The women's 400 meters have returned to the past by the paradoxical procedure of opening the future so that the stale air comes out and the fresco penetrates. The Salwa Eid Naser brand (48.14) introduces us to an unexpected thrust in the time warp. And it takes us to the speed of vertigo to the 80s, when getting off the 49 seconds was not exceptional.
As of Thursday, there had been 31 records below that threshold. Twenty-one in the 80s (and two others, even in 1979). They had been in charge of 11 women. Stopping in the most fruitful, Marita Koch gathered 12. Jarmila Kratochvilová , six. Both remain, therefore, the only ones that have dropped from 48 seconds: 47.60 and 47.99, respectively.
Until Thursday, in the already adult 21st century, only the American Sanya Richards (twice), the Mexican Ana Guevara and the Bahamian Shaunae Miller-Uibo (48.37 that same Thursday) had run in less than 49 seconds. And, of course, much closer to the 49 than the 48 (48.70, 48.83, 48.89 and 48.97).
Naser, born in Nigeria of a Nigerian mother and father of Bahrain, arrived in this country in her early childhood. It is not, then, a false citizen or a nationalized one for convenience. Your deed should also be interpreted in geopolitical key. There is no longer East Koch Germany. Neither the Czechoslovakia of Kratochvilová and Tatána Kocembová (48.59). Neither the USSR by Olga Vladykina (48.27) and Olga Bryzgina (48.65). Not everything they assumed of ideological weight, strategic importance and sport turbidity. It was the Cold War. It was another world. Other life.
Koch, whose second best record is 48.16, world top in 1982, made those 47.60 in 1985, at age 28. At 22 he had beaten his first record in 1979: 48.89 (July) and 48.60 (August). Kratochvilová was 31 when he made 48.86 (his first sub-49) and 32 when he scored 47.99. Naser is 21. No one, then, has run so fast being so young. That does not assure anything. But it promises a lot. For the first time in decades, Koch's record trembles.
Faced with the elegant majesty of Miller-Uibo (1.85), Naser presents a very well proportioned 1.67 and a technically flawless style from the beginning to the end of the race. A star has been born and, perhaps, an era.
According to the criteria of The Trust Project
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