Marion Jones is going home without a medal.
Winner of five medals and arguably the biggest star of the Sydney Games four years ago, the American finished fifth in Friday's long jump and -- barely one hour later -- went out with the US 4x100m relay team.
Jones ran the second leg and was trying to hand over the baton to Lauryn Williams. But Williams had taken off too soon and never managed to grab it, leaving the Americans out of the race.
"Wait up! Wait up!" Jones screamed as she desperately lunged forward, finally reaching her younger teammate and 100m silver medalist on the third attempt.
By then Williams was already out of the handoff zone. She stopped running, and Jones put her arm around Williams as the two walked to the end of the track.
Jones clutched Williams' hand tightly and tears trickled down Jones' face when she was asked later about her Olympic experience.
"It was a rough one," she said, breaking into more tears. "I just couldn't get the baton to Lauryn, and it didn't happen today.
"It was an extremely disappointing performance for me. It exceeded my wildest dreams in a negative sense," Jones said. "I looked for great things this year. It didn't happen for me and it didn't happen for the team this year."
With the Americans out, Jamaica took the gold in 41.73 seconds, Russia was second in 42.27 and France won the bronze in 42.54.
It was a historic night for China, the host nation of the next Olympics in 2008, which got two gold medals one hour apart.
Liu Xiang became the first Chinese man to get an Olympic gold in athletics when he equaled the world record to win the 110m hurdles with a time of 12.91 seconds, then Xing Hui-na captured the women's 10,000m.
Timothy Mack set an Olympic record at 5.95m to lead a 1-2 US finish in the pole vault, with Toby Stevenson taking the silver at 5.90m. World champion Giuseppe Gibilisco of Italy took the bronze at 5.85m.
There was a frightening moment in the competition when Pavel Gerasimov failed at 6.65m, then missed the landing area, falling on his back and crushing an equipment crate next to the mats. The Russian climbed to his feet, walking away and rubbing his lower back. He attempted one more jump, at 5.75m, but stopped midway down the runway because of the pain and withdrew from the competition.
Jones was left without an individual medal when she finished fifth in the long jump. Tatyana Lebedeva led a Russian sweep, leaping 7.07m to add the gold to her bronze in the triple jump four days ago. Irina Simagina won the silver medal at 7.05 and Tatyana Kotova got the bronze, also at 7.05 but with a worse second jump.
Jones' best jump was a wind-aided 6.85. Jones failed to qualify at the US trials for the 100m and dropped out of the 200m.
Xing won the 10,000m in 30:24.36, the second-fastest time this year and a personal best, after surging past Ejegayehu Dibaba, who took the silver in 30:24.98. Fellow Ethiopian and defending champion Derartu Tulu got the bronze in 30:26.42.
Paula Radcliffe of Britain, the fastest woman this year over the distance, dropped out with 8 1-2 laps left. She also failed to finish the marathon one week ago.
Osleidys Menendez of Cuba set an Olympic record to win the javelin with a throw of 71.53m, falling 1cm shy of her world record. Steffi Nerius of Germany won the silver at 65.82m and Mirela Manjani of Greece took the bronze at 64.29m.
RSS