The Tribune

By RENALDO DORSETT

Sports Reporter

rdorsett@tribunemedia.net

THE United States was able to retain the title in the Women’s 4x800m and set a world-leading time in the process.

It was a final time of 8:16.36 seconds for the team of Chanelle Price, Chrisuna Williams, Laura Roesler and Charlene Lipsey.

Led by Price, the 2014 world indoor champion in the individual 800m, led the team off once again, in her third time competing at the World Relays and gave her team an early lead with a 2:01.73 split.

Price was the only returning member from the Americans’ 2015 team which set a meet record in 8:00.62.

This year, she joined Nickel Ashmeade of Jamaica and Sanya Richards-Ross of the United States as the only athletes to win three gold medals at the World Relays.

“I’ve had the pleasure of making all three teams that have won here in the Bahamas,” she said. “I knew we had a target on our backs and that all other teams wanted to take the crown from us. We also wanted to set the tone for the USA.”

Belarus finished second in 8:20.07 and Australia was third in 8:21.08.

Price’s lead after the opening leg evaporated on the second leg, when Australia’s Abbey De la Motte passed Williams after their first lap, and handed off the baton to Zoe Buckman with the lead.

“I am so proud of these three ladies,” De la Motte said. “Athletics is an individual sport, but we came together to achieve one goal and we did it.”

Roesler ran what turned out to be the deciding leg when she regained the advantage for the United States and turned the baton over to Lipsey with a nearly three-second lead.

World champion in the event Maryna Arzamasova anchored Belarus to the second place finish as she passed Australia in the first appearance for Belarus at the World Relays.

“It was the joint decision of our national team to start preparing a squad for the World Relays this year. We had a strong set of runners, so it made sense. It’s very early in the season for us. So it is the time to run the times of this order. In May, we will only start speed specific training to get truly race sharp. It was a bit tricky to deal with a long flight and the climate. Back home when we were leaving it was snowing. We knew that the USA team was well prepared but we weren’t going to just hand them the gold medal. We fought to the line, we loved the organisation of the event as well. Everything was running so smoothly and with zero stress.”

Their winning time for the Americans was the slowest in their trio of gold-medal efforts at the World Relays.