Sanya Richards-Ross, Allyson Felix and USA Win Gold in 4x400-Meter Relay
August 11, 2012
The American women crushed the rest of the field in the 4x400-meter relay on Saturday, delivering one of the most impressive performances of the London 2012 Olympics.
The star-studded team of Sanya Richards-Ross, Allyson Felix, Francena McCorory and DeeDee Trotter blazed to a time of three minutes, 16.87 seconds, nearly four seconds faster than their closest competitor.
It was a season-best performance for the United States, and although the Americans failed to take down the world record of 3:15.17 (Soviet Union, 1988), their gold-medal run was one of the most dominant showings of the entire London Games.
Of course, their victory shouldn't come as much of a surprise, after they took first in Friday's qualifying round. Team USA finished with a time of 3:22.09, and after replacing Keshia Baker and Diamond Dixon with Richards-Ross and Felix, the U.S. women shaved more than five seconds off their time.
With the victory, Richards-Ross and Felix became two of the most decorated track stars of the London Games. Richards-Ross also took home the gold in the 400-meter dash, while Felix won an individual gold in the 200 and a relay gold as part of the USA's world-record 4x100-meter relay team.
This win should be just as gratifying as the others, though, as it was a truly dominant performance.
The United States finished more than three seconds ahead of the silver-medalist Russians (3:20.23) and just over four seconds ahead of Jamaica (3:20.95), which took home the bronze. Great Britain (3:24.76) stumbled to a disappointing fifth-place finish.
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