If we could ask Mick Jagger the perfect soundtrack for Thursday night’s athletics at the Olympic Games, the Rolling Stone’s star cheering on from the royal box would have had no doubts: “I can’t get no satisfaction”.
Noah Lyles would not be pleased, but the lyrics represent exactly his state of mind after he spent his campaign approaching Paris 2024, pledging to erase Usain Bolt from the history books by winning four golds at these Games.
Of course, doing so, he attracted a lot of pressure on himself. He managed to handle it with the 100m triumph, although he wasn’t as dominant as he would have hoped.
On Thursday a man from Botswana completely smashed Lyles ambitions. The only thing Lyles achieved has been attracting more attention than the winner, due to the unrealistic expectations he probably built for himself. Lyles could count in attenuating circumstances, though: after the race he was tended to by medics who carted him off the track in a wheelchair.
Later, wearing a mask, Lyles told reporters he had Covid-19 but decided to compete anyway. “I believe this will be the end of my 2024 Olympics,” Lyles posted on Instagram right after midnight, after his bronze medal.
The first sign something might be wrong came a night earlier when Lyles finished second in a lackluster semifinal, then left the track without talking to reporters to head to the medical tent. His coach said he was fine. It became clear he was not when Tebogo and Bednarek – the silver medalist – reached the curve in the final.
Letsile Tebogo, 21, led wire-to-wire and won in 19.46 seconds, the fourth-fastest time in history, but .15 slower than Lyles’ top time. Kenny Bednarek finished in 19.62 for his second straight silver, and Lyles ran the curve in 19.70. It was the first ever Botswana gold medal at the Olympic Games and first African in the 200m race.
Tebogo dedicated his Olympic gold to his mother Seratiwa, who died in May of this year after a brief illness, and held up his spikes, displaying her date of birth, to the camera following his victory.
“It’s basically me carrying her through every stride that I take inside the field,” Tebogo said.
“To take her [with me], it gives me a lot of motivation. She’s watching up there, and she’s really, really happy.”
Having ended Lyles’ 26-race winning streak over the distance in the semi-finals, Tebogo announced himself on the global stage as he repeated that victory over the man who has long been tipped as Bolt’s heir apparent.
Tebogo, who finished sixth in the 100m final, adds his Olympic gold to the two world medals – 100m silver and 200m bronze – he claimed in Budapest last year. That senior success followed the four medals he gained at the past two editions of the World U20 Championships, as he claimed 100m gold and 200m silver in both 2021 and 2022.
On Thursday night in Paris a possible stellar rivalry was born. Next year at the Athletics World Championship in Tokyo, the next chapter will be presented.
Credit: AIPS Media
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