Four-time European U20 medallist Success Eduan ran a blazing anchor leg for Great Britain in the women’s 4x100m final on the second day of the World Relays in Guangzhou on Sunday (11).
Taking the baton from Bianca Williams with a slight deficit, the 20-year-old turned on the afterburners to anchor the Brits to gold in 42.21 ahead of a vastly improving Spanish team (42.28) who qualified fastest for the final with a national record of 42.18.
A near full-strength Jamaican team featuring both Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce and Shericka Jackson had to settle for bronze in 42.33 with the American team featuring Twanisha Terry - who was part of their gold medal-winning team in Paris 2024 - finishing out of the medals altogether in fourth in 42.38.
And just over 20 minutes after running the third leg of their silver medal-winning team in the 4x100m, European indoor 400m bronze medallist Paula Sevilla ran the first leg of Spain’s triumphant and victorious team in the women's 4x400m final.
Blanca Hervas kept her composure when she was passed on the back straight by Bayley Lear from the United States on the last leg, counter-attacking in the home straight to take Spain to gold in yet another Spanish record of 3:24.13 ahead of the United States (3:24.72) and South Africa (3:24.84).
European indoor 400m silver medallist Henriette Jaeger anchored Norway to an excellent fourth in a national record of 3:25.65.
Another 16 European teams clinch tickets for Tokyo
A second round of relay heats gave teams a second chance to seal their places at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo this September with six more places up for grabs in each discipline.
The Spanish success story began in the mixed 4x400m heats with Blanca Hervas running her first race of the day by anchoring Spain to a heat victory in a national record of 3:12.55 to qualify at the second time of asking along with Italy (3:12.53), France (3:12.66) and Germany (3:13.35).
After surprisingly missing out on automatic qualification yesterday, Olympic bronze medallists Great Britain made no mistake on the second time of asking, winning a competitive heat in 3:24.46 ahead of Belgium (3:24.52) and Poland (3:24.56) with Ireland (3:24.56) and Switzerland (3:32.37) also qualifying from the second heat.
France (43.06), Italy (43.12), Switzerland (43.35) and Poland (43.38) all qualified for the women’s 4x100m on the second time of asking along with France (38.31) and Belgium (38.49) in the men’s 4x100m, a national record for the latter team.
Tokyo 2020 Olympic silver medallist Netherlands was the only European nation to qualify from the second round of men’s 4x400m heats, clocking 3:01.32 to finish second in their heat behind Brazil in 3:01.14.