By Sean McAlister.
@Olympics.
Oblique Seville has been crowned men’s 100m champion after a sensational race at the Tokyo 25 World Athletics Championships on Sunday 14 September.
With Usain Bolt watching from the crowd, the 24-year-old Seville stormed to victory to become the first Jamaican world champion over the distance since the great Bolt himself back in 2015.
“I feel really amazing and excited that the gold is coming home to Jamaica,” an elated Seville said after the race. “I have proved that I am a true competitor, that I have the determination of a champion.
“But still, I was panicking, I didn’t know what was going on throughout the semi-final. Finishing strong in the last 30 to 40 metres was something I was struggling with the whole season, I just didn’t recognise it. Now I have perfected it, and I was confident that if I could do it in the final, I would win. I knew if I had a strong finish, the others will not catch me.”
Much of the talk in the lead-up to the final had been about the budding rivalry between Noah Lyles and Kishane Thompson, winners of the gold and silver medals, respectively, at Paris 2024.
However, on a hot and humid night in Tokyo, Seville stunned his rivals along with the vast majority of the stadium, coming home in a personal best time of 9.77 seconds to claim his first major international championship gold and the title of “world’s fastest man”. Thompson had to settle for silver (9.82), with Lyles ending the evening with bronze (9.89).
Even before the race began, there was high drama in the stadium as Botswana’s Olympic 200m champion Letsile Tebogo was disqualified for jumping the gun.
The false start drew gasps from the almost 60,000-strong crowd, who had waited in silence for the starter’s gun to fire.
But when the race did finally begin, it didn’t disappoint.
Thompson and Lyles, who were drawn in lanes next to each other, battled for position on the track, with the Jamaican looking as if he had won the gold medal that eluded him last year in Paris.
However, Seville had other ideas, storming to the front in the final metres to be crowned world champion.
Meanwhile Melissa Jefferson-Wooden, 24, sealed gold in the women’s final in emphatic fashion, proving a class above her rivals in a championship record 10.61 seconds.
“It has been an amazing year. I have been dreaming of this moment,” said Jefferson-Wooden, who will also chase 200m and relay glory in Tokyo.
“Instead of putting the pressure on myself and taking it as something overwhelming, I was just embracing it.
“Today was all about me, about trusting my abilities, my coach, the line I have been given, and my faith. And just trusting that I was prepared for this moment.”
Jefferson-Wooden has reached the pinnacle seven years after she put her sporting ambitions on hold to save her dad’s life, stepping forward as a stem cell donor when he was diagnosed with a rare blood condition in 2018.