Top 5: Relays Where Jamaica Disappointed

[Historian]

My Top Five: Relays Where Jamaica Disappointed

(Part I: The Women)

Although less than stellar baton exchanges have in the past ruined the chances of Jamaica’s female 4x100-meter relay teams to win gold at the level of the Olympic Games and the IAAF World Championships, sometimes injury has been the culprit. Below are my “Top 5 Women’s Sprint Relays” where, in my opinion, Jamaica could have won the gold but for injury or questionable baton passing.

2008 Olympic Games (Beijing):
Virtually everyone expected Jamaica’s all-time most superb women’s relay team to not only win the 4x100-meter gold medal, but to break the world record in the process. And that team had promised much, as it was the first time in history that a women’s relay team was comprised of four athletes who had ALL won gold and silver medals in the sprints at that specific global meet!

Sadly, backstretch runner Sherone Simpson was not able to connect with curve runner Kerron Stewart, and soon the end of the 20-meter exchange zone was reached, ending the team’s chance at a medal.

1992 Olympic Games (Barcelona):
The year before, at the 1991 IAAF World Championships in Tokyo, the 4x100-meter women’s team of Dahlia Duhaney, Juliet Cuthbert, Beverley McDonald and Merlene Ottey had won Jamaica’s first women’s relay gold medal at a global event.

In 1992 at the Barcelona Olympic Games, the Jamaican women were expected to do the same. Unfortunately, ace sprinter Juliet Cuthbert suffered an injury during the final and so the team was not able to complete the race.

1996 Olympic Games (Atlanta):
Thanks to one of the greatest anchor legs ever run by any athlete, the great Merlene Ottey was able to run down Russia’s Irina Privalova and snatch the bronze medal behind the Pauline Davis-anchored Bahamas (silver) and the Gwen Torrence-anchored USA (gold). The problem for Jamaica was not only did both the Bahamas and the USA have very good baton exchanges, but more so because curve runner Nikole Mitchell suffered a hamstring pull some ten meters or so before the handoff. In other words, the injured Nikole had to literally limp the final few meters in order to hand the baton to Merlene.

2003 IAAF World Championships (Paris):
Brigitte Foster-Hylton was running anchor on a solid Jamaican team when she pulled up, and Jamaica did not complete the race, which was won by France (anchored by Christine Arron) with the Torri Edwards-anchored USA a very close second.

2000 Olympic Games (Sydney):
Yes, the Jamaican team of Tayna Lawrence, Veronica Campbell, Beverley McDonald and Merlene Ottey won the silver behind the powerful Bahamas squad (Sevatheda Fynes, Chandra Sturrup, Pauline Davis and Debbie Ferguson), but there is no question in my mind that, if not for the messed-up baton exchange between McDonald and Ottey, Jamaica would have won its first Olympic Games 4x100-meter gold medal.

My only consolation of sorts is that the USA team of Chryste Gaines, Torri Edwards, Nanceen Perry and Marion Jones had horrible baton changes throughout, in particular the exchange between curve runner Perry and anchor leg runner Jones (where Perry had to literally hold Jones’s hand and place the baton in it).

[Historian]

What About the Men?

The Men: My Least Memorable Relays (Part I)

Much can be written here, including the Michael Blackwood-anchored 4x400-meter relays at the 2002 Commonwealth Games (Manchester, England) and the 2003 IAAF World Championships (Paris), but I’ll just focus right now on the year 2001.

Remember our men’s relay performance (4x100 and 4x400-meter) at the 2001 IAAF World Championships in Edmonton, Canada?

The Men’s 4x100:
There are some who erroneously state that the first time that an IAAF World Championships was ended with the men’s 4x100-meter relays was in 2011 in Daegu, South Korea (due to the Bolt impact). That is incorrect! The final event at the 2001 Edmonton IAAF World Championships was the men’s 4x100-meter relay.

The semi-finals and finals of those men’s 4x100-meter relays in Edmonton were riddled with missed exchanges and dropped batons, much to the benefit of the Trinidad relay team who got a medal in the absence from the final of several big teams. But the most comical episode came from the Jamaican men in the semi-finals!

Christopher Williams was distracted for one reason or another and so didn’t realize that Dwight Thomas was racing towards him with the baton. The result was that Thomas passed without the baton being exchanged, as Williams was staring at something else. Thomas had to literally turn back with the baton. Never in my life have I ever seen anything like that (not even at the primary school level)!!

Suffice it to say that Jamaica did not make it to the final.

The Men’s 4x400:
In the 4x400-meter relay, Danny McFarlane gave up a nice lead on the anchor leg to Tim Munnings of the Bahamas, thereby presenting the Bahamas with the gift of a silver medal behind the Angelo Taylor-anchored USA team.

Bitter memories for me from Edmonton 2001.

[Exile]

What about the 4 by 400 when the first leg runner (Hodges?) 'picked' the start and the team was DQd???

[Islandman]

While not a dropped baton, the 1968 Olympic team must have felt like they did just that after breaking the world record in the prelims, only to come 4th in the finals. I don't know the details of what happened but there must have been at least one really bad exchange for that to happen.

That was before my time but in those days when gold medals, actually medals period, were not raining down on us it must have been a bitter disappointment.

[Exile]

I thought you were there...lol..

[Karl]

Good post, boss!

[Karl]

While not a dropped baton, the 1968 Olympic team must have felt like they did just that after breaking the world record in the prelims, only to come 4th in the finals. I don't know the details of what happened but there must have been at least one really bad exchange for that to happen.

That was before my time but in those days when gold medals, actually medals period, were not raining down on us it must have been a bitter disappointment.

Poor exchange.
I think it was the 3rd exchange - forgive the Shady Pines memory - Someone to Billy Miller. ...I think it was...

I remember...I think I remember Errol Stewart, Michael Fray....Lennox "Billy" Miller

[Karl]

Aaaaah Patrick Robinson!!!

I remember a 'back and forth' with someone saying our former rep at the International Court in the Hague is not the same Patrick Robinson although I was convinced it was the same person(???)

[TDowl]

3rd leg was Clifton Forbes our 400M NR holder, the question that was never asked was, how come he was given that leg instead of the late Pablo McNeil?

Do you notice investigative reporting is not done, case in point 2012 Olympic 4x400M.

[Karl]

3rd leg was Clifton Forbes our 400M NR holder, the question that was never asked was, how come he was given that leg instead of the late Pablo McNeil?

Do you notice investigative reporting is not done, case in point 2012 Olympic 4x400M.

Thanks for the correction... What year was Patrick Robinson on the 4 x 100M?

[Nemesis]

I remember everyone of these and vividly so too.

[Historian]

Good Reminder, boss!

While not a dropped baton, the 1968 Olympic team must have felt like they did just that after breaking the world record in the prelims, only to come 4th in the finals. I don't know the details of what happened but there must have been at least one really bad exchange for that to happen.

That was before my time but in those days when gold medals, actually medals period, were not raining down on us it must have been a bitter disappointment.

I’man, I still haven’t gotten around to compiling the Top 5 men’s 4x100-meter heart-breakers for Jamaica (maybe I should have done this as a separate thread).

At that 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico, the great Lennox Miller (former American sprinter Inger Miller’s dad) anchored Jamaica’s 4x100-meter relay team. That relay, in my opinion, tops the list of unfortunates in the entire history of our men’s 4x100-meter relays!

Don Quarrie was not on the team that year (I think he was injured). But our team was on fire! We actually equaled the world record in the heats, and then broke it in the semi-finals! That world record, however, lasted for just one single day, making it one of the shortest lived world records ever, as the following day the USA (anchored by the legendary Jim Hines) promptly broke our world record in the finals. We placed fourth.

Thanks for the input, Karl, as I honestly cannot recall where the baton mess-up occurred. What I recall, however, was Jim Hines outrunning the Cuban anchor in the final.

We have really come a long way!