Taylor Manson helped pave the way for Team USA to earn bronze in the mixed 4x400-meter relay. Manson didn’t compete in the final event, but the Gator still helped the relay team qualify for the finals.
Manson ran the third leg of the relay in heat one en route to a heat victory and third-place finish overall with a 3 minute, 11.39 second time Friday.
The team was initially disqualified due to an out-of-zone exchange infraction between legs one and two; however, they were later reinstated after an appeal and automatically qualified for Saturday’s finals.
Trevor Stewart, Kendall Ellis, Kaylin Whitney and Vernon Norwood ran in Saturday’s final. The squad crossed the finish line third with a 3:10.22 time to earn Team USA track and field’s first medal of the Tokyo Olympics.
The remaining athletics events for the Tokyo Olympics can be found here.
Contact Kaitlyn Wadulack at kwadulack@alligator.org. Follow her on Twitter @kwadulack.