Photo Credit: Getty Images
A runaway win in one relay and another that was oh-so-close. A long-awaited celebration for France and a high jump competition that felt like it would never end.
What tied it all together on a frantic final day of Olympic track and field at the Stade de France was the most familiar sight of all: Americans on the medal stand, over and over again.
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Gabby Thomas brought the curtain down on track by romping to a win in the women’s 4x400 relay Saturday for America’s 34th overall medal at the track and 14th gold. Thomas was part of the U.S. gold-medal win a night earlier in the 4x100 women’s relay.
Turning the race into a laugher on laps 2 and 3, the 400-hurdles and 200-meter gold medalists helped the U.S. finish more than 4 seconds ahead of second place and only .1 second off the world record set by the USSR in 1988.
The winning time: 3 minutes, 15.27 seconds.
“I think this generation of track and field is just on a different level,” said McLaughlin-Levrone, who now has four gold medals in four events (to go with six world-record runs) over her career. “Everything is improving, including us, including our technique, including how we prepare. I don’t think anything is impossible at this point.”
In another race involving a different sort of .1-second margin, American hurdle gold medalist Rai Benjamin edged out 200-meter champion Letsile Tebogo of Botswana in the men’s relay.
“I calculated that run very well, to a ‘T,’” Benjamin said. “I have a really good, high track IQ on people and how they run and how to do a quick time, so I didn’t have to get out too hard. Let’s just save it up to come home.’”
Two more close races lead to American gold and, finally, a medal for France
Fittingly, the final day of a track meet full of close calls and surprises featured two more races decided by .01 seconds -- an 800-meter win by Kenya’s Emmanuel Wanyonyi and a 100-meter hurdles victory for American Masai Russell.
