The announcer read off the results as “U.S. 6, World 0,” but that’s a simplistic view of what happened at Penn Relays last weekend. Sure, American relay teams won all of the USA vs. the World events, which hasn’t usually been the case in recent years. But a closer look shows that dreaded exchange problems cropped up again for two of the U.S. women’s squads. Penn Relays often serves as the first chance to practice receiving the baton in an Olympic year, but drops in the women’s 4×100 and sprint-medley relays took out one of the two U.S. teams in both events and are a bad omen heading into the London Games.
“I can’t really say it’s the equivalent of a 5-foot putt or a foul shot or anything like that,” 60-meter indoor world champion Justin Gatlin said. “I just know that once you’re under those lights and thousands of people are watching you in person and millions of people are watching you televised, it can be a scary situation.”
– Scott Silverstein
