1984 Summer Olympics / Athletics - 400 m (women)

sport	athletics
discipline	400 meter run
gender	Women
Attendees	28 athletes from 18 countries
Competition location	Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum
Competition phase	August 4, 1984 (preliminary round) August 5, 1984 (semi-finals) August 6, 1984 (final)
Medalists Valerie Brisco-Hooks ( USA )   Chandra Cheeseborough ( USA )   Kathy Cook ( GBR )

The women's 400-meter run at the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles was held on August 4, 5 and 6, 1984 at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum . 28 athletes took part.

The US athlete Valerie Brisco-Hooks became Olympic champion . She won ahead of her compatriot Chandra Cheeseborough and Britain's Kathy Cook .

The Federal Republic of Germany was represented by Gaby Bußmann , Heike Schulte-Mattler and Ute Thimm . Schulte-Mattler was eliminated in the preliminary round. Bußmann qualified for the semi-finals, but did not appear there. Thimm came into the final and finished sixth.
Runners from Switzerland, Austria and Liechtenstein did not take part. Athletes from the GDR were also not there because of the Olympic boycott.

Current titleholders

Olympic champion in 1980	Marita Koch ( GDR )	48.88 s	Moscow 1980
World Champion 1983	Jarmila Kratochvilová ( Czechoslovakia )	47.99 s	Helsinki 1983
European champion 1982	Marita Koch ( GDR )	48.16 s	Athens 1982
Pan American Champion 1983	Charmaine Crooks ( Canada )	51.49 s	Caracas 1983
Central America and Caribbean champion 1983	Ana Fidelia Quirot ( Cuba )	52.89 s	Havana 1983
South America Champion	Elba Barbosa ( Brazil )	54.0 s	Santa Fe 1983
Asian champion 1983	Pilavullakandi Usha ( India )	54.20 s	Kuwait City 1983
African champion 1982	Ruth Atuti ( Kenya )	54.48 s	Cairo 1982

Existing records

World record	47.99 s	Jarmila Kratochvilová ( Czechoslovakia )	Helsinki , Finland	August 10, 1983
Olympic record	48.88 s	Marita Koch ( GDR )	Final of Moscow , Soviet Union (today Russia )	July 28, 1980

Preliminary round

Date: August 4, 1984

For the runs of the preliminary round, the 28 participants were drawn in four runs. The first four athletes (highlighted in light blue) qualified for the quarter-finals.

At the age of 15, Reawadee Srithoa from Thailand was the youngest participant. The oldest starter was Zonia Meigham-Juarez from Guatemala at the age of 30.

The American Chandra Cheeseborough achieved the fastest lead time with 50.94 s in run 1. The slowest qualified athlete was Marie Mathieu from Puerto Rico in run 3 with 53.27 s. The fastest athlete who could not qualify was Heike Schulte-Mattler from the Federal Republic of Germany, who was eliminated in the first run with 52.77 seconds.

Forward 1

The Italian Erica Rossi was eliminated in sixth of her preliminary run

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Chandra Cheeseborough	United States	50.94 s
2	Charmaine Crooks	Canada	52.04 s
3	Ilrey Oliver	Jamaica	52.19 s
4th	June Griffith	Guyana	52.27 s
5	Heike Schulte-Mattler	BR Germany	52.77 s
6th	Erica Rossi	Italy	53.04 s
7th	Jocelyn Joseph	Antigua and Barbuda	53.63 s
8th	Zonia Meigham-Juarez	Guatemala	55.64 s

Forward 2

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Gaby Bussmann	BR Germany	52.42 s
2	Kathy Cook	Great Britain	52.64 s
3	Molly Killingbeck	Canada	52.77 s
4th	Catherine Ann Rattray	Jamaica	52.78 s
5	Gail Emmanuel	Trinidad and Tobago	54.07 s
6th	Elanga Buala	Papua New Guinea	56.82 s
7th	Mercy Addy	Ghana	58.91 s

Forward 3

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Lillie Leatherwood	United States	52.05 s
2	Marita Payne	Canada	52.89 s
3	Helen Barnett	Great Britain	52.94 s
4th	Marie Mathieu	Puerto Rico	53.27 s
5	Emma Tahapari	Indonesia	55.82 s
6th	Reawadee Srithoa	Thailand	58.11 s

Forward 4

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Valerie Brisco-Hooks	United States	51.42 s
2	Ruth Waithera	Kenya	52.53 s
3	Ute Thimm	BR Germany	52.53 s
4th	Michelle Scutt	Great Britain	52.89 s
5	Cynthia Green	Jamaica	53.61 s
6th	Carlon Blackman	Barbados	54.26 s
7th	Zeina Neaimi	Lebanon	59.56 s

Semifinals

Date: August 5, 1984

In each of the two semi-finals, the first four (highlighted in light blue) qualified for the final.

Chandra Cheeseborough achieved the best time in the semifinals with 50.32 seconds in run 2.

Run 1

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Valerie Brisco-Hooks	United States	51.14 s
2	Kathy Cook	Great Britain	51.49 s
3	Charmaine Crooks	Canada	51.53 s
4th	Ruth Waithera	Kenya	52.21 s
5	June Griffith	Guyana	52.39 s
6th	Catherine Ann Rattray	Jamaica	53.23 s
7th	Marie Mathieu	Puerto Rico	53.69 s
DNS	Gaby Bussmann	BR Germany	53.69 s

Run 2

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Chandra Cheeseborough	United States	50.32 s
2	Lillie Leatherwood	United States	50.83 s
3	Marita Payne	Canada	50.94 s
4th	Ute Thimm	BR Germany	51.03 s
5	Molly Killingbeck	Canada	51.72 s
6th	Michelle Scutt	Great Britain	52.07 s
7th	Ilrey Oliver	Jamaica	52.14 s
8th	Helen Barnett	Great Britain	52.26 s

final

space	Surname	nation	time	annotation
1	Valerie Brisco-Hooks	United States	48.83 s	OR
2	Chandra Cheeseborough	United States	49.05 s
3	Kathy Cook	United States	49.43 s
4th	Marita Payne	Canada	49.91 s
5	Lillie Leatherwood	United States	50.25 s
6th	Ute Thimm	BR Germany	50.37 s
7th	Charmaine Crooks	Canada	50.45 s
8th	Ruth Waithera	Kenya	51.56 s

Date: August 6, 1984

All three Americans qualified for the final. There were also two Canadians, a British, a Kenyan and a runner from the Federal Republic of Germany. Due to the Olympic boycott, both the 1980 Olympic champion Marita Koch from the GDR and the Czechoslovak world champion and world record holder Jarmila Kratochvilová were not there. In addition, Vice World Champion Taťána Kocembová from Czechoslovakia and the World Cup third Marija Pinigina , USSR were missing . Numerous other runners from the boycott states were well up in the current world rankings and would have started promisingly in the fight for top positions. The US runner Chandra Cheeseborough was now considered the favorite. In general, the experts also assumed that top times would probably not materialize.

British Kathy Cook, formerly Kathy Smallwood, had the best start. Up to the last corner she was ahead of the American Valerie Brisco-Hooks, who had surprisingly qualified for these games at the US trials. Behind them were Cheeseborough and the third American Lillie Leatherwood. In the curve, Brisco-Hooks and Cheeseborough passed the Briton. Lillie Leatherwood, on the other hand, lost ground and finished fifth. Valerie Brisco-Hooks was the first to cross the finish line and improved the Olympic record by six hundredths of a second. Cheeseborough won silver. Cook won the bronze medal in front of emerging Canadian Marita Payne. Ute Thimm from the Federal Republic of Germany was sixth behind Leatherwood, and the Canadian Charmaine Crooks was seventh. The Kenyan Ruth Waithera came in eighth.

The times achieved were not expected by anyone due to the initial situation. Valerie Brisco-Hooks had improved significantly and even undercut Koch's Olympic record in Moscow . With her final time of 48.83 seconds, she was the first woman under 49 seconds who did not come from Eastern Europe or the GDR. Today - as of January 2017 - it is eighth on the all-time world best list. Chandra Cheeseborough is tenth on this leaderboard today with her 49.05s.

Valerie Brisco-Hooks achieved the first US victory in this discipline.

Three days later, Valerie Brisco-Hooks won the gold medal over 200 meters . She was the first woman at the Olympic Games to become an Olympic champion on these two routes.

literature

• Olympic Games 1984 Los Angeles Sarajevo with contributions by Ulrich Kaiser and Heinz Maegerlein , Eds. Manfred Vorderwülbecke , C. Bertelsmann Verlag, Munich 1984, ISBN 3-570-01851-2 , p. 42f

Web links

• SportsReference 400m , accessed January 14, 2018
• Los Angeles 1984 Official Report, 3, Results of the Games , p. 260, English / French (PDF, 11 MB), accessed on January 14, 2018

Video

• Women's 400m Final at LA Olympics of 1984 , posted June 10, 2015 on youtube.com, accessed January 14, 2018

Individual evidence

1. ↑ IAAF Statistics Handbook, Beijing 2015, page 794 , accessed on January 14, 2018
2. ↑ ^{a b c} Los Angeles 1984 Official Report, 3, Results of the Games , p. 260, English / French (PDF, 11 MB), accessed on January 14, 2018
3. ↑ SportsReference 400 m , accessed January 14, 2018
4. ↑ IAAF senior outdoor, 400 meters women , accessed on January 14, 2018