Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics – Men's 400 metres

Men's 400 metres at the Games of the XXX Olympiad
Venue	Olympic Stadium
Date	4–6 August
Competitors	52 from 38 nations
Winning time	43.94
Medalists
Kirani James   Grenada   Luguelin Santos   Dominican Republic   Lalonde Gordon   Trinidad and Tobago

Official Video

Athletics at the 2012 Summer Olympics
Track events
100 m		men		women
200 m		men		women
400 m		men		women
800 m		men		women
1500 m		men		women
5000 m		men		women
10,000 m		men		women
100 m hurdles				women
110 m hurdles		men
400 m hurdles		men		women
3000 m steeplechase		men		women
4×100 m relay		men		women
4×400 m relay		men		women
Road events
Marathon		men		women
20 km walk		men		women
50 km walk		men
Field events
Long jump		men		women
Triple jump		men		women
High jump		men		women
Pole vault		men		women
Shot put		men		women
Discus throw		men		women
Javelin throw		men		women
Hammer throw		men		women
Combined events
Heptathlon				women
Decathlon		men

The men's 400 metres competition at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, United Kingdom, was held at the Olympic Stadium on 4–6 August.^[1]

The first round went largely to form, but defending champion Lashawn Merritt came to the meet injured and re-injured himself, unable to finish. Renny Quow also failed to start his heat. In the first race, Oscar Pistorius ran a season best to qualify. In the second heat, world champion Kirani James ran easily to win. The third heat featured three national records as Jonathan Borlée took his twin brother's mark for Belgium (Kevin also qualified in the seventh heat), Pavel Maslák set the mark for the Czech Republic and Donald Sanford set the mark for Israel. Most of the time qualifiers came from the hotly contested fourth heat, 45.61, the slowest time qualifier, though Conrad Williams got in with a 46.12 in the slow sixth heat.

It took under 45 seconds to make the final as Lalonde Gordon led the qualifiers from heat 1. Heat 2 featured James and Jonathan Borlée, and double-amputee Pistorius' attempt to make the final. But Pistorius' late charge was non-existent and he finished last in the heat. After the race, in a show of sportsmanship, James and Pistorius exchanged bib numbers, which James proudly showed as he celebrated. In the third heat, shotgun survivor Bryshon Nellum ran 45.02 for the fastest non-qualifier, leaving this the first Olympic 400 final other than the boycott year of 1980 not to have an American competitor. USA swept the medals in 2008 and 2004.

Aside from Chris Brown, the finals were filled by athletes under age 24, three of them still teenagers. Demetrius Pinder took the early lead down the back stretch, but reigning World Junior Champion Luguelin Santos (age 18) and reigning World Champion Kirani James (age 19) were in the lead coming off the turn. Down the stretch, James powered ahead for the gold medal. His 43.94 national record for Grenada was the first time a non-American had run in under 44 seconds.^[2] It was also the first Olympic medal for his country. Lalonde Gordon came from behind but could not overtake Santos; he received a bronze. Santos' silver medal was the third medal for the Dominican Republic, coming 45 minutes after Felix Sánchez won his second gold.

Competition format

The Men's 400m competition consisted of 7 heats (Round 1), 3 semifinals and a final.^[3] The fastest competitors from each race in the heats qualified for the Semifinals along with the fastest overall competitors not already qualified that were required to fill the 24 available spaces in the semifinals. A total of eight competitors qualified for the final from the semifinals.^[4]

Records

Prior to the competition, the existing World and Olympic records were as follows.

World record	Michael Johnson (USA)	43.18	Seville, Spain	26 August 1999
Olympic record		43.49	Atlanta, United States	29 July 1996
2012 World leading	LaShawn Merritt (USA)	44.12	Eugene, OR, United States	24 June 2012
Broken records during the 2012 Summer Olympics
2012 World leading	Kirani James (GRN)	43.94	London, United Kingdom	6 August 2012

The following new National records were set during the competition.

Belgium National Record	Jonathan Borlée (BEL)	44.43 s
Czech Rebulic National Record	Pavel Maslák (CZE)	44.91 s
Israel National Record	Donald Sanford (ISR)	45.71 s
Grenada National Record	Kirani James (GRN)	43.94 s

Schedule

All times are British Summer Time (UTC+1)

Results

Official Video of the First Round

Round 1

^[5]

Qual. rule: first 3 of each heat (Q) plus the 3 fastest times (q) qualified.

Heat 1

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Luguelín Santos	Dominican Republic	0.187	45.04		Q
2	Oscar Pistorius	South Africa	0.236	45.44	SB	Q
3	Maksim Dyldin	Russia	0.190	45.52		Q
4	Rusheen McDonald	Jamaica	0.243	46.67
5	Vitaliy Butrym	Ukraine	0.165	47.62
N/A	Ahmed Mohamed Al-Merjabi[a]	Oman	N/A	N/A	DNS
N/A	Renny Quow	Trinidad and Tobago	N/A	N/A	DNS

[a] Ahmed Mohamed Al-Merjabi was forced to scratch from this race after he injured his foot in a training session three days earlier.^[6]

Heat 2

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Kirani James	Grenada	0.173	45.23		Q
2	Ramon Miller	Bahamas	0.160	45.57		Q
3	Liemarvin Bonevacia	Independent Olympic Athletes	0.232	45.60	PB	Q
4	Isaac Makwala	Botswana	0.211	45.67
5	Deon Lendore	Trinidad and Tobago	0.205	45.81
6	Daundre Barnaby	Canada	0.171	46.04
7	Bereket Desta	Ethiopia	0.224	47.40
8	Bahaa Al Farra	Palestine	0.212	49.93	SB

Heat 3

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Jonathan Borlée	Belgium	0.179	44.43	NR	Q
2	Pavel Maslák	Czech Republic	0.186	44.91	NR	Q
3	Pavel Trenikhin	Russia	0.194	45.00	PB	Q
4	Dane Hyatt	Jamaica	0.261	45.14		q
5	Donald Sanford	Israel	0.168	45.71	NR
6	Nelson Stone	Papua New Guinea	0.193	46.71	SB
7	Sergej Zaikov	Kazakhstan	0.209	47.12
8	Ak Hafiy Tajuddin Rositi	Brunei	0.188	48.67	PB

Heat 4

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Demetrius Pinder	Bahamas	0.151	44.92		Q
2	Bryshon Nellum	United States	0.191	45.29		Q
3	Yousef Ahmed Masrahi	Saudi Arabia	0.147	45.43	PB	Q
4	Tabarie Henry	Virgin Islands	0.176	45.43		q
5	Albert Bravo	Venezuela	0.197	45.61	PB	q
6	Jermaine Gonzales	Jamaica	0.171	46.21
7	Kristijan Efremov	Macedonia	0.229	47.92	PB
8	Zaw Win Thet	Myanmar	0.181	50.07

Heat 5

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Chris Brown	Bahamas	0.171	45.40		Q
2	Tony McQuay	United States	0.155	45.48		Q
3	Nigel Levine	Great Britain	0.148	45.58		Q
4	Yuzo Kanemaru	Japan	0.156	46.01
5	Jānis Leitis	Latvia	0.159	46.41
6	Augusto Stanley	Paraguay	0.190	47.21

Heat 6

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Steven Solomon	Australia	0.145	45.18	PB	Q
2	Lalonde Gordon	Trinidad and Tobago	0.178	45.43		Q
3	Conrad Williams	Great Britain	0.164	46.12		Q
4	Marcell Deák-Nagy	Hungary	0.186	46.17
5	Winston George	Guyana	0.245	46.86
6	Sajjad Hashemi	Iran	0.171	47.75
N/A	LaShawn Merritt	United States	0.195	N/A	DNF

Heat 7

Rank	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	Kevin Borlée	Belgium	0.166	45.14		Q
2	Martyn Rooney	Great Britain	0.186	45.36		Q
3	Rabah Yousif	Sudan	0.203	45.46		Q
4	Nery Brenes	Costa Rica	0.237	45.65
5	Erison Hurtault	Dominica	0.158	46.05	SB
6	Marcin Marciniszyn	Poland	0.180	46.35
N/A	Mathieu Gnanligo	Benin	0.168	N/A	DNF

Official Video of the Semifinal Round

Semi-Finals

^[7]

Qual. rule: first 2 of each heat (Q) plus the 2 fastest times (q) qualified.

Semi-Final 1

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	7	Lalonde Gordon	Trinidad and Tobago	0.168	44.58	PB	Q
2	5	Demetrius Pinder	Bahamas	0.161	44.94		Q
3	6	Steven Solomon	Australia	0.188	44.97	PB	q
4	9	Rabah Yousif	Sudan	0.178	45.13	=PB
5	4	Pavel Maslák	Czech Republic	0.166	45.15
6	2	Tabarie Henry	Virgin Islands	0.167	45.19	SB
7	8	Pavel Trenikhin	Russia	0.198	45.35
8	3	Conrad Williams	Great Britain	0.153	45.53

Semi-Final 2

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	7	Kirani James	Grenada	0.170	44.59	SB	Q
2	6	Chris Brown	Bahamas	0.174	44.67	SB	Q
3	4	Jonathan Borlée	Belgium	0.164	44.99		q
4	9	Tony McQuay	United States	0.230	45.31
5	8	Maksim Dyldin	Russia	0.168	45.39
6	3	Nigel Levine	Great Britain	0.146	45.64
7	2	Albert Bravo	Venezuela	0.185	46.22
8	5	Oscar Pistorius	South Africa	0.254	46.54

Semi-Final 3

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes	Qual.
1	5	Luguelín Santos	Dominican Republic	0.155	44.78		Q
2	4	Kevin Borlée	Belgium	0.147	44.84		Q
3	6	Bryshon Nellum	United States	0.173	45.02
4	8	Ramon Miller	Bahamas	0.190	45.11
5	7	Martyn Rooney	Great Britain	0.186	45.31
6	2	Dane Hyatt	Jamaica	0.159	45.59
7	9	Yousef Ahmed Masrahi	Saudi Arabia	0.146	45.91
8	3	Liemarvin Bonevacia	Independent Olympic Athletes	0.153	1:36.42

Final

^[8] For only the third time in Olympic history, there are no runners from the United States in the final of this event.

The final turn of the 400 metres final
L-R K. Borlée, Pinder, Santos, Brown, James

Rank	Lane	Name	Nationality	Reaction Time	Result	Notes
01 !	5	Kirani James	Grenada	0.163	43.94	WL, NR
02 !	7	Luguelín Santos	Dominican Republic	0.185	44.46
03 !	4	Lalonde Gordon	Trinidad and Tobago	0.159	44.52	PB
4	6	Chris Brown	Bahamas	0.166	44.79
5	9	Kevin Borlée	Belgium	0.151	44.81
6	2	Jonathan Borlée	Belgium	0.173	44.83
7	8	Demetrius Pinder	Bahamas	0.153	44.98
8	3	Steven Solomon	Australia	0.143	45.14

References