There were more relay surprises in the men’s 4x400 metres semi-finals this morning, as traditional powers, such as Germany, Poland and France, were eliminated at the expense of the less fancied teams from Bahamas and Ireland.
The United States head the men’s qualifiers for tonight’s final, their quartet of James Carter, LaBronze Garrett, Jabari Pride and Godfrey Herring clocking 3min 07.58sec to win the first semi by 0.02sec from Russia.
The hard work of the Bahamas and Irish teams in chasing after the two championship favourites bore fruit when the second semi was staged, where Jamaica (3:08.70) led home a surprise package from Switzerland (3:09.04).
It left the Germans, French and Poles out of the automatic slots and too slow to win a place in the top six as fastest losers, since Ireland’s national record 3:08.83 by Robert Daly, Gary Ryan, David Gillick and David McCarthy ensured they would race again this evening.
