Guyana’s Aliyah Abrams will be in Heat 1 of the Women’s 400m alongside defending champion, Shaunae Miller-Uibo, of the Bahamas on Monday night at 20:45h.
Miller-Uibo won gold in the 400m at the Rio 2016 Olympics, diving across the line to beat Allyson Felix by 0.07 seconds and record a then personal best time of 49.44 seconds.
The Bahamian currently has a leading time – 49.08s – in 2021 and will be running out of Lane Two, while Abrams’ 51.46s is 61st.
On Tuesday morning, the 27-year-old Miller-Uibo will also run the Women’s 200m Final at 08:50h.
With regards to the Heat, Abrams, who is in Lane 8, enters with the fourth-best time, which is not close to her Personal Best of 51.13s. She accomplished that season-best in May; her best has been 51.77s and in her final race before the Olympics she clocked 52.31s.
Miller-Uibo is the only person in the Heat with a sub 50-second time, while Cuba’s Roxana Gomez (50.76s) and Canada’s Kyra Constantine (50.87s) are the others with ‘SB’ quicker than Abrams.
The first three finishers in each Heat and the next six fastest will qualify to the three semi-finals.
On her Olympic debut in Rio, Abrams exited the competition in the first round, but this time around she has much higher targets.
“My ultimate goal this time around is to make it to the final that would be a success for me,” she told SportsMax.
Abrams will be the final Guyanese athlete to compete at these Games.
Nothing like taking on the best to up ones game. But win, lose or draw, every Guyanese chest should be bursting with pride for this young lady.