead of Cheptegei and he managed to keep a slight advance at the finish line. The verdict was Barega first, 27:43.22, Cheptegei second, 27:43.63, and Kiplimo third 27.43.88. I think that by now Cheptegei has learned a lesson. You could see it in the 5000 m where he made sure he was a few metres ahead of everybody at the bell. He let the other runners catch up with him in the back straight but, when he entered the final stretch, nobody could follow his sprint.

S. El Bakkali won the 3000 m steeple, with 8:08.90, in a race where the kenyans were way below par (B. Kigen was third and A. Kibiwot 10th) and where L. Girma (second in 8:10.38) did not progress at all since his surprising silver medal at the 2019 World's. And what a  breath-taking race the one of 2019 was. Compared to Doha the Tokyo race was, at least to my eyes, underwhelming. The women's steeple race was definitely better, despite the absence of N. Jeruto, who ran a world leading 8:53.65 just after the Games beating all the olympic elite and who could not participate due to a change of allegiance. Add to this the fact that the world champion and recordwoman, B. Chepkoech, was having a so-so year and the race was wide open. In the end it was ugandan P. Chemutai who won, in 9:01.45 ahead of C. Frerichs, 9:04.79, (she would break the 9 min barrier for the US just behind Jeruto two weeks later) and 2015 world champion H. Kiyeng 9:05.39. Chepkoech finished 7th and bruneian W. Yavi a disappointing 10th, despite her most promising 9:02.64 at the end of May. 

P. Jepchirchir won the women's marathon ahead of world record holder B. Kosgei in 2:27:20 versus 2:27:36. It was a most interesting race where a group of four detached themselves quite early: the two kenyans, M. Seidel of the US and L. Salpeter from Israel. M. Seidel managed to follow the two kenyans all the way to the finish, obtaining bronze in 2:27:46. Salpeter on the other hand started having stomach pains after the 30th km and dropped out of the leading group. She walked all the way to the finish, finishing 66th, 20 minutes adrift of the winners. 

The marathon, held in Sapporo in order to avoid Tokyo stifling heat and humidity conditions, was run under a clear sky with a temperature around 28 degrees, conditions far from ideal. The athletes had to carefully hydrate themselves and tried to lower the body temperature with ice packs. I find the photo below really great. V. Mazuronak went on to finish 5th while S. Rocha had to hang on for 30th. 

E. Kipchoge is the greatest marathon runner ever. With his victory in Tokyo he joined the mythical A. Bikila (and the uncanny W. Cierpinski) in winning back to back Marathons. There was no real race in Sapporo (where the weather was somewhat more clement than during the women's marathon with a partially covered sky). When Kipchoge decided to forge ahead at around 30 km that was that. 

The two somalians A. Nageeye (running for the Netherlands) and B. Abdi (running for Belgium) had only to defeat the second kenyan, L. Cherono, in order to reach the podium. And they did just that. In the photo below you can see Nageeye urging Abdi to sprint towards the finish line which they reached in that order, 1:20 after Kipchoge who had completed his race in 2:08:38. 

Notice the 16th place of (Erythrea born) T. Gabriyesos of the refugee team. He was just two places behind the first erythrean G. Kifle (well, three if you count M. Teferi, also Erythrea born, running for Israel who finished 13th). But he was ahead of E. Ghebrehiwet, erythrean running for Italy, who finished 20th and the second erythrean Y. Ghebregergis who finished 22nd. 

For some unexplainable reason I have decided to include the 4x400 m relays in the middle distances post. (It is due perhaps to the fact that, the overall distance being practically a mile, the whole event is like a middle distance one albeit run at sprint speed). The men's US team won the 4x400 m relay in 2:55.70 ahead of the astonishing dutch team 2:57.10. Are the dutch the heirs of the belgian? The latter finished just outside the medals, behind Botswana, 2:57.88 to 2:57.27, so perhaps they haven't said their last word. The women's US team was as close as one can get to a dream-team. With S. McLaughlin, A. Felix, D. Muhammad and A. Mu (notice that there are two 400 m hurdles and one 800 m specialists in the team) they ran in 3:16.85. One has to go back 28 years in order to find a better time. The polish team was second confirming their supremacy in the old continent.

The 4x400 m mixed relay made its olympic debut in Tokyo. Poland won easily 3:09.87, with Dominican Republic (greatly improved compared to their performance in the World Relays) second 3:10.21, beating the US, 3:10.22, on the finish line. At long last the various nations have understood that there is one, and only one, optimal configuration for the mixed relay: man-woman-woman-man. (Nigeria tried a man-woman-man-woman configuration in the semis and they finished last). Notice that the US team was initially disqualified for violating a handoff rule, but, as is customary when it comes to the US, they were reinstated and went on to win a medal. And since it would be too blatant to reinstate only the US team, the team of the Dominican Republic, that was disqualified because one of its athletes  did not maintain order while awaiting the baton in the exchange zone, was also reinstated. 

My Olympic Report (2020): sprint events

The title of my report refers to 2020. In this I am following what became the rule, naming this year's Olympics as Tokyo 2020. So Tokyo has a unique olympic status with the Games of 1940 cancelled, the ones of 1964 normally held and those of 2020 postponed by one year.

I cannot say that I did not enjoy the athletics in this year's Olympics. They were of a very high quality. But they would have been of the same high quality if we had had a World Championship instead of the Games. In fact I am convinced that the Olympic Games do not bring any added value to athletics, and, probably, to most of the well-established sports. Over the years they have become a money machine and I look forward to the day they close up shop. (I will come back to this in some future post of mine).

The women's sprint events were really great. E. Thompson confirmed her superiority and led the jamaican trio to a medal sweep in the 100 m. (In the photo you can see that S.A. Fraser is far from happy with her second place, while S. Jackson is radiant with her bronze medal). Thompson beat that olympic record of Flo-Jo with 10.61 s and just after the Games ran a 100 m in 10.54 s, which to my eyes is the real world record. She also registered the second best performance ever while winning the 200 m with 21.53 s. In this event Fraser was fourth and Jackson was eliminated in the heats: she relaxed a few metres from the finish and was passed on the line by the portuguese and italian athletes. M.J. TaLou was once more just outside the medals, finishing 4th in the 100 m and 5th in the 200 M, but she did equal M. Ahouré's (who was eliminated in the semis)) African record with 10.78 s. Kambundji equalled the swiss record with 10.95 and then DelPonte improved it to 10.91 s (dipping for the first time below 11 s). 

The 100 m final was another proof (as if one needed it) that using milliseconds is absurd and even unfair. D. Neita and M.L. Ahye both ran in 11.00 seconds in the semis, at the last qualifying place. Using milliseconds, 10.992 for Neita and 10.993 for Ahye the organisers gave the 8th place in the final to the former. But Neita and Ahye had run in different races, and moreover the wind was +0.3 m/s in Neita's case and -0.2 m/s in Ahye's. Looking at the photo-finish below I don't know how one can be sure of a 1 cm precision (Neita is 4th from the right. Unfortunately the photo-finish of Ahye's race does not exist). Now why on Earth didn't they allow a 9th finalist, since there are 9 lanes in the stadium and they preferred to take an unjust decision based on milliseconds? To me such decisions are really hurting athletics.

I have already written about C. Mboma and B. Masilingi. Their presence in the 200 m olympic final is the proof that the testosterone rules are not working, contrary to Sir Sebastian's claims. The pre-race favourite, G. Thomas, barely saved the US honour in the sprints by obtaining the bronze medal in the 200 m with 21.87 s, another indication that the formula of the US Trials is far from optimal. S. Miller had initially planned to run the 200 m, then she decided to double and participate also in the 400 m. That was a wise decision. In fact it became clear, early enough, that obtaining a medal in the 200 m, let alone win, would be very difficult for her. So she qualified for the final but ran relaxed, sparing her forces for the 400 m. 

If one looks at the official report one sees that only 23 athletes contested the 100 m semis. The missing name: B. Okagbare. She did obtain her place there but then it became known that the results of a previous doping test turned out to be positive and so she was suspended. However, unless one has followed the competition closely, there is no indication in the official report allowing one to interpret the missing competitor.

The men's races were equally interesting. The main surprise was the elimination of T. Bromell who was one of the favourites for the 100 m having won the US Trials in 9.80 s (and with a PB of 9.77 s). After qualifying on the basis of time in the heats, he went out in the semis.  The future winner L. Jacobs registered an italian record in the heats with 9.94, and a European record in the semis with 9.84 s. Still such was the quality of this semifinal that he entered the final only thanks to his time. B. Su ran an Asian record of 9.83 s in that final. When I saw this I was convinced that it was over for Su: entering the final with the best time is too much a stress. Jacobs dominated the final with 9.80 s ahead of Kerley, 9.86s, and de Grasse, 9.89 s. For the first time since 2000 there was no jamaican in the 100 m final, Y. Blake having exited at the semis. de Grasse reinforced my opinion that he is the best sprinter today by winning the 200 m thanks to a superb second 100 m. His final time of 19.62 (into a slight headwind) puts him among the 10 best performers of all times. Bednarek and Lyles were second and third with 19.68 and 19.74 s. 

But the most interesting finalists were the ones in 4th and 5th place. E. Knighton is just 17 years old. He ran in Tokyo in 19.93 s but he has a PB of 19.84 s from the Trials. J. Fahnbulleh is running for Liberia but lives in the US. He is 20 years old and ran 19.98 s in Tokyo. You can bet that I will follow closely the progress  of these two young sprinters. 

The women's 4x100 relay was dominated by the jamaican team with B. Williams joining the trio of the medalists of the individual event. Their record of 41.02 s is second only to the US record held by the US. In fact I could detect some disappointment in the face of S. Jackson, who anchored the relay, when she saw that they did not break the world record. The US team finished second with 41.45 s followed by the british one, 41.88 s, which included D. Asher-Smith who had to drop out of the individual sprints due to some slight injury. 

In the men's race the US team managed once more to be absent from the final: they finished 6th with 38.10 s. King Carl (Lewis), always ready to criticise other people, qualified this "a clown show". But his technical comments were to the point: the athletes were running the wrong legs, with R. Baker running a turn, Bromell running the opening leg and Kerley not anchoring. For M. Johnson it was “embarrassing and ridiculous". Italy on the other hand did everything perfectly and with a magnificent anchoring by F. Tortu won the race in 37.50 s. Great Britain was second with 37.51 s but may lose the medal due to a doping violation by C. Ujah. de Grasse secured the bronze medal for Canada in 37.70 s. 

As I said above S. Miller had kept her forces for the 400 m. And she put them to excellent use there. Five years after Rio she did not have to dive in order to win the gold medal. She dominated the final with 48.36 s. A. Felix, the silver medalist of Rio was third with 49.46 s (a proof of her talent, since she is not so young any more). In between the two was dominican M. Paulino with 49.20 s. I was expecting her to play a major role in the individual event after her phenomenal 48.7 split in the mixed relay. And she did.

The men's 400 m did not reserve us big surprises. S. Gardiner added the olympic gold to his world crown winning with 43.85 s. K. James and A. Zambrano ran in 43.88 s and 43.93 s in the semis but their respective positions were permuted in the final Zambrano winning silver. K. James has now a complete collection of olympic medals with gold, silver and bronze crowning his excellent career. The fifth place of, pre-race favourite, M. Norman is a minor surprise (see my article on the US Trials). World record holder and 2016 olympic champion W. van Niekerk was present but he hasn't yet found his pre-injury shape, exiting at the semis. He will be just 30 years old next year, so there is hope for the 2022 (or is it 2021?) World's.

On the other hand, the result of the 110 m hurdles did surprise us. G. Holloway was the indisputable favourite. His flawless technique and his basic speed guaranteed that. But hurdles are hurdles and in his case a small mistake of the 8th was enough for H. Parchment to pass him on the finish line 13.04 to 13.09 s. Holloway had roundly beaten Parchment in the semifinal (they ran in the same race) but a final is where everything can change. 

Jamaica did not feel the absence of O. McLeod as with R. Levy (13.10 s) also on the podium they got the lion's share of the medals. Cypriot M. Trajkovic, not fully recovered from various injuries, did not manage to make the olympic final this time.

The women's high hurdles were a race of redemption. Four (well, five) years ago J. Camacho-Quinn crashed out in the semis of Rio while K. Harrison did not manage to qualify at the US Trials, placing 6th. This time they had a flawless competition finishing first and second with 12.37 and 12.52 s respectively (but Camacho had run an olympic record 12.26 s in her semi-final). N. Visser confirmed her status as the best european high-hurdler, being the only presence from the old continent in the final where she finished 5th. I was keeping an eye open for costa-rican athlete A. Vargas whom I had remarked in the 2019 World's final but this time she did not make it beyond the semis having the 9th overall time.

I have already written a separate article for the 400 m hurdles. There is nothing I can add here, but I will repeat that for me they were the most exciting races of the Games (plus the women's semis under a pouring rain were a pure gem).

(In case you wonder why I included the 400 m in the sprint article and left the 4x400 m for the middle-long distance post, I must say that there is no convincing reason for this. I just decided to cut my report in this way).