Canadians Rodney, Brown advance into Olympic men's 200m semifinals from repechage round

PARIS — Christopher Morales Williams is going for it all in the years to come.

The Vaughan, Ont., native fell short of qualifying for the Olympic men's 400-metre final after crossing the finish line in 45.25 seconds to finish eighth in the third semifinal heat on Tuesday night at Stade de France.

Morales Williams, who turned 20 on Monday, made it into the semifinals after finishing second in Heat 5 on Sunday with a time of 44.96 seconds.

"Definitely," he said when asked if it adds fuel to the fire. "Now I know what it's like and I feel like a lot of these guys, they had experience and that's the advantage they had over me. But now I got to experience it, I did some Diamond Leagues — next year I'll be a (full-time) pro and I'll be back.

"Just win worlds outdoors, win worlds indoors and be back next Olympics, I'll win the gold, everything. World record, you name it I'll have it all, just watch."

Entering the Olympics, Morales Williams had the third-leading time in the world, which at one point was the world-leading time, at 44.05 seconds from the Southeastern Conference outdoor championships in May.

Morales Williams turned pro and signed a deal with Adidas after finishing his sophomore year at the University of Georgia.

He won the indoor and outdoor NCAA national championships this season and also set the all-time best indoor mark with 44.49 seconds at the SEC indoor championships in February.

While he had Olympic medal hopes, the toll from such a hectic calendar year made it difficult for Morales Williams to peak again in Paris.

"It's really difficult, especially the way I run since I tend to dig deep at the end," he said. "You can only do that so many times and doing it now when you're fatigued, it's like, you can't really dig deep anymore when you just don't have it in you and you're behind.

"I've done that in, what, 20 races already this year. I don't think I could do it 21 times, just trying to peak over and over again was definitely tough but we got here to the semis. It's still better than just having no good races at all so I still can't complain.

"I feel like, honestly, I just had such an incredible indoor season that — it sucks because I did so well early on (in the year), it made it harder for here. But I had to do so well early on to make my statement to get here in the first place."

Morales Williams, who said he won't be competing anymore this year and that he's "exhausted," will continue to train at the University of Georgia while he remains in school working toward a degree in ecology.

While he called the race a "disappointment" for himself and said he dealt with some nerves before the start, Morales Williams said the plan for the year came to fruition.

"I'd say it was all according to plan and even better, I'll give it a nice S-rank for the season," he said. "Everything that we talked about with (Georgia assistant) coach Karim (Abdel Wahab), I got and even more.

"My goal was make Olympics and break the school record and I ended breaking the world record, (made) an Olympics semifinals and then the school record again. I broke five to 10 national records. … I cannot complain, I'd be greedy to be upset about not making the finals. I've already done so much, I can't win it all in one year."

Saskatoon's Savannah Sutherland earned a spot in Thursday night's women's 400 hurdles final. She was one of two non-automatic qualifiers with a time of 53.80 seconds to finish fourth in the third semifinal heat on Tuesday.

"I was in a fast heat so my best bet was to run as fast as possible and try to get a small q (qualifying mark) so I'm happy that I was able to execute," said Sutherland who turns 21 on Wednesday.

Earlier in the day, Brendon Rodney and Aaron Brown qualified for the men's 200 semifinals.

Rodney, from Toronto, ran a time of 20.42 seconds to earn the top spot in Heat 2 of the repechage round.

Rodney finished fourth in Heat 3 in Monday's opening heats with a time of 20.30 seconds. He failed to qualify from there, with the newly implemented repechage giving him a second chance that he capitalized on.

The winner from each of the four heats in the repechage round along with the fastest two times among non-automatic qualifiers advance into Wednesday night's semifinal. The final is set for Thursday night.

Brown, also from Toronto, finished second in Heat 3 at 20.42 on Tuesday but qualified with one of two fastest non-automatic qualifier spots. The 32-year-old finished sixth in the 200 at the Tokyo Games in 2021.

Rodney and Brown join reigning Olympic champion Andre De Grasse to make for three Canadians in the semifinals.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Aug. 6, 2024.