The men's 400 metres at the 2015 World Championships in Athletics was held at the Beijing National Stadium on 23, 24 and 26 August. The winning margin was 0.17 seconds.
Summary Since 2008, all of the major gold medals had been won by either reigning Olympic champion Kirani James or defending champion LaShawn Merritt. In the final, both were out ahead, along with Wayde van Niekerk and Isaac Makwala, Africans with none of those credentials. Through the final turn, van Niekerk took sole possession of the lead, Makwala passed James to hit the home stretch with a slight advantage in second. Far off the pace was Luguelín Santos. Down the home stretch, Makwala was unable to hold his position and was passed by a burst from James. James was unable to hold that burst, Merritt cruised past James but was unable to make any headway on van Niekerk's lead. Merritt made a desperate lean that actually cost him time but was well beaten, Santos followed Merritt down the home stretch to take fourth beating the National Record he set in the semi-final round. van Niekerk's 43.48 improved upon his own African Record, putting him at number 4 on the all-time list. For the first time in history, three men broke 44 seconds. Merritt set the fastest non-winning time of all time at 43.65 seconds. In fact, places 2, 3 and 4 were all the fastest ever in that position.
Records Prior to the competition, the records were as follows:
World record43.18 Sevilla, Spain26 August 1999Championship recordWorld Leading43.72 La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland5 July 2015African RecordAsian Record44.27 La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland5 July 2015NACAC record43.18 Seville, Spain26 August 1999South American Record44.29 Seville, Spain26 August 1999European Record44.33 Rome, Italy3 September 1987Oceanian record44.38 Seoul, South Korea26 September 1988The following records were established during the competition:Asian Record43.93Beijing, China23 August 2015World Leading43.48 Beijing, China26 August 2015African Record
Qualification standards Entry standards 45.50
Schedule Date Time Round23 August 2015 11:10 Heats24 August 2015 20:05 Semifinals26 August 2015 21:25 Final
Results KEY:QQualifiedqFastest non-qualifiersNRNational recordPBPersonal bestSBSeasonal best
Heats Qualification: Best 3 (Q) and next 6 fastest (q) qualify for the next round.
Rank Heat Name Nationality Time Notes 1 2 Yousef Masrahi 43.93 , 2 2 Rusheen McDonald 43.93 , 3 2 Isaac Makwala 44.19 4 6 Wayde van Niekerk 44.42 5 1 David Verburg 44.43 6 2 Martyn Rooney 44.45, 7 3 LaShawn Merritt 44.51 8 1 Machel Cedenio 44.54 8 6 Renny Quow 44.54 , 10 4 Kirani James 44.56 11 4 Luguelín Santos 44.62 12 6 Bryshon Nellum 44.65 , 13 1 Jonathan Borlée 44.67 , 14 6 Chris Brown 44.68 15 1 Peter Matthews 44.69 , 16 2 Liemarvin Bonevacia 44.72 , 17 3 Javon Francis 44.83 18 4 Lalonde Gordon 44.97 19 3 Kevin Borlée 45.01 , 20 3 Michael Mathieu 45.07 21 3 Nery Brenes 45.08 22 2 Pavel Maslák 45.16 23 4 Onkabetse Nkobolo 45.17 24 5 Rabah Yousif 45.24 25 1 Pavel Ivashko 45.25 25 6 Winston George 45.25 27 5 Steven Gardiner 45.26 28 1 Luka Janežič 45.28 28 1 Alberth Bravo 45.28 30 4 Hederson Estefani 45.36 31 6 Hugo de Sousa 45.42 32 4 Jarryd Dunn 45.49 33 5 Vernon Norwood 45.53 34 5 Mame-Ibra Anne 45.55 35 6 Gustavo Cuesta 45.59 36 5 Abubakar Abbas 45.64 37 3 Yuzo Kanemaru 45.65 38 3 Aliaksandr Linnik 45.79 39 4 Vitaliy Butrym 45.88 40 5 Alphas Kishoyian 46.02 41 1 Bralon Taplin 46.27 42 3 Guo Zhongze 46.42 43 5 Mohamed Khouaja 46.50 44 5 Berend Koekemoer 46.52 2 Donald Sanford
Semifinals Qualification: Best 2 (Q) and next 2 fastest (q) qualify for the next round.
Rank Heat Name Nationality Time Notes 1 2 Isaac Makwala 44.11 2 1 Kirani James 44.16 3 1 Luguelín Santos 44.26 , 4 3 Wayde van Niekerk 44.31 5 3 LaShawn Merritt 44.34 , 6 2 Yousef Masrahi 44.40 7 2 Rabah Yousif 44.54 , 8 3 Machel Cedenio 44.64 9 2 Lalonde Gordon 44.70 10 1 David Verburg 44.71 11 1 Kevin Borlée 44.74 12 3 Javon Francis 44.77 12 2 Bryshon Nellum 44.77 14 3 Jonathan Borlée 44.85 15 2 Rusheen McDonald 44.86 16 1 Renny Quow 44.98 16 2 Steven Gardiner 44.98 18 1 Vernon Norwood 45.07 18 1 Chris Brown 45.07 20 3 Martyn Rooney 45.29 21 2 Nery Brenes 45.41 22 1 Peter Matthews 45.42 23 3 Michael Mathieu 45.43 24 3 Liemarvin Bonevacia 45.65
Final The final was held at 21:25.Final results
Rank Lane Name Nationality Time Notes 6 Wayde van Niekerk 43.48 , 8 LaShawn Merritt 43.65 5 Kirani James 43.78 4 7 Luguelín Santos 44.11 5 4 Isaac Makwala 44.63 6 3 Rabah Yousif 44.68 7 2 Machel Cedenio 45.06 8 9 Yousef Masrahi 45.15
References