World record holder Tobi Amusan has reacted to comments by retired American athlete Michael Johnson shortly after she broke the world record in the Women’s 100m hurdles at the World Athletics Championships in Eugene, Oregon, USA.
The 25-year-old stunned the world with her performance in the semifinal, running in 12.12 seconds. She ran even faster in the final. However, the mark of 12.06 seconds did not count for the record books because the wind speed was over the legal limit.
Johnson, apparently stunned by the numbers, expressed doubts on Twitter over the timing.
He wrote: “I don’t believe 100h times are correct. World record broken by .08! 12 PBs set. 5 National records set. And Cindy Sember quote after her PB/NR ‘I thoroughly I was running slow!’ All athletes looked shocked.”
With Amusan’s record now ratified by the World Athletics, the Nigerian expressed disappointment over Johnson’s comments.
“As much as I try not to answer this question, I’ll answer it this one time. At a point, I felt like you are an artiste.
“Things are meant to happen; records are meant to be broken. But the fact that he just had that much to say about me, says a lot about him.
“Because I’ve been on the circuit, he’s seen me run. I wouldn’t get mad at him because the person they expect to actually break the world record did not, so coming from a black girl from Nigeria just got them really worked up, so they got to deal with it,” she said on Beat FM.
