When you have over 81 entrants, 4 qualifying rounds are required by the IAAF. With 89 declared competitors, we had 12 heats where the top 3 places and 4 fastest times (i.e. “3P4T”) advanced to the Quarter-Final round of 40 athletes.
Basically, it meant coming in top 3, and not leaving the rest to chance.
I got lane 2, which is normally an unfavorable lane, but this track was a “fat” track: 122 meter curve and 78 meter straightaway!
I had a good start, with a little pop-up instead of driving out of the blocks. I immediately make up the stagger on 2 guys, but De Feo of Italy makes up the stagger on me within 60 meters. Isashi of Japan runs well out of lane 6, so I ended up in 3rd place. I am relieved as I don’t have to wait for the next 8 heats to see if I qualify on time.
The Quarter-Finals were 90 minutes later… enough time to put on my sweats, grab a drink, go to the stands, check in with my family, then back to the warm up track and the control room & declaration area.
You can simply click the image below (FLV version, browser ready) to view the race, or click here for the full size 720×480. You can also right-click on the link above and save it onto your computer.
START LIST / Lane Assignments
-
1 DE FEO, Alfonso, ITA
2 LEE, Jimson, CAN
3 ANCLAUSKAS, Romutis, LTU
4 VIGLIANESE, Mario, ITA
5 WARNKE, Neville, GBR
6 ISASHI, Yasuhiro, JPN
7 MARKOV, Alexander, RUS
8 MELIS, Ignazio, ITA
Results:
Full results can be found here.
Really good and really interesting post. I expect (and other readers maybe :)) new useful posts from you!
Good luck and successes in blogging!