Only five women in history have ever dipped below 50s in the 400m indoor track, two laps of the 200m track, and one of them, the Dutch Femke Bol, just turned 24, with long, magnificently defined legs. and muscular, and stride seemingly so easy, and even light, and how frequently, he has done it four times in a month. The last one, last night in the final in Glasgow, an extraordinary 49.17s, which allowed her to beat by seven hundredths the world record that she herself had held since February 18, when she won the national championship in her country (49.24s ).
It is the first world record to be broken at the Glasgow Indoor World Championships.
On lane five, Bol, who had the help of his compatriot Lieke Klaver, great start on lane six, above, passed the 100m in 11.88s and the 200m in 23.52s. The 49.17s are so extraordinary that they are the 20th best outdoor mark in history, a 400m track with wide curves. However, in summer, and in the Olympic year, Bol, who has a best time of 49.44s, focuses his efforts on the 400m hurdles, a specialty in which he has the second best time in history (51.45s) and proclaimed world champion in Budapest. The Tokyo Olympic champion and world record holder in the 400m hurdles (50.68s), the North American Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, did not participate there. The duel in Paris will be one of the great moments of the coming summer.