World Relays Final Day: South Africa, Kenya Botswana Medals

World Relays Final Day: South Africa, Kenya Botswana Medals By Uche Dozie The World Athletics Relays in Selsia, Poland came to a crescendo on Sunday with glits and great performance from African teams who had podium finishes, BSNSports.com.ng reports. South Africa's 4×100 male relay team ran the race of their lives to record a blistering performance and take gold in one of the first finals on Sunday. Team Leader Akani Simbine took the last lap in a strong fashion to beat the Brazilian team by a hundredth of seconds in a time of 38.71s. Fellow African brothers, Ghana who had finished third had their joy cut short after the team was disqualified for lane infringement. The Brazilians also were disqualified. Hence, fourth placed Italy emerge sliver medalist. Kenya added a medal to the two medals they earned on Saturday. Team Kenya made sure that medals were got from the one-off relay events that will not feature in the Olympics. The team's quartet of Mark Odhiambo, Mike Mokamba, Elijah Onkware and Hesborn Ochieng won silver in men’s 4x200m World Relay in Poland. The Kenyan team ran 1:24.26 to come second in the Men's 4×200 metres relay behind Germany who ran for 1:22.43s. Host Nation, Poland came third with a time of 1:24.53. The podium finish increased the medal garnered by the East African country to three (2 silver and a bronze). Botswana came third in the final of the 4x400 metres Men's relay at the World Relay Championship behind Japan and winners Netherlands. Team Botswana took the last podium position in third place (3:04.77) to finish the World Relays. However, Team South Africa faded in the home stretch to fith position in 3:05.76. A fifth place and 4x200m women's national record (1:38.26 ) at World Athletics Relays it was for Kenya. Maximila Imali was with the fastest time in the final leg 23.45. Final World Relays Podium Count Poland - 4 Kenya - 3 Italy - 3 Germany - 2 Japan - 2 Netherlands - 2 Poland - 1 Slovenia - 1 Brazil - 1 DR - 1 SA - 1 Ireland - 1 Ecuador - 1 Portugal - 1 Cuba - 1 Great Britain - 1 Botswana - 1