If the men’s 100m final was close, then the men’s 110m hurdles repechage at Paris 2024 was even tighter.
In a heart-pounding race on Tuesday, Brazil’s Rafael Pereira won gold by just 0.002 seconds in the second heat at Stade de France.
The finish was so close that a photo finish was needed to separate Pereira from France’s Raphael Mohamed and Algeria’s Amine Bouanani.
Pereira clocked 13.54 seconds, edging out Mohamed by the slimmest of margins, who also advanced to the semifinals.
Bouanani heartbreakingly missed a spot by just one thousandth of a second.
The race was chaotic even before it started, with multiple false starts and Kazakhstan’s David Yefremov being disqualified. The starter’s gun even appeared to malfunction.
Another dramatic photo finish occurred in the third heat, where France’s Wilhem Belocian advanced to the semifinals ahead of Japan’s Shunya Takayama by just five-thousandths of a second.
