China makes progress in Olympic track and field, USA bows out of men's 4X100 relay final

TOKYO, Aug. 5 (Xinhua) -- The Chinese athletics team continued to make breakthrough at the Tokyo Olympics on Thursday with a silver medal in the men's triple jump and both the men's and women's teams reaching the 4X100m relay finals.

Team USA suffered another significant setback when its men's 4x100m team failed to qualify for the final after handoff issues.

The highlight for China came from the men's triple jump final, where Zhu Yaming produced his personal best jump twice to win a silver medal with 17.57 meters, an improvement from the bronze that China won at Rio 2016.

Pedro Pichardo of Portugal took an outright victory with 17.98m, while Hugues Fabrice Zango won bronze, the first-ever Olympic medal for his country Burkina Faso.

In the preliminary round of 4X100m, for the first time, both the Chinese men's and women's quartets advanced into the final.

The Chinese quartet of Liang Xiaojing, Ge Manqi, Huang Guifen and Wei Yongli clocked 42.82 seconds in the women's 4x100m relay, qualifying for the final after 21 years of waiting since the Sydney Olympics.

Men's 100m finalist Su Bingtian led the men's 4X100m squad with Xie Zhenye, Tang Xingqiang and Wu Zhiqiang to finish the heat in 37.92 seconds, second-best among the eight finalists, only behind Jamaica.

The U.S. men's team failed to qualify for the final after a disappointing sixth in the heat, a result described by U.S. track legend Carl Lewis as a "total embarrassment and completely unacceptable."

"The USA team did everything wrong in the men's relay. The passing system is wrong, athletes running the wrong legs, and it was clear that there was no leadership," he tweeted.

Chinese pole vaulter Xu Huiqin ranked 8th in the women's final, the highest-ranking ever for Chinese athletes. Katie Nageotte of the USA won the gold medal at 4.90m. Anzhelika Sidorova of ROC clinched the silver while the bronze went to Britain's Holly Bradshaw.

Nafissatou Thiam of Belgium successfully retained her Olympic heptathlon title by amassing 6,791 points to win the event. Anouk Vetter of the Netherlands took silver in a national record of 6,689 points, and the bronze went to Emma Oosterwegel with a personal best of 6,590 points. Chinese athlete Zheng Ninali finished 10th with 6,318 points.

Damian Warner of Canada claimed the Olympic decathlon title with an Olympic record of 9,018 points and became only the fourth man in history to better 9,000 points. France's Kevin Mayer, who set the world record of 9,126 points in 2018, earned the silver with 8,726, with the bronze going to Australia's 21-year-old Ash Moloney on 8,649 - an Oceania record.

World champion Steven Gardiner from the Bahamas claimed the men's 400m gold medal in a season's best of 43.85 seconds. The silver went to Anthony Zambrano of Colombia in 44.08, and Kirani James earned the bronze in 44.19.

In the men's 110 hurdles final, Jamaican Hurdler Hansle Parchment took a surprising victory after overtaking favorite Grant Holloway of the USA through the final hurdle and crossed the line first in 13.04 seconds.

Holloway took the silver in 13.09 and Ronald Levy of Jamaica won bronze in 13.10.

World record holder Ryan Crouser of the USA claimed the men's shot put title with 23.30 meters in his sixth attempt that refreshed the Olympic record. Crouser's compatriot Joe Kovacs bagged the silver with 22.65m, Tomas Walsh of New Zealand took bronze with 22.47m.

In the men's 20km race held in Sapporo, Massimo Stano of Italy claimed the gold in 1 hour 21 minutes and 5 seconds. Japan's Koki Ikeda finished second in 1:21:14, followed by his teammate and reigning world champion Toshikazu Yamanishi with 23 seconds behind.

China's Wang Kaihua was in a solo lead after the halfway mark, but he failed to hold off the challenge from behind and eventually ranked seventh in 1:22:03. Another Chinese walker Zhang Jun finished eighth in 1:22:16.