The Tribune

by RENALDO DORSETT

Tribune Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

Steven Gardiner heads into Thursday morning’s 400m final with the lofty expectations of claiming The Bahamas’ first medal at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Gardiner, the Bahamian 400m national record holder and reigning World Champion in the event, will look to add an individual Olympic medal to his resumé when he races in the final at 8am local time.

Reigning Olympic champion and world record holder Wayde Van Niekerk of South Africa failed to advance to the final, guaranteeing a new Olympic champion in Tokyo.

Gardiner’s body of work over the last few years is the reason why many project him to be a contender for the medal podium after he opted out of contesting the 200m and focus solely on the 400m.

The Abaco native heads into the final confidently with a season’s best time of 44.14 secs to win the third semifinal and qualify as the third fastest among the field. He opened competition with a 45.05 to win his round one heat.

Kirani James of Grenada heads into the final as the fastest qualifier after he produced a season’s best time of 43.88 secs in the first of three semifinals. James is the most experienced and decorated athlete in the field with a pair of Olympic 400m medals to his credit - gold in 2012 in London, England and the silver in 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Anthony Jose Zambrano of Colombia set a new area record of 43.93 secs in the semifinals to qualify at no.2 in the final.

Gardiner will run out of lane six Thursday morning while James and Zambrano will be in the middle of the track in lanes three and four respectively.

The remainder of the field includes: Isaac Makwalan of Botswana in lane one, Liemarcin Bonevacia of The Netherlands in lane two, Michael Cherry of the United States in lane five, Michael Norman of the United States in lane seven and Christian Taylor of Jamaica in lane eight.

Gardiner’s first major individual medal at the senior level was the aforementioned gold won the at the 2019 World Championships in Doha, Qatar.

Opportunities have been few and far between to race a field of this magnitude this season, but Gardiner defeated Norman at last month’s Istvan Gyulai Memorial in Hungary.

While the country’s attention will be fixated on Gardiner’s medal chase, the women’s 4x400 will begin their preliminary rounds.

Anthonique Strachan, Shaunae Miller-Uibo, Doniesha Anderson and Megan Moss will run in heat one at 6:25am local time.

They will compete against Poland, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, Australia, Cuba and France.