These are the official results of the men's 100 metres event at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta. There were a total number of 106 participating athletes from 75 nations, with twelve heats in round 1, five quarterfinals, two semifinals and a final. Each nation was limited to 3 athletes per rules in force since the 1930 Olympic Congress. The event was won by Donovan Bailey of Canada, the nation's first title in the event since Percy Williams won it in 1928.

Summary Canada's Donovan Bailey won the gold medal, breaking the world record that Leroy Burrell of the United States had set in 1994. Namibia's Frankie Fredericks won the silver medal for a second consecutive Olympics, while Trinidad and Tobago sprinter Ato Boldon won the bronze. It was Trinidad and Tobago's first medal in the event since Hasely Crawford's win in 1976. For Fredericks and Boldon, this was the first of two events where they both medaled behind a world record setting run; Fredericks took silver and Boldon bronze in the 200 metre event where Michael Johnson ran 19.32 to win.

At first Bailey who was going to be the eventual winner did not get a great start. Mitchell and Boldon got terrific starts. Boldon led the race till the 60 metre mark, the point where Canadian Donovan Bailey was gaining on the field. He had an unbelievable surge with a top end speed of over 12 m/s, world record at that time. He won the race with a new 100 metres men's world record time of 9.84 which was 100th of a second faster than the previous record. Fredericks of Namibia edged past Boldon of Trinidad to take silver. Linford Christie, the defending Olympic Champion, was watching the entire event unfold from the point of view of a spectator, having been disqualified after two false starts, the second of which was controversial.

This marked the first time since 1976 (and the boycotted 1980 Games) that no American runner medaled in the 100 metres, with 1992 bronze medalist Dennis Mitchell placing fourth behind Boldon. Counting 1980, it was only the fourth time that the United States missed the podium.

Background This was the twenty-third time the event was held, having appeared at every Olympics since the first in 1896. For the first time, all three medalists from the previous Games (Great Britain's Linford Christie, Namibia's Frankie Fredericks, and the United States's Dennis Mitchell) returned. Indeed, seven of the eight finalists from 1992 were back in 1996—the other returners were Canadian Bruny Surin, Nigerians Olapade Adeniken and Davidson Ezinwa, and Jamaican Raymond Stewart; only Leroy Burrell did not return to the 100 metres in 1996. Donovan Bailey of Canada had won the 1995 world championships, followed by countryman Surin and then Trinidad and Tobago's Ato Boldon. Christie was the reigning Commonwealth and European champion, and had won the 1993 world championship.

Azerbaijan, Comoros, Guinea-Bissau, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Libya, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, São Tomé and Príncipe, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan appeared in the event for the first time. Russia appeared independently for the first time since 1912 and Latvia did so for the first time since 1924. The United States made its 22nd appearance in the event, most of any country, having missed only the boycotted 1980 Games.

Competition format

The event retained the same basic four round format introduced in 1920: heats, quarterfinals, semifinals, and a final. The "fastest loser" system, introduced in 1968, was used again to ensure that the quarterfinals and subsequent rounds had exactly 8 runners per heat; this time, the system was used in both the heats and quarterfinals.

The first round consisted of 12 heats, each with 9 athletes scheduled (2 heats had 8 actually run due to withdrawals). The top three runners in each heat advanced, along with the next four fastest runners overall. This made 40 quarterfinalists, who were divided into 5 heats of 8 runners. The top three runners in each quarterfinal advanced, with one "fastest loser" place. The 16 semifinalists competed in two heats of 8, with the top four in each semifinal advancing to the eight-man final.Official Report, vol. 3, pp. 68–69.

Records

These were the standing world and Olympic records (in seconds) prior to the 1996 Summer Olympics.

World record 9.85 Leroy Burrell Lausanne (SUI) July 6, 1994 Olympic record 9.92 Carl Lewis Seoul (KOR) September 24, 1988

Donovan Bailey's 9.84 seconds in the final broke both the world and Olympic records.

Schedule All times are Eastern Daylight Time (UTC-4)

Date Time RoundFriday, 26 July 1996 11:0018:30HeatsQuarterfinalsSaturday, 27 July 1996 19:3021:00SemifinalsFinal

Results

Round 1

Heat 1

Wells had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Reaction Time Notes 1 6 Emmanuel Tuffour 0.187 10.15 2 5 Bruny Surin 0.168 10.18 3 2 Andrey Fedoriv 0.159 10.39 4 1 Renward Wells 0.156 10.48 5 3 Chithaka De Soyza 0.173 10.55 6 7 Luís Cunha 0.149 10.65 7 9 Patrick Mocci-Raoumbe 0.185 10.87 8 8 Nordine Ould Menira 0.186 10.95 9 4 Bonifacio Edu 0.198 11.87 Wind: −0.9 m/s

Heat 2

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes 1 1 Davidson Ezinwa 10.03 2 2 Jon Drummond 10.08 3 9 Erik Wymeersch 10.24 4 5 Leon Gordon 10.48 5 6 Stefan Burkart 10.49 6 7 Barnabe Jolicoeur 10.57 7 4 Bimal Tarafdar 10.98 8 3 Abdul Ghafoor 12.20 – 8 Andrew Tynes

Heat 3

Markoullides had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes 1 5 Ato Boldon 10.06 2 7 Anninos Markoullides 10.26 3 2 Kim Collins 10.27 4 8 Augustine Nketia 10.34 5 4 Raymond Stewart 10.38 6 9 Stefano Tilli 10.38 7 6 Jamal Al-Saffar 10.44 8 3 Amarildo Almeida 10.85 9 1 Mohamed Bakar 11.02

Heat 4

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 7 Michael Green 10.16 2 9 Patrick Stevens 10.21 3 8 Serhiy Osovych 10.29 4 1 Ezio Madonia 10.33 5 2 Edson Ribeiro 10.39 6 3 Chris Donaldson 10.39 7 5 Patrik Strenius 10.48 8 4 Toluta'u Koula 10.71 9 6 Vladislav Chernobay 10.88

Heat 5

Borrega had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 2 Deji Aliu 10.34 2 8 Ousmane Diarra 10.34 3 3 Wenzhong Chen 10.37 4 6 Manuel Borrega 10.52 5 7 Hiroyasu Tsuchie 10.58 6 9 Ruben Benitez 10.74 7 1 Vitaly Medvedev 10.90 8 4 Mitchell Peters 11.12 9 5 Bouriema Kimba 11.24

Heat 6

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 4 Dennis Mitchell 10.24 2 7 Ian Mackie 10.27 3 3 Marc Blume 10.33 4 9 Alexandros Terzian 10.48 5 1 Franck Amegnigan 10.51 6 6 Rod Mapstone 10.56 7 8 Sayon Cooper 10.58 8 2 Pa Modou Gai 10.72 9 5 Jorge Castellon 10.74

Heat 7

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 1 Obadele Thompson 10.33 2 5 Kostyantyn Rurak 10.37 3 9 Pascal Theophile 10.41 4 2 Carlos Gats 10.57 5 3 Joel Mascoll 10.64 6 6 Anvar Kuchmuradov 10.71 7 4 Arif Akhundov 11.11 8 8 Khaled Othman 11.65 9 7 Jean-Olivier Zirignon 22.69

Heat 8

Silva had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 7 Michael Marsh 10.14 2 8 Darren Braithwaite 10.29 3 9 Kirk Cummins 10.47 4 5 Torbjörn Eriksson 10.49 5 6 Paul Henderson 10.52 6 3 Alberto Mendez 10.60 7 2 Arnaldo da Silva 10.62 8 1 Mario Bonello 10.89 9 4 Odair Baia 11.05

Heat 9

Douhou had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 8 André da Silva 10.25 2 5 Linford Christie 10.26 3 6 Yiannis Zisimides 10.32 4 1 Venancio Jose 10.34 5 9 Hamed Douhou 10.53 6 7 Robert Dennis 10.65 7 2 Donald Onchiri 10.66 8 3 Sun-Kuk Jin 10.73 9 4 Peter Pulu 10.76

Heat 10

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 5 Eric Nkansah 10.26 2 2 Needy Guims 10.39 3 1 Olapade Adeniken 10.41 4 7 Jone Delai 10.42 5 8 Vitaliy Savin 10.52 6 9 Watson Nyambek 10.55 7 6 Neil Ryan 10.78 8 3 Javier Verne 10.91 9 4 Van Lam Hai 11.14

Heat 11

Karlsson had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 3 Donovan Bailey 10.24 2 1 Nobuharu Asahara 10.28 3 2 Peter Karlsson 10.35 4 6 Sanusi Turay 10.39 5 9 Sergejs Insakovs 10.42 6 8 Haralambos Papadias 10.46 7 7 Hsin-Ping Huang 10.70 8 4 Eric Agueh 10.98 – 5 Alfayaya Embalo

Heat 12

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 4 Frank Fredericks 10.32 2 1 Glenroy Gilbert 10.34 3 3 Alexandros Yenovelis 10.39 4 6 Frutos Feo 10.56 5 8 Benjamin Sirimou 10.58 6 7 Hamed Sadeq 10.81 7 9 Devon Bean 10.89 8 5 Robert Loua 11.21 9 2 Mark Sherwin 11.41

Quarterfinals

Quarterfinal 1

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 5 Ato Boldon 9.95 2 3 Nobuharu Asahara 10.19 3 6 Eric Nkansah 10.24 4 4 Deji Aliu 10.26 5 7 Glenroy Gilbert 10.28 6 8 Marc Blume 10.33 7 1 Andrey Fedoriv 10.34 8 2 Augustine Nketia 10.35

Quarterfinal 2

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 6 Linford Christie 10.03 2 5 Donovan Bailey 10.05 3 3 Jon Drummond 10.17 4 4 Emmanuel Tuffour 10.18 5 2 Erik Wymeersch 10.37 6 7 Olapade Adeniken 10.38 7 8 Needy Guims 10.43 8 1 Ezio Madonia 10.43

Quarterfinal 3

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 5 Frank Fredericks 9.93 2 3 Davidson Ezinwa 10.08 3 4 Obadele Thompson 10.14 4 8 Raymond Stewart 10.18 5 7 Peter Karlsson 10.24 6 6 Darren Braithwaite 10.27 7 2 Wenzhong Chen 10.29 8 1 Ousmane Diarra 10.38

Quarterfinal 4

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 6 Dennis Mitchell 10.09 2 3 Michael Green 10.11 3 4 Anninos Markoullides 10.23 4 5 Patrick Stevens 10.31 5 2 Kim Collins 10.34 6 1 Pascal Theophile 10.38 7 7 Serhiy Osovych 10.38 8 8 Kirk Cummins 10.45

Quarterfinal 5

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 6 Michael Marsh 10.04 2 4 Bruny Surin 10.13 3 5 Ian Mackie 10.25 4 3 André da Silva 10.26 5 2 Alexandros Yenovelis 10.31 6 1 Venancio Jose 10.46 7 7 Kostyantyn Rurak 10.47 8 8 Yiannis Zisimides 10.47

Semifinals

Semifinal 1

Bailey had one false start (a second would have resulted in disqualification).

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 5 Frank Fredericks 9.94 2 3 Donovan Bailey 10.00 3 6 Michael Marsh 10.08 4 4 Michael Green 10.11 5 1 Nobuharu Asahara 10.16 6 8 Obadele Thompson 10.16 7 2 Emmanuel Tuffour 10.22 8 7 Anninos Markoullides 10.36

Semifinal 2

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes1 3 Ato Boldon 9.93 2 5 Dennis Mitchell 10.00 3 6 Linford Christie 10.04 4 4 Davidson Ezinwa 10.04 5 1 Bruny Surin 10.13 6 2 Jon Drummond 10.16 7 8 Eric Nkansah 10.26 – 7Ian Mackie

Final

The final was held on July 27, 1996. Christie was disqualified after two false starts. Boldon also had one false start.Official Report, vol. 3, p. 69.

Rank Lane Athlete Nation Time Notes 6 Donovan Bailey 9.84 5 Frank Fredericks 9.89 3 Ato Boldon 9.90 4 4 Dennis Mitchell 9.99 5 1 Michael Marsh 10.00 6 7 Davidson Ezinwa 10.14 7 8 Michael Green 10.16 — 2 Linford Christie

References

Official Report