The men's

200 metres The 200 metres, or 200-meter dash, is a sprint running event. On an outdoor 400 metre racetrack, the race begins on the curve and ends on the home straight, so a combination of techniques is needed to successfully run the race. A slightl ...

was an event at the

1992 Summer Olympics The 1992 Summer Olympics ( es, Juegos Olímpicos de Verano de 1992, ca, Jocs Olímpics d'estiu de 1992), officially known as the Games of the XXV Olympiad ( es, Juegos de la XXV Olimpiada, ca, Jocs de la XXV Olimpíada) and commonly known as ...

Barcelona, Spain Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

. There were 79 participating athletes from 65 nations, with eleven qualifying heats. The maximum number of athletes per nation had been set at 3 since the 1930 Olympic Congress. The event was won by Michael Marsh of the United States, the nation's third consecutive and 15th overall victory in the event. The Americans would take a second medal for the third consecutive Games as well, this time with Michael Bates earning bronze. The silver medal went to

Frankie Fredericks Frank "Frankie" Fredericks (born 2 October 1967) is a former track and field athlete from Namibia. Running in the 100 metres and 200 metres, he won four silver medals at the Olympic Games (two in 1992 and two in 1996), making him Namibia's only ...

, taking Namibia's first medal in the men's 200 metres.

Background

This was the 21st appearance of the event, which was not held at the first Olympics in 1896 but has been on the program ever since. Four of the eight finalists from the 1988 Games returned: bronze medalist

Robson da Silva Robson Caetano da Silva (born September 4, 1964 in Rio de Janeiro) is a Brazilian sprinter. He participated in four consecutive Olympic Summer Games (1984, 1988, 1992, 1996) and won the bronze medal over 200 metres in the 1988 Seoul Olympics a ...

of Brazil, fourth-place finisher

Linford Christie Linford Cicero Christie (born 2 April 1960) is a Jamaican-born British former sprinter. He is the only British man to have won gold medals in the 100 metres at all four major competitions open to British athletes: the Olympic Games, the World ...

of Great Britain, fifth-place finisher

Atlee Mahorn Atlee Anthony Mahorn (born 27 October 1965) is a three-time Canadian Olympic and four-time World Championship sprinter. He won Bronze medals in the 200 metres at the 1991 World Championships in Tokyo and the 4 x 100 metre relay at the 1993 ...

of Canada, and sixth-place finisher

Gilles Quénéhervé Gilles Quénéhervé (born 17 May 1966) is a retired French sprinter who specialized in the 200 metres. Biography At the 1987 World Championships in Rome he won the silver medal in a time of 20.16, which still stood as a French record for 24 ye ...

of France. Michael Johnson was the favorite coming into the Games; he had won the 1991 World Championship and was ranked #1 in the world in 1990 and 1991. He had been beaten in June by

of Namibia, however, and teammate Michael Marsh had been only 0.07 seconds behind Johnson at the U.S. trials. Before the Games, Johnson came down with food poisoning; while he still competed, he was clearly not at full strength. Bahrain, the Central African Republic, Cyprus, Grenada, Mauritania, Namibia, Niger, San Marino, and Togo each made their debut in the event. Some former Soviet republics competed as the Unified Team. One Yugoslav athlete competed as an Independent Olympic Participant. The United States made its 20th appearance, most of any nation, having missed only the boycotted 1980 Games.

Competition format

The competition used the four round format introduced in 1920: heats, quarterfinals, semifinals, and a final. The "fastest loser" system introduced in 1960 was used in the heats and quarterfinals. There were 11 heats of 7 or 8 runners each, with the top 3 men in each advancing to the quarterfinals along with the next 7 fastest overall. The quarterfinals consisted of 5 heats of 8 athletes each; the 3 fastest men in each heat and the next fastest overall advanced to the semifinals. There were 2 semifinals, each with 8 runners. The top 4 athletes in each semifinal advanced. The final had 8 runners. The races were run on a 400 metre track.

Records

These were the standing world and Olympic records (in seconds) prior to the 1992 Summer Olympics. Michael Marsh set a new Olympic and American record with 19.73 seconds in his semifinal.

Schedule

The schedule featured three days of competition for the first time since 1908, up from two days in previous Games, with the semifinals and final on separate days. All times are

Central European Summer Time Central European Summer Time (CEST), sometimes referred to as Central European Daylight Time (CEDT), is the standard clock time observed during the period of summer daylight-saving in those European countries which observe Central European Time ...

(

UTC+2 UTC+02:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +02:00. In ISO 8601, the associated time would be written as 2020-11-08T23:41:45+02:00. This time is used in: As standard time (year-round) ''Principal cities: Cairo, Pretoria, Cape ...

)

Results

Heats

Heat 1

Heat 2

Heat 3

Heat 4

Quénéhervé was originally disqualified, putting Seaksarn Boonrat in third place and qualifying the Thai runner for the quarterfinals. When Quénéhervé was reinstated, both men advanced on placement (Seaksarn Boonrat would have advanced on time, but this resulted in him not using one of the "lucky loser" places).

Heat 5

Heat 6

Heat 7

Heat 8

Heat 9

Heat 10

Heat 11

Quarterfinals

Quarterfinal 1

Quarterfinal 2

Quarterfinal 3

Quarterfinal 4

Quarterfinal 5

Semifinals

Semifinal 1

Semifinal 2

Final

Held on August 6, 1992.

References

External links

Official Report

{{DEFAULTSORT:Athletics at the 1992 Summer Olympics - Men's 200 metres 200 metres at the Olympics Men's events at the 1992 Summer Olympics