Tag: Christian Coleman

4 photos of the failed men’s 4×100 baton pass that cost Team USA at the Olympics once again

This was MESSY from Christian Coleman and Kenny Bednarek.

It was another disaster for Team USA men’s track and field during the 4×100 meter relay at the 2024 Paris Olympics.

Shortly after the Sha’Carri Richardson and the Team USA women’s track and field team won gold at the same event, the men were disqualified when it was their turn to compete.

Team USA men’s was competing without anchor Noah Lyles, who sat out after testing positive for COVID-19 earlier this week. But his presence would not have impacted the results much considering the team was DQ’d before he would have had his chance to run.

As you can see in the video above, USA’s Kenny Bednarek took off before his teammate Christian Coleman could give him the baton. This is a violation of the rules (via Olympics.com):

“The baton exchange has to happen within a 20m changeover box, located 10m before and 10m after the start of each leg, starting from the second relay runner.

A team can be disqualified if any member drops the baton during the handover or if the handover occurs outside the designated area. The runner finishing the race will generally be the fastest sprinter in a team.”

You can see that violation happening in the photos below:

REUTERS/Phil Noble

 

REUTERS/Phil Noble

 

REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach

 

REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach

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Why didn’t Christian Coleman compete at the Tokyo Olympics? A look back at his suspension

A failed drug test means 2024 may be Coleman’s only shot at Olympic glory.

Christian Coleman was world champion in the 100 meters in 2019. But his window for Olympic gold in the event appears to have shut.

Coleman failed to qualify as an individual sprinter at this year’s United States Olympic Trials, finishing fourth in both the 100m and 200m races to fall agonizingly short of making it to Paris on his own. He will, however, have a chance to earn his first medal as part of the 4 x 100m relay this summer.

So why didn’t Coleman, who would have been one of the favorites among male sprinters, compete in Tokyo during the 2020 Games? It involves missed drug tests and a telltale Chipotle receipt.

Coleman served a two-year ban during the 2020 Summer Olympics

Coleman had run one of the fastest 100m sprints in history in 2019 and was primed to enter a Usain Bolt-less field as the men’s favorite. However, a missed drug test in December 2019 — after missing two others earlier in the year — put him in the crosshairs of an Olympic tribunal. Coleman explained he’d been Christmas shopping but had returned home within the hour required of drug testers to wait for him.

This argument was entirely dismissed by those judges. He was done, at least in part, by a circumstantial burrito:

“Shopping receipts show that the athlete was shopping at least from 7:13 pm, also purchased a Chipotle at 7:13 pm and finally purchased 16 items from a Walmart Super Center at 8:22 pm. The athlete’s evidence was that he returned home briefly some time between 8 and 8:10 pm, ate his Chipotle while watching the kick-off and then went out again. We do not accept the athlete’s evidence.

“It would have been simply impossible for him to purchase a chipotle at 7:53 pm [the store being five to nine minutes from his residence], drive home, park the car, go into his residence, eat the chipotle, then watch the kick-off of the football game which only started at 8:15 pm, and thereafter go out again in his car, drive to the store and pick up 16 items at the Walmart Supercenter so as to be able to pay for them by 8:22 pm.”

That missed test led to a two-year ban that lasted into 2022 — nine months after the delayed 2020 Summer Olympics finally took place in Tokyo in 2021. Coleman’s world record time in 2019, 9.76 seconds, would have been enough to win gold that night.

Instead, he’ll have to hope the 4 x 100m relay breaks his way in what could be the 28-year-old’s final Olympics.

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