Saudi Arabia retain men's 4x400m relay title

Hamdan Awdah Al Bishi anchored the Saudi Arabian team to a successful defence of their men's 4x400m relay crown in the final event of the 15th Asian Games athletics programme at Khalifa Stadium on Tuesday 12 December.

The individual 400m champion received the baton from 800m finalist Mohammed O Al Salhi with a 10m lead and Al Bishi could cruise round to victory in a season's best time of 3:05.31.

Saudi Arabia, led off by Ismail M Al Sabani, were one of four teams to breakaway from the field on the second leg, the others being India, Sri Lanka and Japan with Hamed Hamdan Al Bishi pulling away slightly down the home straight. "The gold medal has a different taste," Hamdan Awdah Al Bishi admitted.

"The race depends on only two things, your technique and your power. We used our slowest runner first, so that we could catch up with our remaining runners if we needed to."

The battle for the minor medals went right down to the line. Japan, with 400m hurdles champion Kenji Narisako on the final leg, seemed set to claim silver, but were passed by India's Binu Kalayathumkuzhiyil Mathew.

It got even worse for the Japanese with Narisako piped on the line for the bronze medal as well, Sri Lanka's fast-finishing Ashoka Kumara Jayasundara Mudiyanselage raising his hand in celebration as he finished.

"I was thinking about just trying to run as fast as I could. I wanted to win that medal. We just wanted to win a medal. Gold, silver or bronze - it didn't matter," Jayasundara Mudiyanselage said.

15th Asian Games