The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

BEIJING, China — Shaunae Miller made this one look so easy.

In what was clearly supposed to be one of the more competitive heats of the women’s 400 metre semi-finals last night at the 15th IAAF World Championships, Miller ran away from the pack on the home stretch.

She was so far ahead that over the last 50 metres she was able to check and double check just how much distance, if any, they had covered to the gap before she started to shut it down.

By the time she crossed the finish line at the Bird’s Nest, she had posted a time of 50.12 for the victory. Jamaica’s national champion Christine Day was a distant second in 50.82.

And just how the 21-year-old six-foot, one-inch national champion was able to get past her rivals in the race, she managed to avoid giving a lengthy interview with the media in the mixed zone where the journalists get a chance to interview the athletes.

As she made her exit, she just simply stated: “It just went well.”

With a day’s rest in between, Miller will be back on the track at 8:40am EST to run the final and a chance to get the Bahamas its second medal in just the team’s second appearance in a final so far.

Miller will be in the ultimate match-up that everybody anticipated just as her and American Allyson Felix had planned it. Both opted not to run the 200m here and decided to concentrate on the 400m.

While Miller will run out of lane five ahead of Day, Felix will be in front of her in lane six.

Miller will be going after her second global medal after winning the IAAF World Indoor Championship bronze medal in Sopot, Poland, last year following her back-to-back reign as the IAAF World Junior champion in 2010 in Moncton, Canada and the 2011 World Youth champion in 2011 in Lille, France.

She ran a personal best of 49.97 this year to join an elite field of Bahamian females who have dipped under the 50-second barrier, led by Tonique Williams, the national record at 49.07 that she set in Berlin, Germany in 2002.

Also part of the 49 club is ‘Golden Girl’ Pauline Davis, who was re-elected as the IAAF council member during the congress held prior to the start of the championship last week.

On Tuesday night, Davis-Thompson was the presenter of the medals to the winners of the women’s 100m with Jamaican Shelly Ann Fraser-Price as the gold medallist.