Carmelita Jeter’s perfect exchange

Sat, 11 Aug 2012 12:15:00 +0000

The baton that gets passed from runner to a runner during a 4x100 relay race is made of wood and weighs a little more than 2 and a half pounds – or about the same as a quart of milk. In Sydney in 2000, Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008, that weight was too great.

In Sydney, the American team, anchored by gold medalist Marion Jones, only took a bronze after a very poor exchange between Torri Edwards and Nanceen Perry.

In Athens, Lauryn Williams, who had already won a silver in the 100m, botched an exchange on the final leg, and the American women failed to medal. Four years later in Beijing, the U.S. didn’t make it to the finals when Edwards and Williams couldn’t connect in the semifinal.

Those of us who watch the Olympics without closely following these sports in the intervening four years tend to come away with a sense of the inevitability of records falling, and for the most part that’s true. But the sports whose records take the longest to fall are the ones that demand a combination of athleticism and teamwork.

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Carmelita Jeter’s perfect exchange