The Jamaican team (from left) Leroy Colquhoun, Davian Clarke, Michael McDonald and Gregory Haughton celebrate after winning the 4x400 meters relay event of the World Indoor Athletics Championships in Budapest yesterday. - Reuters
BUDAPEST, Hungary, CMC:
JAMAICA'S 4x400 metres relay men secured the country's only gold medal with a fine win at the 10th IAAF World Track & Field Indoor Championship on yesterday's final evening.
They swept to a big win in the final event of the championship, landing the 1600-metre relay in a 2004 world best of three minutes 05.21 seconds.
It lifted their country's tally to five medals overall - one gold, two silver (James Beckford - long jump, Davian Clarke - 400m) and two bronze (Maurice Wignall - 60m hurdles, Germaine Mason - high jump), giving Jamaica a sixth place finish among the 110 nations that competed.
The Jamaican mile relay quartet's job was made easier by the USA dropping the baton on the final exchange, as they won the Caribbean's first ever men's 1600-metre relay World Indoor title after getting a strong start from Olympic bronze medallist Gregory Haughton.
Leroy Colquhoun and Michael McDonald kept the Jamaicans in gold medal range for Davian Clarke, and as the 400-metre silver medallist took the baton for the last leg, the pressured Americans - just marginally ahead on the hand-over - dropped their baton as Joe Mendel fell in a fumbling exchange with Godfrey Herring.
It was the first ever victory in the event for the Jamaicans, who had been silver medallists in 1997 and 2003.
"It was a good victory," Clarke said after taking the team home.
"I was tired after the 400-metre rounds and I depended on my teammates. Relay is a team event, they stepped up to the plate and I was confident there was no way I was going to let them down," Clarke added.
RUSSIA CHASED JAMAICA
"Russia (3:06.23) chased Jamaica for second and the USA, who were third at finish, were subsequently disqualified and placed last. The Bahamas got fifth in 3:17.57.
In the women's final, Russia won in a world record 3:23.88, while Jamaica placed fifth in 3:33.77.
The English-speaking Caribbean had much to cheer about earlier when Bahamian Dominic Demeritte gave the region its first ever men's World Indoor 200-metre title.
He won in a Bahamas national record 20.66 seconds.
The pair of gold medal successes, added to Alleyne Francique's 400-metre triumph for Grenada on Saturday, carried the English-speaking Caribbean's total medal haul at the meet to eight.
Demeritte, a bronze medallist in the event last year, sped out of the blocks from the favourable lane six and repelled a strong challenge from Sweden's Johan Wissman (20.72) down the stretch. Germany's Tobias Unger (21.02) placed third.
There was another world record on the final day when Sweden's Christian Carlsson won the men's triple jump at 17.83 metres, to equal the Cuban Aliecer Urrutia's mark set in Sindelfingen, Germany in March 1997.
The 24 year-old Olsson's previous best was 17.80 set in 2002.
Canada's World (outdoor) Championship 100-metre hurdles gold medallist, Perdita Felicien, added the 60-metre hurdles indoor title to her collection when she toppled American race favourite and 60-metre gold medallist Gail Devers to win in a championship record 7.75 seconds.
Devers (7.78) and France's Linda Ferga (7.82) took silver and bronze, respectively, behind Felicien, who has St. Lucian parentage.
Jamaica's Lacena Golding-Clarke was sixth in 7.89 seconds.
While Devers failed to clinch her double, Russian Tatyana Lebedeva achieved the triple jump/long jump double by winning long jump gold medal with a season's leading mark at 6.98 metres.
In other events, Russia's Anastasiya Kapachinskaya (22.78) won the 200-metre final, and the 800s went to Mozambique's Maria Mutola (1:58.50)and South African Mbulaeni Mulaudzi (1:45.71).
