The world record holder was a medal hope but has ultimately been outrun by injury
Olympic champion Wayde van Niekerk won’t be defending his 400m title in the final of this year’s Tokyo Games. The world record holder could only scrap to a fifth-place finish in the third semifinal on Monday, not good enough to earn a place on Thursday’s starting blocks. . After his immense gold-medal race at Rio 2016, with the world seemingly at his feet, he would infamously injure his knee in a celebrity touch rugby game only a few months later.
But it was not to be in Monday’s semifinal. Starting in lane eight among a tough line-up, Van Niekerk surged past his Dutch opponent to his right but struggled to fend off the other frontrunners. By the time the athletes coalesced at the final bend he looked to be visibly fading and was outrun in the final stretch.
The elimination brings fresh pain to a South African team that was 0.04 seconds away from winning a medal in the Olympics’ marquee event. Akani Simbine lined up as arguably one of the favourites in an absurdly open 100m race on Sunday,
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