Athletics at the 2004 Summer Olympics – Men's 110 metre hurdles
| Men's 110 metres hurdles at the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad
|
|||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Venue | Athens Olympic Stadium | ||||||||||||
| Dates | 24–27 August | ||||||||||||
| Competitors | 48 from 34 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 12.91 =WR | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
Liu Xiang |
 China
|
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
Terrence Trammell |
 United States
|
|
|
Anier García |
 Cuba
|
The men's 110 metre hurdles at the 2004 Summer Olympics as part of the athletics program were held at the Athens Olympic Stadium from August 24 to 27.
The top four runners in each of the initial six heats automatically qualified for the second round. The next eight fastest runners from across the heats also qualified. Those 32 runners competed in 4 heats in the second round, with the top three runners from each heat and the four next fastest runners qualifying for the semifinals. There were two semifinal heats, and only the top four from each heat advanced to the final.
Ladji Doucouré was the leader in all of the preliminary rounds, but in the final, Liu Xiang led from the gun, running a flawless race to take the Olympic record and match Colin Jackson's world record with an identical 12.91. Behind him, returning silver medalist Terrence Trammell had a slight lead despite touching virtually every hurdle. As the attrition from dragging each weighted barrier slowed him more and more, Staņislavs Olijars appeared to edge ahead. But when Olijars hit the sixth hurdle he slowed out of contention. Coming back from an abysmal start, Doucouré became the next to edge ahead, looking like a lock for silver until he demolished the final hurdle, leaving Doucouré to stumble across the finish in dead last. A wall of Trammell, Olijars, Maurice Wignall and defending champion Anier García desperately leaning from 5 metres out, all hit the finish line at almost the same time. Trammell's perfectly timed dip edged García, to give him his second successive silver.
Prior to the competition[update], the existing World and Olympic records were as follows.
The following records were established during the competition:
The qualification period for Athletics was 1 January 2003 to 9 August 2004. For the men's 110 metres hurdles, each National Olympic Committee was permitted to enter up to three athletes that had run the race in 13.55 seconds or faster during the qualification period. If an NOC had no athletes that qualified under that standard, one athlete that had run the race in 13.72 seconds or faster could be entered.
...
Wikipedia