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 the second-shortest of the men's track races in the
Athletics at the 1964 Summer Olympics
At the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, the athletics competition included 36 events, 24 for men and 12 for women. The women's 400 metres and women's pentathlon events were newly introduced at these Games. There were a total number of 1016 particip ...
program in
Tokyo
Tokyo (; ja, 東京, , ), officially the Tokyo Metropolis ( ja, 東京都, label=none, ), is the capital and List of cities in Japan, largest city of Japan. Formerly known as Edo, its metropolitan area () is the most populous in the world, ...
. 63 athletes from 48 nations entered, with 6 not starting in the first round. The maximum number of athletes per nation had been set at 3 since the 1930 Olympic Congress. The first two rounds were held on 16 October, with the semifinals and the final on 17 October. The event was won by
Henry Carr
Henry Carr (November 27, 1941 – May 29, 2015) was an American track and field athlete who won two gold medals at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan.Paul Drayton took silver; it was the fifth time in six Games that the United States had the top two finishers. Edwin Roberts gave Trinidad and Tobago its first medal in the men's 200 metres with his bronze.
Background
This was the 14th appearance of the event, which was not held at the first Olympics in 1896 but has been on the program ever since. Two of the six finalists from the 1960 Games returned: gold medalist
Livio Berruti
Livio Berruti (born 19 May 1939) is an Italian former athlete who was the winner of the 200-meter dash in the 1960 Summer Olympics.
He won five medals, at individual level, and three medals with the national relay team at the International athl ...
of Italy and fourth-place finisher Marian Foik of Poland. The American team, however, was favored:
Henry Carr
Henry Carr (November 27, 1941 – May 29, 2015) was an American track and field athlete who won two gold medals at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan.Paul Drayton had won in 1961 and 1962, and the two had tied in 1963. Carr held the world record of 20.2 seconds (set in a 220 yards race).
Cameroon, Colombia, Hong Kong, Iran, Madagascar, Northern Rhodesia, Rhodesia, and Senegal each made their debut in the event. The United States made its 14th appearance, the only nation to have competed at each edition of the 200 metres to date.
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 not used, with the number of heats in each round make it unnecessary. The 1964 competition made the 8 person heat standard.
There were 8 heats of between 7 and 8 runners each (before withdrawals), with the top 4 men in each advancing to the quarterfinals. The quarterfinals consisted of 4 heats of 8 athletes each; the 4 fastest men in each heat advanced to the semifinals. There were 2 semifinals, each with 8 runners. Again, the top 4 athletes advanced. The final had 8 runners. The races were run on a 400 metre track.
Records
Prior to the competition, the existing world and Olympic records were as follows.
Paul Drayton matched the Olympic record of 20.5 seconds in the first semifinal. He ran the same time in the final, but
Henry Carr
Henry Carr (November 27, 1941 – May 29, 2015) was an American track and field athlete who won two gold medals at the 1964 Summer Olympics in Tokyo, Japan.Japan Standard Time
, or , is the standard time zone in Japan, 9 hours ahead of UTC ( UTC+09:00). Japan does not observe daylight saving time, though its introduction has been debated on several occasions. During World War II, the time zone was often referred to ...
(
UTC+9
UTC+09:00 is an identifier for a time offset from UTC of +09:00.
During the Japanese occupations of British Borneo, Burma, Hong Kong, Dutch East Indies, Malaya, Philippines, Singapore, and French Indochina, it was used as a common time wit ...
)
Results
Heats
The top four runners in each of the 8 heats advanced.
Heat 1
Heat 2
Heat 3
Heat 4
Heat 5
Heat 6
Heat 7
Heat 8
Quarterfinals
The four fastest runners in each of the four heats advanced to the semifinals.
Quarterfinal 1
Quarterfinal 2
Quarterfinal 3
Quarterfinal 4
Semifinals
The top four runners in each of the two semifinals qualified for the final.
Semifinal 1
Drayton tied the Olympic record in this semifinal, three-tenths of a second short of the world record.
Semifinal 2
The second semifinal was the fourth race of the 200 metres in which an American won and an Italian took second place.
Final
Drayton matched his semifinal time, which had tied the Olympic record at 20.5 seconds, but Carr did even better, setting a new Olympic record of 20.3 seconds to bump Drayton to the silver medal. Carr's time was only one-tenth of a second off the world record.