Qatari runner Abderrahman Samba qualified for the semi-finals of the 400-meter hurdles race in the athletics competitions that took place today at the Stade de France Olympic in the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.
Samba finished the qualifying round in Group 2 with a time of 48:35 seconds, behind Norway’s Karsten Warholm, the Tokyo 2020 Olympic gold medalist, who snatched first place with a time of 47:57 seconds, and France’s Clement Dugos, who came in second with a time of 47:69 seconds.
The Qatari champion, Samba, will compete in the semi-finals tomorrow evening, Tuesday, and if he qualifies, he will compete in the final the day after tomorrow.
Samba, who won the gold medal at the 2023 Asian Games in Hangzhou, China, hopes to break through the barriers of the experienced trio, Warholm, the Tokyo 2020 gold medalist, Brazilian Alisson dos Santos, the runner-up, and American Ray Benjamin, the bronze medalist.
Benjamin topped the first heat with a time of 48.82 seconds, while Dos Santos came third in the third heat with a time of 48.75 seconds.
In the same context, the other Qatari runner, Basem Hamida, will compete in the second round tomorrow, after coming in fifth in the first series today, recording a time of 49.82 seconds, which is his best time this season.
The International Federation gives runners a second chance to compete for a semi-final ticket. 24 runners participate in it, distributed into three groups, and the first and second place winners qualify for the last four.
Qatari runner Abdulrahman Samba expressed his happiness with the result he achieved in the qualifying round and his qualification for the semi-final round, stressing his determination to prepare strongly for the semi-final round competitions tomorrow.
Samba said in a statement today after the race that what he achieved today gives him the incentive to continue the journey and achieve what he aspires to, which is winning a medal, noting the difficulty of the competitions with the presence of former world and Olympic champions.
The Qatari champion pointed out the need to focus on tomorrow’s semi-final race in order to advance to the final.
Throughout the history of Qatar’s participation in the Olympics, athletics champions have won 4 colored medals, the first of which was in Barcelona 1992 with the bronze medal won by Mohammed Sulaiman in the 1500 meters, making him the first Qatari and Gulf national to win an Olympic medal.
While the other three medals were achieved by Olympic champion Mutaz Barshim, first in the London Olympics and the Tokyo Games, and he is the first Asian athlete to win 3 Olympic medals in athletics.