Some upbeat news for Thailand near the end of what has been a difficult year: The women’s 4×100-meter relay team won a gold metal Friday at the Guangzhou Asian Games.
AP has the details:
Thailand was the surprise winner of the women’s race, clocking 44.09 seconds as they interrupted Chinese dominance of six straight golds in the event. No female sprinters from Thailand finished in the top three of either the 100 or the 200, but that didn’t prevent them putting togther a winning team.
Nongnuch Sanrat flashed a wide smile as she overtook China’s Ye Jiabei in the final leg to give Thailand its first track and field gold in Guangzhou. It was sweet vindication for the 27-year-old Thai after she dropped the baton in the same race at the previous Asian Games in Doha four years ago.
“We lost at the Doha Asian Games and this time we came here for a gold medal,” her 30-year-old teammate Neeranuch Klomdee said. “I have trained for 10 years. Our team trained five days every week and we worked on strength, speed and co-operation.”
(Emphasis mine.)
Here’s a video — embedded below — of the race. Nongnuch’s sprint in the final leg is inspiring indeed. She takes the baton around the 3:20 mark.
3 replies on “Asian Games: Thailand women win gold in 4×100-meter relay”
Sweet! The silence of the crowd when China don’t win is deafening!
Even though I’m not Thai (nor a Thailand-phile), I can definitely appreciate that that was a great race and win. Very exciting and dramatic! 🙂
I agree, YTSL. An entertaining race indeed.