US star Freddie Crittenden deliberately fell behind in the 110m hurdles – but there was a reason for it

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Freddie Crittenden on Sunday Men’s 110m Hurdles exist Paris 2024 — but it looked like he jogged all the way to the finish line, finishing as much as five seconds behind his rivals in his heat race.

By comparison, Louis Francois Mendy of Senegal won his heat in 13.31 seconds, while Crittenden finished in 18.27, taking nearly 40 percent longer than his peers to finish.

along with Team USA The star looked as if this approach was part of the plan from the outset, which immediately raised concerns and questions about the reason for his slow game.

As expected, he ranked last among the eight athletes in the group, and only the top three could advance to the semi-finals.

However, Crittenden explained to the broadcasters after the game the reason for his slow warm-up — which also revealed his new mentality and approach to these issues. Olympic Games This was not common in most previous track and field events.

“It was strange, I had an easy pre-match training session on Saturday but in the last session I had a bit of pain in my adductor muscle and the doctor did some tests on me,” he said.

“They said it wasn’t an injury, just a lack of muscle activity and I’ve been feeling a bit sore. I wanted to come here to relax and thank God for the repechage, I have to come here and get through the line so I can look forward to the repechage on Tuesday, get into the top six and get into the semi-finals the next day.”

Crittenden’s view on repechage – athletes effectively Extra chance to play and advance to the next round in their chosen event – ​​meaning it was essentially a tactical defeat designed to delay his true competitive action and give him more time to recover.

Olympic rules state that no athlete outside the top three in the 110m hurdles heats, and none of the next three fastest athletes who did not automatically qualify, can attempt a repechage – except for those who did not start, did not finish or were disqualified.

Therefore, he needed to compete and complete the entire schedule, which he did, but without compromising his fitness or ability to go all out next time.

Crittenden’s American teammate Grant Holloway set the fastest preliminaries time at 13.01 seconds. 34-year-old Olympic champion Hansler Pachment finished a disappointing fifth in the third round, but he avoided a repechage by taking one of the last three fastest spots. In the third round, the four runners were separated by an incredible nine thousandths of a second.

“I pushed everybody to the mark. It was early in the morning and to run this (13.01) with no day of preparation was really impressive,” Holloway said after his heats. “Of course I was nervous, it’s the biggest stage, going against a big guy like (Olympic champion Hansler Pachment), who was once my idol. You have to perform at your best and the same thing happened in Tokyo. I ran well but I didn’t get there.”

Crittenden’s approach was further reinforced by the fact that Yakubu Aluha was unable to complete the fifth round due to injury. The Kuwaiti athlete sat in the middle of the track for several minutes before receiving medical assistance. As a non-finisher, he will not participate in the repechage.