2012 Olympics - Women's 4x100m Relay

Men’s and women’s sprinting is dominated by Jamaica and the USA, although it will surprise many to see that they haven’t won the Olympic 4x100m title since 1996. How? That most thorny of issues with the relays, baton changes.

At the last two Olympics, they’ve turned up as favourite for gold but have failed to finish on two occasions (in Beijing four years ago they did not make the final after failing to finish in their heat, while they fumbled at Athens 4 years ago), and even this time around there have been shaky moments, notably at Monaco in the Diamond League where their 'A’ team failed to finish, but the their 'B’ team was more than good enough to win that particular race.

It’s this strength in depth which sees the US as short as 1/2 to pick up yet another track and field gold, although one had to be impressed by the searing pace of their ‘B’ team in the heat which saw them post a sensational 41.64, which was just 5 tenths off the Olympics record, a world leading time by a large margin, and all without Carmelita Jeter and Alisyon Felix in the team. They must be favourites on form, although at 9/4 the Jamaicans are the only value in the race.

The Jamaicans looked positively abhorrent in their opening heat – ironically given the criticism that’s been given for poor batonship between the US team, the Jamaicans nearly didn’t make it – but that’s seen them move out to 9/4 when usually they’d be joint favourites at 11/10 and there’s good reasons for thinking they can be a second faster in tonight’s final and at least give us a moment or two of excitement.

Their elite, comprising Olympic champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Olympic silver medallists Kerron Stewart and Sherone Simpson, and two-time Olympic champion Veronica Campbell-Brown, should not only be faster but significantly slicker this time around and while they couldn’t beat the USA last time around, they’re the only real value in the race.

The other two to focus on look to be Trinidad and Ukraine. Trinidad might well have beaten Ukraine in last year’s World Championships but for some slicker baton changes (they were disqualified) but shouldn’t be as short as evens without the top two while Ukraine are 11/4 in what could also be called a two horse race.

Advice

1 pt Jamaica (9/4 Totesport, Betfred)

1 pt Ukraine w/o Jamaica and the USA (11/4 Sportingbet)