Fred Kerley is world champion over 100 m

One of the highlights of the ongoing 2022 World Championships in Athletics in Eugene, Oregon, USA, took place this morning at 4:50 a.m. European time: the men's 100 m final. We had already presented some of the absolute 100 m stars in the run-up to the event. But not all of them should be successful in the end. Already in the preliminaries one day before, various favorites showed themselves successful, but some fluffed already here.

Preliminary heats 100 m men
It is always difficult to judge who really gives 100% in the heats and who is rather tactical. In the first preliminary heat, favorite Marvin Bracy from the USA took the win, but the winning time of 10.05 seconds was not really convincing. In the second preliminary heat, crown favorite Fred Kerley took the victory with an impressive 9.79 s. Great Britain's Zharnel Hughes also impressed with a season's best of 9.97 s and Emmanuel Matadi from Liberia with 9.99 s. The fastest Chinese Bingtian Su could save himself into the semi-final with 10.15 s, but it was not sovereign. Trayvon Bromell took the win in the third preliminary heat with a time of 9.89 s. In the fourth preliminary heat the young Jamaican Oblique Seville surprised with 9.93 s as fastest. Olympic champion Lamont Marcell Jacobs had no chance against him. He just didn't get going and crossed the finish line with only 10.04 s. In the fifth heat, young Letsile Tebogo from Botswana impressed with a winning time of 9.94 s, with which he created a new U20 world record. The once second fastest man on earth, Yohan Blake of Jamaica, "limped" to the finish in 10.04 s, without a chance. He is simply not the youngest anymore. Akani Simbine also surprised with only 10.07 s. In the sixth preliminary heat, 2019 world champion in the 100 m, Christian Coleman, made everything clear, but 10.08 s did not promise too much. In the seventh and final preliminary heat, Japan's Abdul Hakim Sani Brown surprised with 9.98 s, in which he left African champion Ferdinand Omanyala standing with 10.10 s. The latter talked about breaking Usain Bolt's world record not so long ago, but it was not to be.

Semifinals 100 m men
Easy come, easy go. What happened in the preliminary heats was history. Now the story began anew. This was already proven in the first of the three heats, where the "lame" Akani Simbine from South Africa took the victory with 9.97 s and tied with Trayvon Bromell. In the second run Fred Kerley with 10.02 s and Christian Coleman with 10.05 s got the ticket for the final run. In the third heat, Jamaican Oblique Seville impressed once again with 9.90 s. Marvin Bracy made clear his participation in the final with 9.93 s.

Final 100 m men
Based on the results in the heats and the semifinals, some favorites for the medal places had emerged. Especially the Americans Fred Kerley, Trayvon Bromell and Marvin Bracy shone with top times. But young Jamaican Oblique Seville also stood out with consistent top performance. At 19:50 local time it was still daylight, the atmosphere in the stadium was good but not euphoric. I have seen more spectacular 100m races in previous years where the crowd was much louder, cheering along, shouting, screaming and cheering for the runners. It was very subdued in comparison. The atmosphere was missing, but that could not interest the 100 m runners now. They knelt down in the starting blocks and shot out of the blocks at the starting gun. It was a close race. On the far right Bromell was in front and on the left it was Bracy and Kerley, who was behind Bracy for a long time, until shortly before the end, when he, as usual, came up to speed at the end of the 100 m and took the lead from him by a razor-thin margin. A very close race in which the crown favorite emerged victorious in the end. Mission accomplished!