U.S. women's 4x100 relay track team earns silver medal
TOKYO — Just by making it to the final, the U.S. women's 4x100 meter relay team did what its male counterpart could not.
But just making the final has never been good enough for American relay teams.
The foursome of Javianne Oliver, Teahna Daniels, Jenna Prandini and Gabby Thomas won silver in 41.45 seconds.
Favorite Jamaica won gold in 41.02 seconds, the third-fastest time in history; Great Britain claimed bronze (41.88).
"We were really excited to come out here and work hard together and come up with a medal," said Thomas, who also won bronze in the 200 meters. "We knew it was going to come. You know we manifested it, we plan for it and we're just really excited to do this for Team USA."
After the disastrous showing by the men's 4x100 team in Thursday's prelims — once again done in by poor handoffs, it finished sixth in its heat and didn't make the medal race — the women were asked why they were able to get the relay baton around cleanly but the men could not.
"I wouldn't say the men can't do it," Daniels said in defense of her teammates. "They just … it's a challenge, you know, challenges can be overcome. But for us, I feel like we are so young, and we come from great college programs [where they run the sprint relay often]. So, for us it's like money."
"We have great chemistry together too," Prandini said. "We're really confident and comfortable with each other so we knew that whatever team we put out here we were going to get the stick out."
The U.S. team did not have a pre-Olympics relay camp due to COVID-19 restrictions.
With the U.S. not on the track for the men's final, Italy once again came out with a surprise win, claiming gold in 37.50 seconds, with Filippo Tortu delivering a great anchor leg; 100 champion Lamont Marcell Jacobs ran second.
Great Britain was the silver medalist in 37.51, and Canada the bronze in 37.70.
Canadian anchor Andre DeGrasse added another medal to the 200 gold and 100 gold he won earlier in the meet.
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