Duke literally dropped the baton 2 meters from finish line and loses ACC team title as a result (video)

In this day and age, 2 things come to mind. Most people are right handed and that baton, your heavy iphone or droid is constantly in your right hand.

If you carry your phone on runs like I do always in my right hand, going to your left hand is uncomfortable as all get out. I just normally stop.

This aspect would make an interesting research paper.

I wonder what the coaches bonuses are for winning the conference meet.

A lot of armchair quarterbacking happening in this thread talking about which hand to carry the baton in and if the girl should have done something differently. IMO the takeaway is that it's just unfortunate and the girl didn't actually do anything wrong.

If a RB fumbled at the 1 yard line he did something wrong. Saying she didn’t do anything wrong is just false.

Meh if this was any other sport that the general public cared about there would be a lot of (correct) people saying the coaching and runner both messed up here. Her job was to hold onto the baton and the coaches job was to remind the team to run smart. Both messed up and then threw a temper tantrum.

Still don’t see how it’s an unfortunate call from the officials. More like unfortunate coaching and execution.

Seems like there are several people in this thread who either are completely unfamiliar with or have forgotten what they knew about college relays.

The issue here isn’t that she needs to switch to her non-dominant hand, which would most likely cause more problems because she presumably has less grip strength and control in that hand.

The issue is she’s not holding the baton in a way that protects the baton.

Always hold the baton where only 1/2 to a 1/4 is sticking out of the top of your grip. You should naturally tuck the other three quarters of the baton on the inside of your arm if you let a quarter stick out.

It provides less baton for a flailing arm to strike and if the baton does shift in your hand, there’s plenty of baton on either side of your grip to re-secure it.

I taped the replay on ACC Network this morning. They condense the entire meet. On Thursday night the girl who dropped the baton on Saturday ran the 400 leg of the distance medley relay. She was largely credited for that victory since she put so much margin over North Carolina State.

But in watching the replay today the same tendencies were evident. She not only holds the baton far too low but she swings it inside out to the point she's guaranteeing it extends away from her body and much closer to traffic than warranted. Those other runners are running in standard relationship to your frame. They can't be asked to account for wild abnormalcy, like a truck with a 2 x 4 sticking out into the adjacent lane.

Any complaints from Duke were preposterous desperation.

It's obvious Duke does not coach this aspect. In watching their relay runners they all have different carry styles and arm swings.

BTW, Maatoug did receive the MVP award for the women.

Here is what the deleted tweet said.

Unfortunate call from the officials for these women who ran their hearts out and competed with grit all weekend. We’ll be back stronger.

What I'm having trouble understanding is what do the Duke coaches want to be done?

The moment the Duke runner crossed the finish line without the baton the rule book says she is DQd. Regardless, she never went back to get the baton.

So what call could possibly help Duke? Even if we knew Virgnia Tech boosters paid the Miami girl $1,000,000 to intentionally knock the baton out of her hand, I dont get what remedy would help Duke. You can't just place them 2nd.

Now I've always wanted a race to be re-run but I've never seen it done. But short of a re-run race, there was nothing for the officials to do that would help Duke even if they saw a foul - which they didn't.

What am I missing?

In this case, nothing can be done. As soon as she crossed the finish line the DQ was inevitable. The only exception I can see would be if they determined that interference by the Miami runner caused the baton to be knocked out. If this was the case, I think the only recourse would be to give Duke a chance to do a solo re-run maybe an hour later.

Remember the US women's 4x100 team in Rio dropping the baton after being interfered with and then doing a solo re-run to get into the final?

LOL....You don't have a clue about what you speak of, as evidenced by that nonsense.

First off if you carry in your left and hand off to the outgoing runners left hand, then you are crossing your body during the exchange (assuming the incoming runner is on the inside and the outgoing on the outside). The outgoing runner should always face the infield when receiving the baton and receive it in their left hand and move it to their right. Not having their back to the infield.

Also you assume that if you have the baton in your left that it will not be dropped from contact from runners passing you. What about when you pass someone who has the baton their right hand and yours in your left. They might hit and someone will drop the baton.

Lastly you mentioned the baton travels a longer distance. WTH? What does that have to do with anything.

The SEC 4x4s were a joke this year, both genders. 14 teams and only 5 actually scored in both genders

What I most hate is that the rules push the athletes towards being uncompetitive. It's true that Duke could have hung back and taken a lesser place, being safe to ensure that they won the meet. Then,

-- They would have been giving up their chance to win the ACC title in the 4x400m
-- They might have been too far back to qualify for NCAAs
-- We all would have been robbed of this exciting finish

How does any of that help anyone? I'm in the camp that the Duke anchor was clearly at fault, and by the rules, should have been disqualified. So I don't blame the officials or the Miami runner. Given the circumstances, the Duke coaches and athletes made the wrong decision.

But is that really what we want from the sport? Why aren't the rules such that Duke can just be put behind Miami in the results or get a time penalty? Why is it that in the closest--and therefore most exciting--team battles, the "right" thing to do is so often to be more risk-averse and cautious?

Bio duder

yep. This is one of those situations where it’s a clear DQ unless Allyson Felix is involved. Unfortunately for Duke, she wasn’t on this particular relay

I don’t know the rules here, but if Miami intentionally hit the baton out (which they didn’t, the Duke runner was 100% at fault), does Miami get DQed and Duke win, or how does it work? If both teams get DQed, it could create some bad situations sportsmanship be aside.

Guess it’s been answered above. Solo rerun an hour later.

Correct.

Duke ran wide, clearly on the lane 1/2 line, holding the baton at the end like a tissue paper. That is allowed, but at the runner's own risk. No need for it whatsoever. Little benefit, all risk.

WOW.

The anchor ran a great leg, and made an error. Things can go wrong, and they definitely can in an indoor 4x4.

As everyone including me has posted, Duke ran wide on the lane 1/2 line, holding the baton like a tissue paper. That is all allowed, but at the runner's own risk.

Good coaching at the youth level includes how to hold a relay baton. With several relays to observe, the coach should have had the opportunity to comment on odd habits like this grip.

A good coach would own this, not start pointing fingers.

This is actually a more fair critique than the others