Summary
In the final, Jamaica and the United States were out early, Jamaica passing first. The British team seemed to be keeping up with the leaders, passing efficiently. At the second handoff, English Gardner seemed to leave even with Schillonie Calvert, while Alexandria Anderson had not arrived with the baton yet. Gardner had to come to a complete stop at the end of the zone to wait for the baton, finally resuming with a legal handoff in dead last place. Inside of USA, France was having similar difficulties with the baton. By the final handoff, Jamaica had an 8-meter lead on the second place Russian team, Gold medalist Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce on the anchor pulling away and victory assured. Jamaica dominated the race finishing with a championship record 41.29. Coming down the straight, Britain's Hayley Jones was swallowed up by France's Stella Akakpo, Germany's Verena Sailer and American Octavious Freeman speeding from the back trying to make up lost ground. Freeman was able to pass three teams in the last few steps but France beat USA to the line.
The French relay team members were duly presented their silver medals during the medal ceremony. After the medal ceremony, the British team filed a protest against the French team, claiming that the latter had an out-of-zone baton handover between Ayodelé Ikuesan and Myriam Soumaré. More than two hours after the race, the French relay team was officially disqualified. The French delegation appealed against their disqualification, but it was in vain. Consequently, the American team was upgraded to the silver medal and the British team received the bronze medal. Bernard Amsalem, the president of the Fédération française d'athlétisme, called the French team's disqualification "an outrage". He explained that normally the decision to disqualify a team had to be made before the medal ceremony and teams had to file protests within thirty minutes from the end of the race. [2]
With this 4 × 100 m victory, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce became the first woman to win the sprint triple (100, 200, 4 × 100) at the World Athletics Championships. The winning margin was 1.46 seconds, which as of 2024 is the only time this women's relay race has been won by more than one second at these championships.
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