Spain’s Orlando Ortega had the fifth-fastest time in the 110m hurdles final at the world championships, but he will leave Doha with a bronze medal.
Ortega was one of two athletes to be retroactively awarded bronze medals from Wednesday finals at worlds. The other was Polish hammer thrower Wojciech Nowicki, who was originally fourth.
Start with Ortega.
He was impeded by a stumbling Olympic champion Omar McLeod in the adjacent lane in the 110m hurdles final. Before the last hurdle, Ortega was in medal position but had to put out his left hand to keep McLeod from falling into him. In doing so, Ortega slipped behind Russian Sergey Shubenkov, Frenchman Pascal Martinot-Lagarde and Chinese Xie Wenjun.
On Thursday, an IAAF jury of appeal awarded a second bronze to Ortega while keeping Shubenkov in silver position and Martinot-Lagarde with the original bronze. Gold medalist Grant Holloway was clearly in the lead when Ortega and McLeod made contact.
“I’m very disheartened for Ortega that had to happened to him,” McLeod said after, noting he felt a hamstring injury after the first hurdle. “I wish I stopped because that cost him a medal.”
Ortega, who formerly competed for Cuba, took silver behind McLeod at the Rio Olympics.
In the hammer, the Polish federation appealed the original bronze-medal-winning throw of Hungarian Bence Halasz, arguing that Halasz touched the ground outside the circle. Like in the hurdles, no medals were stripped, but Nowicki was upgraded to make it four men on the podium.
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