Tokyo Olympics: Men's 4x400m Relay Odds

To sum up why the USA come into this event as huge favourites, one stat is all that is required: the 4x400m relay has been contested in 24 previous Olympic Games, and Team USA have taken the gold medal on 17 occasions. They won gold in 2000 but had it stripped from them 12 years later, and their boycott of the 1980 Olympics in Moscow most probably robbed them of another gold.

The class of 2021 look very impressive too, despite none of their individuals medalling in the individual 400m, they were the only nation who had two representatives in the final, with Michael Cherry and Michael Norman finishing fourth and fifth, respectively. The only two occasions where they failed to take a world gold in the last two decades came at London 2012 and four years ago in the 2017 World Championships. They have won both titles back since, and will be determined to hold on to their Olympic title here in Tokyo.

The potential weak spot in the team may come from the other two members they will need to pick alongside Cherry and Norman. Trevor Stewart and Vernon Norwood ran as big favourites to win the mixed 4x400m relay earlier in these Games but came third, and Randolph Ross failed to make it through the individual heats. USA have all the pedigree and experience in this event though, and are favourites at 1/10 to win gold, but do not discount the other nations.

In what has been a disappointing Olympics for the male Jamaican athletes, with no representatives in the 100m final, and a seventh-place finish for Rasheed Dwyer in the 200m, a gold and bronze in the 100m hurdles have been their only individual achievements. The pressure will now move onto their relay teams to bring home some medals.

They have not been overly successful in this event in the past, winning just four Olympic medals, none of which were gold, but they did take silver in Rio and also in Doha at the 2019 Worlds. Nathon Allen raced in both, and Demish Gaye did so in Doha, so there is medal experience in the team.

Allen was disappointing in the individual 400m though after going out in the heats, while the most inexperienced member of their 400m team, Christopher Taylor, made it to the final, coming sixth.

Sean Bailey and Karayme Bartley could only manage a seventh-place finish when running in the mixed 4x400m relay here, so selecting a solid, reliable four-man team may be a challenge, but Jamaica are highly fancied to win a medal at 2/5, and 15/2 to take gold.

Being the only team in the field not to have run a single relay at any point this season, the Trinidadian team are something of an unknown prospect when it comes to how they will perform as a group. They did not qualify at all for the 4x400m mixed relay competition, but that was mainly due to the lack of female 400m runners in the country. The men, on the other hand, have chased medals consistently over the past few years, including winning the gold at the 2017 World Championships, silver in 2015 and bronze at the 2012 Olympics.

Michael Cedenio and Jereem Richards both ran in that gold medal-winning team in 2017 and will do so again here, with Richards moving up from the individual 200m where he reached the final earlier in the week. Cedenio, along with teammates Dwight St. Hillaire and Deon Lendore all reached the 400m semi-finals, with Lendore just one-hundredth of a second short of making the final.

Outside of the US team, Trinidad have the most consistent, well-rounded team which have shown decent form at the Games already and are 8/11 to take a medal, but 11/1 to repeat their brilliant gold medal performance from 2017.

Despite seemingly having been around forever, the Belgian Borlee brothers will run again in the 4x400m relay and they have an excellent chance at finally clinching a long-awaited Olympic medal. Twins Kevin and Jonathan will run here in a fourth consecutive Olympics, having finished in an agonising fourth place twice, and fifth in London. Their younger brother Dylan ran with them in Rio where they set the Belgian national record and also won back-to-back golds at the 2016 and 2018 European Championships.

Their only global medal came at the last World Championships in 2019, where Kevin and Dylan ran along with another member of the squad here, Jonathan Sacoor. They also have Alexander Doom who finished fourth in the individual 400m at the European Indoors earlier this year, so there is plenty of quality all over the Belgian team.

Dylan and Kevin ran in the mixed 4x400m relay last week as Belgium finished fifth, with Kevin clocking the fastest time out of all the final leg runners in the field. The Belgian team take this event very seriously and Kevin pulled out of his individual semi-final to prepare for this shows their commitment. They are 22/1 to secure a shock gold, but 13/8 to achieve a very capable medal.

Team GB are one of the very few nations to have ever beaten the USA to the gold medal in this event, but that was way back in 1936, and despite medalling frequently between the 1960s and 1990s, their only Olympic medal in the men’s 4x400m relay since the turn of the Millennium was given retrospectively in 2008 when the Russian team were stripped of their bronze medal for doping offences.

They have improved significantly over recent years though and World Championship bronzes in 2013, 2015 and 2017 prove they do have a decent chance of potentially sneaking onto the podium. They will be one of the strongest European challengers too, having medalled in the last 12 consecutive European Championships in the event, dating back to 1982.

Cameron Chalmers ran in the mixed relay, finishing sixth, but the fact GB had no individual representatives at all in the 400m competition raises questions about the quality of this team. Therefore, it is no surprise to see them priced at a huge 40/1 to win gold, but with the field wide open beneath the Americans, they are 3/1 to take a medal.

The Olympic champions from the 4x400m mixed relay will hope to shock the US team once again by pipping them to gold in both the men’s and women’s relays. Karol Zalewski was part of the four who took that gold and he was also in the 4x400 men’s team which broke the indoor world record back in 2018. Zalewski will run in this relay too, along with Kajetan Duszynski, who ran the final leg for the victorious mixed team.

The performance of Justyna Swiety-Ersetic and Natalia Kaczmarek against their fellow female runners may have been the decisive factor in Poland winning gold, and they are well-fancied for a medal in the women’s relay, so whether or not the men’s quartet can bring one home too is more questionable, given that Polish men are more specialised in 800m and 1500m running.

However, having already won a 400m relay gold at these games, it is hard to discount the Polish team from being a medal contender here. They are 13/2 to get on the podium, and a massive 66/1 to replicate their achievement from last week.