TOKYO (AP) — Marcell Jacobs backed up his shocking 100-meter victory with another totally unexpected gold for Italy in the 4×100-meter relay at the Olympics.
TOKYO (AP) — There are some things track fans are used to: Nobody stops the Jamaican women at these Olympics and the tireless Sifan Hassan is a contender for a medal in every distance race she enters. Other things might take some getting used to: Italy is a sprint power. It now owns the gold medal in the men’s 4×100-meter relay to go with the shocking 100-meter gold that Marcell Jacobs won. The Italian relay team made Jacobs a double Olympic champion Friday, as the country pulled off a stunner to equal Jacobs’ solo triumph five nights earlier. Jacobs ran the second leg of Italy’s 37.5-second trip around the track, and Filippo Tortu outraced Britain’s Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake to the line. Tortu, who was slightly behind at the changeover, dipped first for a.01-second victory. “We are four Ferraris,” Tortu said. The triumph set off a second bout of Italian sprint celebrations on the track at the Olympic Stadium — two more than anyone expected when these Games opened. Canada, featuring 200-meter champion Andre De Grasse, took bronze in 37.70. A Jamaican Olympic squad without Usain Bolt came in fifth to end a run of three straight relay wins for the island nation. (One was stripped because of a doping case.) Jamaica with Bolt used to be a virtual guarantee for gold. At these Olympics, a Jamaican women’s team with the world’s three fastest sprinters was the surest thing going. Elaine Thompson-Herah, the double-sprint champion in Tokyo, ran the second leg after an awkward, but legal, exchange with Briana Williams. She passed the baton to Shelly-Ann Fraser Pryce, the 100 silver medalist.
