The Oregon men’s 4×100 meter team returned after a dropped baton at the Pepsi Invitational to take first place Saturday afternoon in the Oregon Relays at Hayward Field.
Benjamin Thiel replaced Tony Brooks-James, who dropped the baton and led to Oregon’s disqualification a week ago.
Thiel, Arthur Delaney, Charles Nelson and Marcus Chambers finished with a season best time of 40.14 seconds.
“Get the baton around, that was our main focus,” Delaney said. “I was nervous in the beginning, but I sucked it up. [Dropping the baton] happens to everyone, happens to the best of us.”
Delaney took a clean handoff from replacement Thiel and managed to push a cushion for Nelson going into the 300-meter mark.
“We needed to work on the later part of the race,” Delaney said. It was certainly an improvement there, as Nelson powered to a comfortable lead and allowed Chambers to kick nearly a second and a half ahead of second place Montana in the last 100 meters.
Despite James being absent from the team today, Delaney said that the main 4×100 team would remain himself, Nelson, James and Chambers for future events.
“It’ll come, we’ll break 40,” Delaney said.
–by Zach Blaine
