Athletics at the 2016 Summer Olympics – Men's 200 metres
| Men's 200 metres at the Games of the XXXI Olympiad
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Usain Bolt and LaShawn Merritt at finish
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| Venue | Olympic Stadium | ||||||||||||
| Dates | 16 August 2016 (Preliminary round & heats) 17 August 2016 (semi-final) 18 August 2016 (final) |
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| Competitors | 79 from 49 nations | ||||||||||||
| Winning time | 19.78 s | ||||||||||||
| Medalists | |||||||||||||
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Usain Bolt |
 Jamaica
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Andre de Grasse |
 Canada
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Christophe Lemaitre |
 France
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The men's 200 metres event at the 2016 Summer Olympics took place between 16–18 August in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, at the Olympic Stadium.
2012 Olympic champion and 2015 World Champion Usain Bolt, is unbeaten over 200 m since 2007. Bolt had only competed once over 200 m in 2016 before the Olympics, recording a time of 19.89 seconds, fifth in the world in 2016. US team entries had the 3 world leading times in 2016 before the Olympics 400 metres specialist LaShawn Merritt, 2015 World runner-up and American champion Justin Gatlin and Ameer Webb. The Canadian team was Brendon Rodney, Aaron Brown and Andre De Grasse. Bolt's training partner Miguel Francis and Britain's Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake were the other athletes to have run under 20 seconds that season. The Jamaican team also featured 2012 Olympic runner-up Yohan Blake.
In the semi-final round, #1 of the year. LaShawn Merritt cruised to an easy win in the first, with Christophe Lemaitre second. The second semi saw Usain Bolt run 19.78, in the last few metres Andre De Grasse rushed up to Bolt's shoulder, the two friends looking at each other and laughing as they crossed the line. Bolt's time was his fastest the year and De Grasse set a new Canadian record of 19.80 seconds. As Bud Winter the sprint coach who influenced Glen Mills, Bolt's coach, would say; "Relax and win." Both the time qualifiers Adam Gemili and Ramil Guliyev both came from this fastest of the three semi final heats. #3 of the year, Ameer Webb was left behind. In the third semi, Alonso Edward and Churandy Martina qualified in 1st and 2nd place. World #2 in 2016 Justin Gatlin held the lead with 50 metres to go but started looking around did not keep up his speed sufficiently. He should have seen Alonso Edward as he pulled ahead of Gatlin and on the far outside, Churandy Martina closed fast to take the second qualifying position. Gatlin failed to reach the final. 2012 silver medallist and number #2 runner of all time, Yohan Blake finished sixth.
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