August 22, 2008	Friday	Sha'aban 19, 1429

BEIJING, Aug 21: Jamaica continued their athletics Olympic gold rush when Veronica Campbell-Brown won the women’s 200 metres on Thursday and though there was an American sweep in the men’s 400m it was another bad day for the sport’s superpower.

Dayron Robles claimed the 110 hurdles for Cuba with the Bird’s Nest crowd still lamenting the absence of injured defending champion Liu Xiang on what was supposed to be his night of glory.

Barbora Spotakova of the Czech Republic took the women’s javelin, Portugal’s Nelson Evora won the triple jump and it was carnage in the sprint relay heats as the US dropped the baton in the men’s and women’s events.

They were not alone, however, as defending champions Britain and Athens bronze medallists Nigeria also messed up in the men’s heats, wiping out all three 2004 medallists.

Needless to say, both Jamaican teams romped home, clearing the way for yet more gold on Friday when double sprint champion Usain Bolt should be in the team for the final.

Campbell-Brown anchored the Jamaican relay quartet only 90 minutes after winning the 200m to make it 4-0 to Jamaica in the sprint gold medal competition against the US, the first time the Americans have failed to win one in a non-boycotted Games since 1976.

The race was still quite tight coming off the bend but Campbell-Brown took charge in the home straight to win in a career best 21.74 seconds.

American Allyson Felix took silver for the second successive Olympics and Jamaica’s Kerron Stewart, who shared silver in the 100, claimed bronze.

Asked about the gulf in performances between the two rivals, Lauryn Williams said: “They brought their A-game. I don’t know where we left ours.”

The American one-lap specialists may choose to disagree, as they followed a clean sweep in the men’s 400 hurdles by filling the podium in the flat version.

However, the 1-2 was not in the order most people were predicting as LaShawn Merritt found something extra to win in a personal best 43.75 seconds.

Jeremy Wariner, the double world champion, gave up when he knew gold was out of his grasp, handing his compatriot the biggest winning margin, 0.99 seconds, since 1896.

David Neville took third with a spectacular dive for the line.

Robles capped his world-record breaking year with his expected hurdles gold, winning in 12.93 seconds ahead of American duo David Payne and David Oliver.

Briton Phillips Idowu twice led Thursday’s competition but had to settle for silver after world champion Evora pulled out a 17.67-metre effort in the fourth round.

Spotakova won the javelin with a dramatic last throw of 71.42 metres to overhaul Russian Maria Abakumova.

Russia’s Olga Kaniskina took the first medal of the day when she pounded through the pouring rain to win the women’s 20km walk in one hour, 26 minutes and 31 seconds.

In the 800m semi-finals, defending champion Yuriy Borzakovskiy of Russia, fancied Sudanese teenager Abubaker Kaki and South Africa’s Mbulaeni Mulaudzi all failed to progress.

American Bryan Clay had a great first day in the decathlon, posting the best performances of the 100 metres and long jump and second-best in shot.

Although he was pegged back in the high jump and 400 metres, he takes a healthy lead into Friday when seven athletics golds are up for grabs.

Meanwhile, heptathlon silver medallist Lyudmila Blonska looks set to be banned for life for a second doping offence and four riders were disqualified from the equestrian jumping final when their horses failed drugs tests.

With torrential rain sweeping the Games city for much of the 14th day, the US were on the verge of handing over their mantle of Olympic supremacy to China.

The Games hosts have 46 gold medals to 29 for the US, 17 for Great Britain and Russia on 16.

It was not all plaudits for Jamaica as Bolt drew a rebuke from IOC President Jacques Rogge who was not impressed with the sprint king’s showmanship at the end of races and said he should shake hands instead.

“That would be more in the spirit of the Olympic ideal,” said Rogge.

Ukranian heptathlete Blonska, who failed her A sample, was removed from the women’s long jump final after her B sample was tested ahead of an IOC announcement on Friday.

Blonska’s is the fifth drugs case involving athletes while horses from Brazil, Ireland, Germany and Norway also failed doping tests.—Agencies