LONDON’S UPS AND DOWNS
HIGH POINT BRITISH 4x100m relay men not only getting the baton round but also winning on Saturday night. An incredible result with an atmosphere only matched by Mo Farah’s 10,000m win. LOW POINT JUSTIN GATLIN, twice banned for drugs, beating Usain Bolt to win the most cherished prize. Sickening and yet a moment that exposed the sport’s problems for what they really are. No more hiding the issues behind Bolt’s brilliance. EMBARRASSING MOMENT A BBC panel that frequently fails to ask meaningful questions of its own sports attempting to grill a medical expert on the norovirus. There’s going in hard and there’s going in daft. HOME HEARTBREAK WATCHING Laura Muir lose out on bronze in the 1500m in the final stride. She was gutsy and brilliant, but may regret sprinting that bit too soon. MOST SURREAL ISAAC MAKWALA running his 200m heat on his own in the rain, having been blocked from entering the stadium a night earlier when he was meant to be in quarantine for norovirus. BEST QUOTE ‘OF COURSE you look people in the eye, and we all do it, and you have to work out and ask the question “Do I believe — is there anything that suggests otherwise?” And there is nothing at all that suggests otherwise to me.’ So said Neil Black, the British team performance director in his defence of Mo Farah and the doping questions that stalk his coach, Alberto Salazar. Black’s eye test could be a new weapon in the doping fight! TEAR-JERKER WAYDE VAN NIEKERK weeping after losing the 200m final, claiming he had been disrespected by Makwala and others over a conspiracy theory that Makwala was being kept out of the 200m in order to make life easier for the South African. Might need to develop a thicker skin.