Tokyo Olympics 2021: Team USA athletics savaged in track carnage

Team USA’s performance at the track has been savaged by a former champion after shock result called the ‘biggest upset of the Games’. And it just got worse.

Team USA’s men’s 4x100m relay team has been savaged, labelled a “total embarrassment” that “did everything wrong”.
The Americans and South Africa failed to qualify thanks to some monumental stuff-ups, while Turkey were disqualified.

Former American track and field athlete, Carl Lewis, didn’t hold back as he took aim at the team’s performance.

“The USA team did everything wrong in the men’s relay,” Lewis said.

“The passing system is wrong, athletes running the wrong legs, and it was clear that there was no leadership.

“It was a total embarrassment, and completely unacceptable for a USA team to look worse than the AAU (Amateur Athletic Union) kids I saw.”

The USA men's 4x100m relay team has missed the final.

In the individual 100m event, the USA has 12 of the top 20 athletes this year, including 6 of the top nine.#athletics#Tokyo2020pic.twitter.com/GKnelkPoYN

— InsightLane (@insightlane) August 5, 2021

Cravon Gillespie of Team United States reacts after coming in sixth. Picture: Getty Images

The USA team did everything wrong in the men's relay. The passing system is wrong, athletes running the wrong legs, and it was clear that there was no leadership. It was a total embarrassment, and completely unacceptable for a USA team to look worse than the AAU kids I saw .

— Carl Lewis (@Carl_Lewis) August 5, 2021

Channel 7 Olympics commentator, Tamsyn Manou said: “Wow. USA really stuffed up their changes.

“The third one again was horrendous. They dropped back. Their change was terrible.

Hopefully we get another look at it. Just haven’t done enough changes.”

Fellow commentator Bruce McAvaney said: Gee. Coming to the final baton change, there were seven teams in a row basically.

“(Andre) De Grasse had to do something quite extraordinary to wind up and get Canada through. And China, China with that great baton work and Su (Bingtian) in their team on the bend. The Italians there coming home for them. Filippo Tortu. I thought he was going to get them home. You see here the despair.”

USA’s Trayvon Bromell competes in the men's 4x100m relay heats. Picture: AFP

Meanwhile, Steven Gardiner of the Bahamas poured more pain on the US in the 400m final.

All the talk around the 400m in the lead-up to Tokyo had been about a possible US resurgence.

When you have Michael Johnson on your side of the history books it tends to weigh heavily in your favour with the Americans winning gold in seven straight Games from 1984 to 2008.

Michael Norman and Michael Cherry were the two left to fly the USA flag in the final but they weren’t a factor as Gardiner stamped his authority on the event, backing up his 2019 world title in Doha with Olympic gold.

The 25-year-old from the Bahamas looked in control a long way out in the final and claimed his first Olympic crown in 43.85sec.

Colombia’s Anthony Jose Zambrano took silver in 44.08sec with 2012 Olympic champion Kirani James fading over the final stages for bronze (44.19sec).

Gardiner, who was also the silver medallist at the 2017 world championships in London, had won five of his six 400m races this year with his only loss coming when he actually fell.

Cherry won the battle of the Americans coming in fourth, one spot ahead of Norman.

Hansle Parchment (C) of Team Jamaica finishes first ahead of Grant Holloway of Team United States. Picture: Getty Images

Over to he 110m hurdles and it has been labelled the greatest upset of the Tokyo Games, Jamaica’s Hansle Parchment winning gold over America’s Grant Holloway who had been the dominant force on the track.

Holloway, the reigning world champion, was rated the biggest certainty on the track and field program given he hadn’t lost a race since August last year.

But when it mattered the most it was Parchment who produced a career breakthrough performance.

The 31-year-old, a bronze medallist from the 2012 London Games, reduced his best time for 2021 from 13.16sec down to 13.04sec to win the Olympic title.

Holloway, 23, the second-fastest man in history, led for most of the final until fading late to get the silver medal in 13.09sec.

Another Jamaican Ronald Levy took home bronze in 13.10sec.

“The greatest feeling, the greatest feeling,” Parchment said.

“I’ve worked so hard. It’s unbelievable that I caught this guy (Grant Holloway). I’m really grateful.

“I don’t think a lot of people expected me to win.”

Holloway admitted the occasion got to him inside Tokyo’s Olympic Stadium.

“I just think the nerves, the big atmosphere got the best of me a little bit,” he said. “But I’m young, I’ve got a lot of races under my belt so I’ll take this with a grain of salt and I’ll keep moving forward.

“This was not the outcome that I wanted but it enables me to say I’m an Olympic medallist.”

Parchment (R) and Holloway after the event. Picture: AFP

It was another dagger in a dismal athletics campaign for the USA.

Will Claye — favoured at last to win a gold medal after twice finishing runner-up in the Olympic final behind Christian Taylor, who missed Tokyo due to injury – came up short in fourth place.

Gold instead went to Portugal’s Cuba-born Pedro Pichardo, who showed Claye how to transform minor medals into gold having previously won two world silvers when representing Cuba.

The USA came as ever with great hopes of dominating track and field but have just four titles thus far and missed out on the 100/200m sprint titles.

Their women’s 100 and 200m sextet yielded just a bronze — Gabby Thomas in the 200m — whilst the men managed two silvers and a bronze in the 100 and 200m.

Holloway was circumspect about having led till the final hurdle only to be overhauled by Jamaica’s Hansle Parchment.

Only Fred Kerley of the relay quartet will be able to leave Tokyo saying he is an Olympic medallist having taken silver in the 100m individual event.

There was a slither of a silver lining for the USA when Ryan Crouser broke his own Olympic shot put record three times to win the USA its first track and field gold medal.

Crouser, whose previous record of 22.52m was set in winning at Rio five years ago, smashed the record on his very first throw of Thursday morning’s final.

Parchment, a bronze medallist at the 2012 London Games, clocked 13.04 seconds. Picture: AFP

He heaved it 22.83m and then improved that with a 22.93m throw before moving the record to 23.30m.

Crouser, who broke the world record in June with a 23.37 mark, held up a card to the camera when his victory was confirmed that read “Grandpa, we did it, 2020 Olympic champion”.

His American teammate Joe Kovacs won silver in 22.65m with New Zealand’s Tomas Walsh claiming bronze with a season’s best 22.47m. The final results mirrored the 2016 final.

The normally dominant USA team has had a horror start to the track and field program in Tokyo with Crouser at least helping to ease the embarrassment.

In the men’s triple jump, Portugal’s Pedro Pichardo took gold with a leap of 17.98m. He had previously won silver medals at the 2013 and 2015 world championships while representing Cuba.

China’s Zhu Yaming took silver with 17.57m while the tiny West African country of Burkina Faso won its first ever Olympic medal with Hugues Fabrice Zango taking bronze (17.47m).

The USA team did taste some success, claiming their second gold medal of the day in the women’s pole vault.

Katie Nageotte continued her consistent season by taking the Olympic title with a leap of 4.90m.

Reigning world champion Anzhelika Sidorova, from the Russian Olympic Committee, took silver and Great Britain’s Holly Bradshaw bronze, both clearing 4.85m.