Simbine’s race of his life not enough for Games 100m podium, Lyles wins

Fate was at her cruellest in Paris on Sunday night.

Akani Simbine ran the race of his life, but it still wasn’t enough to make an Olympic podium at the Stade de France on Sunday night, condemning him to fourth for the second time in his career.

The veteran sprinter lowered his national record to 9.82sec in one of the tightest finals in games history, but he missed out on a medal by one-hundredth of a second.

World champion Noah Lyles of the US won in 9.79, just five-thousandths of a second in front of Jamaican Kishane Thompson, while 2022 world champion Fred Kerley ended third in 9.81.

Simbine, who ended fourth in the 100m in Tokyo three years ago, became only the second South African to have finished fourth twice at an Olympics, after racewalker Cecil McMaster.

McMaster got it right in his third outing — in Paris in 1924 — and Simbine will get one more crack in the 4x100m relay later in the week.

Simbine, 30, has yet to win a medal at an Olympics or world championships, despite having made six finals across the two showpieces, finishing fourth three times and fifth three times.

To date only one South African has medalled in this event, Reggie Walker who took the gold at London 1908.

Simbine finished fifth in his first Olympic attempt at Rio 2016 and made it fourth five years later. That result nearly destroyed his career, but he rediscovered his love for the sport and built himself back into a contender who hit his peak in the final.

It just wasn’t quite fast enough.

Earlier Simbine qualified for his third straight Olympic 100m final, winning his semifinal in 9.87sec, the fifth-fastest time behind Jamaicans Thompson (9.80) and Oblique Seville (9.81) and Lyles (9.83) and Kerley (9.84).

Simbine was impressive in his semifinal, winning ahead of Botswana’s world championship silver medallist Letsile Tebogo (9.91) and defending Games champion Marcell Jacobs of Italy (9.92).

Neither Shaun Maswanganyi nor Benjamin Richardson advanced to the semifinals.

Maswanganyi ended fifth in the first heat in a 10.02 season’s best and Richardson was third in the final third heat in 9.95.