World Athletics Indoor Championships 2024: Belgium's Alexander Doom denies Noah Lyles and USA gold in men's 4x400m relay
Lyles ran a solid third leg to hand over the baton in front, but Chris Bailey could not hold off a late surge from the individual world indoor champion.
Athletics
If anyone thought sprinter Noah Lyles was joking about taking on the 4x400m relay as well as the 100m, 200m, and 4x100m at Paris 2024, they're not laughing now.
Despite having previously run the 400m just twice in his career - an individual race in 2016 and a relay last year - Lyles ran a very respectable third leg in the men's 4x400m relay final at the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow on Sunday (3 March) and handed over in front to Chris Bailey.
But the individual 60m runner-up collected his second silver medal of the weekend after Belgium's individual champion Alexander Doom finished strongly to pip Bailey on the line.
The triple world champion from 2023 said of his foray into the longer distance: "I kind of expected everything that I gave tonight. The only thing that was different, being as it is indoors, are that the turns are tighter and it's kind of hard to come off the turn tall, so that was a little bit out of shape. But I know that outdoors is a completely different scenario.
"So, truthfully, I believe that everying I've proved today is really how good a shape I'm in and how versatile I'm able to be when it comes to just being a sprinter."
The United States had led thanks to strong runs from Jacory Patterson and Matthew Boling before Lyles received the baton.
He managed to stay in front of Christian Iguacel, timing the fastest third leg split in the race at 45.68, just five-hundredths slower than Boling.
Doom, who had beaten Karsten Warholm in the 400m on Saturday, pipping the Norwegian icon to the line, did much the same here, overtaking Bailey in the last few strides.
The front two were almost two seconds clear of the Netherlands who clocked a new national record in third. Kenya were fourth in a new African record.
Lyles believes that he has shown his mettle in the distance and was non commital on running the distance outdoors.
"I think it was a situation where I was either going to be able to prove it here or we were going to go to Tom Jones (college meet) in Florida relays and run a 400 but now that I feel like we've been able to prove ourself here we're going to leave that as it is, knowing that as the season goes on I'll get stronger and faster."