Athletics: Drummond's lie-down protest fails

The men's 100 metres event underwent dramatic disruption last night as America's Jon Drummond, disqualified from his quarter-final under the controversial starting rules introduced this season, set in motion a one-man French Revolution here in the Stade de France.

The 34-year-old graduate of Texas Christian University delayed the programme for more than half-an-hour as he staged an emotive protest under the dismayed gaze of the past and present presidents of the International Olympic Committee, Juan Antonio Samaranch and Jacques Rogge, at one point lying down in his lane and refusing to move for five minutes as officials remonstrated impotently with him.

In scenes reminiscent of those that took place in Atlanta when Linford Christie was disqualified from the Olympic 100m final after two false starts, Drummond eventually stormed away down the track, only to return to his blocks ­ with photographers scurrying around him ­ in an apparent effort to run.

Despite winning over the near-capacity crowd, who responded to the decision with a ferment of boos and whistles, the American ultimately failed to overthrow the organisers, who hurriedly rescheduled the race for an hour later, and was forced to accept his exit along with the man whose twitch on the blocks to his right appeared to have led him to do likewise, Asafa Powell. The figures showed that Drummond and Powell, with reaction times of 0.052sec and 0.086sec, had both activated their blocks quicker than the permissible time of a tenth of a second.

The Jamaican went sadly but quietly ­ unlike the man assigned to the next lane, who was pictured on television weeping bitterly at the warm-up track before flinging himself into the water jump.

Three runners had already fallen victim to the new rules during the opening heats here, but unlike Drummond, they were inexperienced athletes who were unfamiliar with the new state of play. One false start is allowed, but then anyone subsequently offending, even if they did not have the original false start, is disqualified.

Ironically, earlier this week Drummond had spoken in favour of the new false-start arrangement, claiming it gave him "an edge", but added: "The IAAF may have to reconsider it." Drummond's friend and training partner Ato Boldon, one of the qualifiers, indicated afterwards that the American's attitude may have hardened. "Jon said the false start rule sucks," Boldon said. "I knew when they made this rule that someone big was going to get thrown out. The machine made a wrong call. 50,000 pairs of eyes saw it was a wrong call."

Others were less sympathetic. France's heptathon silver medallist Eunice Barber commented acidly: "You'd expect an American to make a song and dance about it." As it happens, Drummond does sing and dance regularly with a gospel band. From now on, perhaps, he will be singing the Blues. Then again, he has been training all his life for this moment.

* USA Track and Field later released a statement regretting the delay caused, commenting: "It was an unprecedented circumstance that was challenging for everyone." Drummond, it added, had "received a full review of the situation under all relevant rules," he had withdrawn from the competition and shaken the hands of the officials.