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WORLD RELAYS GALLERY

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

THE Bahamas men’s 4 x 400 metre team gave the United States of America all they could handle. But for the second consecutive year, the Bahamas came up short at home in the grand finale of the IAAF/BTC World Relays Bahamas 2015.

The American team of David Verburg, Tony McQuay, Jeremy Wariner and LaShawn Merritt stopped the clock in a world- leading time of two minutes and 58.43 seconds to snatch the gold and shatter the Bahamas’ hope for revenge as the team of Ramon Miller, Michael Mathieu, rookie Steven Gardiner and veteran Chris ‘Fireman’ Brown had to settle for the silver in 2:58.91.

Belgium, with the Borlee twins (Johnathan and Kevin on third and anchor) and their younger brother Dylan on pop off, took the bronze in 2:59.33. “I was the anchor, so the main amount of work was done by my teammates. I just did what I had to do,” Merritt said. “The crowd was loud, but as David said, we used it to our advantage. I didn’t hear ‘Bahamas,’ I just heard yelling. So we benefitted from that energy.”

A lot of that yelling was for Team Bahamas as the stadium was looking for another upset. Although he gave it his all, Brown thanked God and the Bahamian people for their tremendous support.

“We didn’t get the gold, but nonetheless, we did our best,” he said. “I think the future looks good for us. We have some work to do and we need to get a few more races under our belts.”

Brown, the most decorated member of the men’s team, praised Gardiner for stepping up and taking on the challenge of trying to push the Bahamas in the lead on the third leg.

But the more experienced Wariner waited for the opportune time to regain the lead coming off the final bend and once he took control on the straight away, he passed it on to Merritt, who preserved the win.

Gardiner nor Mathieu spoke because of fatigue, but Miller said they “went out there and gave it our best and I’m happy with how we performed. It’s still early in the season for us and we still have some improvements to make. We will be working on these as we prepare for future events.”

In the preliminaries, which was recalled twice, the Bahamas held off Brazil for the victory in 3:02.18 to clinch a spot in the final in Sunday’s final. They did it with splits of 45.98 by Mathieu, 45.30 by Pinder, 45.84 by Russell and 45.06 by Miller. Brazil was the other automatic qualifier in 3:02.23. It was the second fastest qualifying time behind Trinidad & Tobago, who had a season’s best of 3:02.09 to win their heat.

Miller, back in action after he got injured running in the heats of the initial event last year, gave God thanks for allowing the team to be able to complete the race and make it back to the final. “It’s still early in the season, so we need more rounds,” he said. “But we haven’t ran our A team, so we will see what happens tomorrow.”

For Russell, it was his second time running on the team after competing last year at the Commonwealth Games. He noted that the other members of the team constantly spoke to him, keeping him hyped up so that he was ready to compete. Meanwhile, Mathieu and Pinder both felt good, especially Pinder, who indicated that he almost didn’t make it after he was not originally named to the team.