Coming into these Championships, only four men had ever run under 47 seconds. While world record holder Kevin Young never officially retired, now at 53 he's largely been a spectator for a couple of decades. The other three have accomplished the feat in less than a year, two this season in the same race. And all three were in Doha setting up a highly anticipated confrontation.
In the final, Rai Benjamin in lane 7 appeared to get a better start, making up the stagger on Lahoulou to his outside, but that may have been deceptive. Down the backstretch, defending champion Karsten Warholm started to take charge. All alone in lane 9, the third of the big 3 Abderrahman Samba, was getting passed by. Through the turn, Warholm held his advantage over Benjamin which revealed to be a full stride coming off the turn. Kyron McMaster looked to be in third place. Benjamin made a run at Warholm down the stretch but stretched for the final hurdle, landing awkwardly and losing momentum and his last opportunity to try to catch Warholm. In front of a home crowd, Samba was able to get past McMaster to take the bronze.
Records
Before the competition records were as follows:[2]
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