England swept the gold medals in the 4x100m relays yesterday at the Commonwealth Games, winning both the men’s and women’s races.
The men’s team of Ryan Scott, Leon Baptiste, Marlon Devonish and Mark Lewis-Francis won in 38.74 seconds at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium, holding off a Jamaican team missing Usain Bolt and Asafa Powell.
Jamaica were second in 38.79 and India third in 38.89.
In the women’s sprint relay, England earned the gold by nearly a second, winning in 44.19. Katherine Endacott led off and was followed by Montell Douglas, Laura Turner and Abiodun Oyepitan.
Ghana were second in 45.24, and India again took bronze in 45.25.
Silas Kiplagat of Kenya won the men’s 1,500m in 3:41.78, and teammate James Magut was second in 3:42.27. However, defending champion Nick Willis of New Zealand helped avoid a Kenyan sweep by claiming bronze in 3:42.38.
Kiplagat and Magut were joined by another teammate, Gideon Mathimba, at the front of the pack for most of the race, with Willis just behind them. But as Kiplagat and Magut started to pull away on the back straight, Mathimba couldn’t keep up, eventually finishing in fifth place behind Chaminda Indika Wijekoon of Sri Lanka.
Diminutive Kenyan world champion Vivian Cheruiyot strode to the women’s 5,000m gold in a time of 15:55.12 seconds.
She led a Kenyan clean sweep with Syliva Kibet second (15:55.61) and Ines Chenonge (16:02.47) third.
It was always going to be hard to look beyond a Kenyan 1-2-3 with the only other woman in the hunt being Scotland’s Stephanie Twell, who was distanced with one lap to go and she finally finished fourth.
Cheruiyot was always in charge yesterday, dictating the race and sprinting away from Kibet, the world silver medalist, comfortably in the final 200m.
Australia’s Jarrod Bannister threw 81.71m to win the men’s javelin gold medal.
New Zealand’s Stuart Farquhar came second (78.15) and India’s Kashinath Naik took the bronze (74.21).
Away from the track, Alexandre Despatie won his ninth Commonwealth Games diving gold after he and fellow Canadian Reuben Ross won the men’s 3m springboard synchro title.
Despatie, 25, won his first gold in the Commonwealth Games as a 13-year-old in Kuala Lumpur and could make it 10 if he wins the 10m platform competition today.
In the two other finals, Canada’s Jennifer Abel won gold in the women’s 1m springboard while Tom Daley and Max Brick took the men’s 10m platform synchro title for England.
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