Epic Failure

I've just rewatched it and I still think he would have been fine. The Kenyan starts dying as soon as they hit the home straight. Bonavacia not long after. Then the Qatari. Davey is the only one who is actually accelerating on that home stretch. Room opens up quickly in those scenarios. Basically there was always going to be a gap on one side of the Qatari. Had he not left the gap on the inside that Davey took, there would have been a bigger gap on the outside between him and Bonavacia. The only way Davey wasn't likely to find a gap in my opinion is if Bonavacia hadn't died. And even then I think he would probably have been fine with judicious use of elbows. The biggest 'risk' he took was assuming that they were all going to die coming home. That was a chance. But it was a sound choice in the end. That's 4x4 relays for you!

If Botswana can find a 4th leg from someone younger than Makwala they are serious gold medal contenders in the mens 4x4 in Paris. The other 3 legs were outstanding.

Disagree. Davey was smart. Everyone else charged off and died. Even if the gap on the inside hadn't opened he had room to move out. That was always the weakest of our 5 teams. Both Dobson and Young would be with MHS and Davey in the first choice team of those selected today (both AHW and Brier would be on past form but neither were selected today). Getting the job done was the only thing that mattered and they did that.

Mawdsley's PB is about half a second quicker than Lina's, so it probably wasn't a shock. The big moment from that from a GBR point of view was Yeargin's leg of 50.23. Considering that you could make an argument that we have 3 runners who could improve that team - Anning, Pipi and Laviai - it was a good run by GBR.

That was so dumb by Allison.

Jamaica having a bad time here is not good for other countries who are on the cusp. If Jamaica don't get through tomorrow you would say they are guaranteed to get one of the 2 remaining time slots in each relay.

Adeleke outstanding. Really impressive leg from Yeargin as well.

It's also the fact that all the Olympic qualification is riding on this one event. No continental qualification. So everyone is nervously excited about this.

No excuses for with that draw. That first heat looks like an absolutely dog fight.

Never predict that a British relay team will get around safely. A dropped baton is always a reasonable bet.

That's more like it from

It's a Birmingham University team from a meet in Philadelphia according to WA.

The WA website has crashed due to traffic at pretty much every large meet in the last few years. It's not great.

It's very British that the first time the system moves away from fast times to just auto qualifiers we fall foul of it.

The crowds in Lyon this weekend have been outstanding. Looking forward to similar in Glasgow and Berlin over the summer.

Unless they are waaaay off the back, I'd doubt it. It's the first race of the weekend so they are freshest. And you never know what might happen in front of you even in a 4x4 (see Bol tripping and the US women exchanging outside the zone just from last summer). If they were going to take that chance, better to do it in race 2 tonight in the hope you are fresher tomorrow.

If anyone knows how they are going to work out the seeding for the heats on day 2 (or, indeed, how they worked out the seeding for the heats on day 1), I'd love to know. Worth noting, in case it hasn't already been mentioned, that there's 2 spots in each relay saved for the fastest time for teams that don't qualify this weekend. So let's all hope the US and Jamaican teams get their batons around safely, so that they don't hog those spots.

I'm internally trying to work out how they came up with the draws for the first round and even more fascinated how they are going to do the draw for round 2, given the stakes. I'd agree that none of the draws are particularly scary, for either GBR or Ireland. More than anything, I have the inevitable baton worries that come with the sprint relays especially. It'll be interesting to see who lines up for what - in theory Paulino is down only for the mixed 4x4 for the Dominican Republic, which would likely make Ireland's job in the women's 4x4 easier if that were the case. But I trust those entry lists about as far as I can throw them.

Start lists for day 1 heats published - https://worldathletics.org/competiti...as24/timetable GBR has the following: MX 4x4 - Heat 3 - , , , , , , , W 4x1 - Heat 4 - , , , , , , , M 4x1 - Heat 2 - , , , , , , , W 4x4 - Heat 2 - , , , , , , M 4x4 - Heat 3 - , , , , , , ,

it was heats and repechage originally, I think. Clearly repechage was too big a word for World Athletics to deal with, hence the change.

They had 29 in Tokyo, so whilst an increase, it's not that crazy. The jump from 10 in Rio to 29 in Tokyo was much bigger. But let's be honest here - the IOC is always going to support this because it makes them look good, so to speak. It's at least 50% pure politics.

Yup. We're talking about the 9th highest funded sport currently, our 4th most successful sport in Tokyo, and GBR's 6th most successful sport in terms of total medals won at all Olympics. It's just not remotely feasible that it would go from where it is down to nothing.

I would very much doubt that. Cuts, sure. But I can't see a situation where Boxing goes from its current level of funding to zero.

Jeff Petry and Lucas Raymond both confirmed I believe (if Michigan reporting is accurate). Ray-Ray was already likely, just had to work out insurance. Which I believe is the same situation for Seider.