A 37.62 seconds scorcher at the Olympic Stadium, here in Berlin, Germany, yesterday secured silver for Trinidad and Tobago in the World Championship men’s 4x100 metres relay.
Darrel Brown, Marc Burns, Emmanuel Callender and Richard Thompson teamed up for the new national record, a clocking that earned T&T a five-place jump, to third, on the all-time national team list.
’That time puts us with pretty big company,’ an excited Burns declared. ’A country of just 1.4/1.5 million people, that’s a great, great achievement.’
World record holders Jamaica are at the top of the national team list, and the United States are second.
Yesterday, the Jamaicans followed up on their Olympic triumph with victory in the World Championship final, Steve Mullings, Michael Frater, double sprint champion Usain Bolt and Asafa Powell combining for a 37.31 seconds clocking-a new Championship record and the second fastest time in history, behind their 37.10 world record run at the 2008 Beijing Olympics.
Great Britain finished third in 38.02.
In Beijing, T&T were a distant second to Jamaica in 38.06 seconds. Yesterday, though, the race was far more competitive.
Afterwards, Bolt paid tribute to Team T&T.
’These guys are great athletes. They don’t come out to play.’
The Jamaicans were originally listed to compete in lane eight, but the draw was revised following the disqualification of the Americans in the qualifying round, and the Olympic champions were moved to lane seven, setting the stage for a head-to-head duel with T&T, in six.
Each member of the T&T team pulled his weight. Brown ran the lead-off leg, handing the baton to Burns, and halfway through the race there was very little between Jamaica and T&T. Up against Bolt on the third leg, Callender was not out of his depth. However, by the time Callender completed the exchange with Thompson, Powell enjoyed too much of a cushion for the T&T anchor to challenge his Jamaican counterpart.
T&T’s 37.62 clocking was the 11th fastest time in history, a confidence booster in Team T&T’s bid to turn silver into gold at the 2011 World Championships, in Daegu, Korea.
’I honestly believe that we can,’ Thompson told the Sunday Express, ’as long as everyone stays healthy and as long as we are able to continue to work together to form a chemistry. The only (national) teams to ever run faster than us are USA and Jamaica. To be right behind them shows just where we stand, and what a great run it was today by the Trinidad and Tobago team.’
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