By Lehlohonolo Lehana.
@AntonGeyser.
Canada exceed expectations with a gold-medal winning time of 37.50 seconds in the men’s 4×100 metres relay final, South Africa sprinted to silver and Great Britain picked up bronze.
Andre de Grasse ran a superb last leg to bring the Tokyo silver medallists their second gold in the event following their 1996 win.
Akani Simbine, the nearly man of the individual 100 metres, ran a terrific last leg to get South Africa silver in an African record 37.57, as did Zharnel Hughes to earn Britain bronze in 37.61.
Simbine joined Shaun Maswanganyi, as well as teenagers Bradley Nkoana and Bayanda Walaza.
Walaza got the team off to a good start, clocking 10.41 before handing over to Maswanganyi, who did 9.06 down the back straight.Nkoana, at 19 just one year older than Walaza, went around the bend in 9.32 before handing over to Simbine. The latter delivered a superb performance as the anchor, streaking the final leg in an incredible 8.78sec.
And when Benjamin Richardson withdrew earlier in the week after injuring his hamstring injury during the 200m semifinals, it seemed that the relay was doomed.
This is South Africa’s first Olympic medal in this event and the country’s first medal at a major competition since the world championships in 2017.
Meanwhile the U.S. failure was the latest in a long series as they have not won the event they used to dominate since 2000.
Christian Coleman gave them a great start but ended up virtually colliding with Kenny Bednarek at the first handover. They recovered to finish well down the field, but were disqualified as the exchange was illegal.
Since 1995, in the Olympics and World Championships, the U.S. have now had 11 dropped batons, disqualifications or bans.
Elewhere Sha’Carri Richardson and Gabby Thomas, the newly crowned Olympic 100 and 200m champions, steered the United States into the final of the women’s 4x100m relay after winning their heat in 41.94 seconds on Thursday.