Tokyo (AFP) – Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone won her second gold of the world championships in Tokyo on Sunday, anchoring the USA team to a dominant victory in the 4×400 metres relay. Double Olympic 400m hurdles champion McLaughlin-Levrone, who impressively won the 400m flat gold at these championships earlier in the week, put in a punishing last leg timed at a rapid 47.82sec to bring the USA team home in a championship record of 3min 16.61sec. It beat by 0.10sec the previous best set by the United States in Stuttgart in 1993. Jamaica claimed silver in 3:19.25, with the Netherlands taking bronze in 3:20.18.
Femke Bol, fresh from retaining her 400m hurdles crown and known for her fast finishing speed, was on the anchor leg for the Dutch team. But she had been left too much to do and could only chase down the shadows of her hurdling nemesis McLaughlin-Levrone. “When you have great teammates as I have, it’s amazing,” said McLaughlin-Levrone, who ran the second fastest women’s 400m flat time in history in winning the individual event. “My last lap felt it was like a victory lap for us. I just wanted to finish strong because you never know who is behind, chasing you. It was just an incredible race. Everyone just wanted to go out there, do their job. We weren’t really going for a time; we just wanted to obviously do our parts and win the race, so it’s always special to also add a championship record to the mix.”
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Bol said the bronze brought the curtain down on yet another successful championships. “It’s a team medal,” she said. “Even if I overtook a lot, we made it all together. We worked hard to be able to do this and we have a great team around us to help us achieve our goals. I leave these world championships with three medals and I’m happy with that,” she said, having also won silver in the mixed 4x400m relay.
– Boost for Tebogo –
Botswana’s quartet of Lee Bhekempilo Eppie, Letsile Tebogo, Bayapo Ndori, and the individual 400m world champion Busang Collen Kebinatshipi claimed a thrilling victory in the men’s 4x400m relay. Kebinatshipi ran an impressive anchor leg, stealing the win in the final metres after running down American Rai Benjamin, the 400m hurdles gold medallist. Botswana timed 2:57.76 to top the podium, with the US foursome taking silver 0.07sec adrift. World 400m record holder Wayde van Niekerk ran the third leg to help South Africa to bronze.
“This gold medal makes up for my individual non-medal performances,” said Olympic 200m champion Tebogo, who false started in the 100m final here and finished fourth in the 200m. “I am grateful to my teammates and to our coach. We came here dreaming of becoming world champions. It took a lot of courage for me. I am really happy to be sharing this medal with these guys.”
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