2022 World Athletics Championships – Men's 400 metres

Men's 400 metres
at the 2022 World Championships
Men's 400 metres ; at the 2022 World Championships
	Michael Norman shortly after the final.
Venue	Hayward Field
Dates	17 July (heats); 20 July (semi-finals); 22 July (final)
Competitors	48 from 31 nations
Winning time	44.29
Medalists
	← 2019 2023 →

Video on YouTube
Official Video

The men's 400 metres at the 2022 World Athletics Championships was held at the Hayward Field in Eugene from 17 to 22 July 2022.^[1] The winning margin was 0.19 seconds.

Summary

The semi-final took every athlete who broke 45 seconds into the final. By contrast, in 2015, sixteen athletes broke 45 in the semi-final round. 2015 was the second World Championships for two of the finalists, both former champions, Kirani James and world record holder Wayde van Niekerk. After what should have been a career-ending knee injury, it was remarkable for van Niekerk to get this far, each race an experiment to see how fast he could still go. The 2022 world leader was Michael Norman at 43.56. In two previous major championships, 2019 and the Olympics, Norman had failed to win, so he had something to prove here too.

Norman went out fast, but James was marginally faster through the entire first half of the race. Christopher Taylor, Matthew Hudson-Smith and van Niekerk were just a tick back. James maintained his slight edge through the turn, when they hit the straight, Norman accelerated, putting a gap on van Niekerk and Hudson-Smith, but James didn't go away. Norman battled, gaining a slight advantage, then widening it to a full meter by the finish. Two meters back, Hudson-Smith had gained the advantage over van Niekerk whose form broke down the last 25 meters. Coming from dead last off the turn, Champion Allison blazed by van Niekerk but came up short to catch Hudson-Smith for bronze.

Records

Before the competition records were as follows:^[2]

Record	Athlete & Nat.	Perf.	Location	Date
World record	Wayde van Niekerk (RSA)	43.03	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	14 August 2016
Championship record	Michael Johnson (USA)	43.18	Seville, Spain	26 August 1999
World Leading	Michael Norman (USA)	43.56	Eugene, United States	25 June 2022
African Record	Wayde van Niekerk (RSA)	43.03	Rio de Janeiro, Brazil	14 August 2016
Asian Record	Youssef Ahmed Masrahi (KSA)	43.93	Beijing, China	23 August 2015
North, Central American and Caribbean record	Michael Johnson (USA)	43.18	Seville, Spain	26 August 1999
South American Record	Anthony Zambrano (COL)	43.93	Tokyo, Japan	2 August 2021
European Record	Thomas Schönlebe (GDR)	44.33	Rome, Italy	3 September 1987
Oceanian record	Darren Clark (AUS)	44.38	Seoul, South Korea	26 September 1988

Qualification standard

The standard to qualify automatically for entry was 44.90.^[3]

Schedule

The event schedule, in local time (UTC−7), was as follows:

Date	Time	Round
17 July	11:05	Heats
20 July	19:15	Semi-finals
22 July	19:35	Final

Results

Heats

The first 3 athletes in each heat (Q) and the next 6 fastest (q) qualify for the heats.^[4]

Rank	Heat	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	5	Bayapo Ndori	Botswana (BOT)	44.87	Q, PB
2	1	Wayde van Niekerk	South Africa (RSA)	45.18	Q
3	5	Kirani James	Grenada (GRN)	45.29	Q
4	2	Michael Norman	United States (USA)	45.37	Q
5	1	Jonathan Jones	Barbados (BAR)	45.46	Q
6	6	Matthew Hudson-Smith	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	45.49	Q
7	4	Champion Allison	United States (USA)	45.56	Q
8	5	Nathon Allen	Jamaica (JAM)	45.61	Q
9	1	Alex Haydock-Wilson	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	45.62	Q, SB
10	2	Christopher Taylor	Jamaica (JAM)	45.68	Q
11	2	Zakhiti Nene	South Africa (RSA)	45.69	Q
12	4	Dylan Borlée	Belgium (BEL)	45.70	Q
13	2	Kevin Borlée	Belgium (BEL)	45.72	q
14	3	Michael Cherry	United States (USA)	45.81	Q
15	3	Muzala Samukonga	Zambia (ZAM)	45.82	Q
16	6	Liemarvin Bonevacia	Netherlands (NED)	45.82	Q
17	6	Lidio Andrés Feliz	Dominican Republic (DOM)	45.87	Q
18	5	Fuga Sato	Japan (JPN)	45.88	q
19	1	Julian Jrummi Walsh	Japan (JPN)	45.90	q
20	4	Isaac Makwala	Botswana (BOT)	45.93	Q
21	5	Alex Beck	Australia (AUS)	45.99	q
22	4	Mikhail Litvin	Kazakhstan (KAZ)	46.00	q, SB
23	6	Christopher O'Donnell	Ireland (IRL)	46.01	q
24	1	Patrik Šorm	Czech Republic (CZE)	46.07
25	3	Alexander Doom	Belgium (BEL)	46.18	Q
26	2	Benjamin Lobo Vedel	Denmark (DEN)	46.27
27	6	Kaito Kawabata	Japan (JPN)	46.34
28	3	Jevaughn Powell	Jamaica (JAM)	46.42
29	5	Edoardo Scotti	Italy (ITA)	46.46
30	2	Luis Avilés	Mexico (MEX)	46.47
31	4	Davide Re	Italy (ITA)	46.49
32	2	Kajetan Duszyński	Poland (POL)	46.57
33	4	Dwight St. Hillaire	Trinidad and Tobago (TTO)	46.60
34	3	Ricky Petrucciani	Switzerland (SUI)	46.60
35	4	Boško Kijanović	Serbia (SRB)	46.85
36	1	Steven Solomon	Australia (AUS)	46.87
37	3	Anthony Pesela	Botswana (BOT)	47.36
38	6	Lucas Carvalho	Brazil (BRA)	47.53
39	5	Dexter Mayorga	Nicaragua (NCA)	48.40
40	6	Aiden Hazzard	Anguilla (AIA)	51.44	SB
41	3	Obediah Timbaci	Vanuatu (VAN)	53.32

Semi-finals

The first 2 athletes in each heat (Q) and the next 2 fastest (q) qualify to the final.^[5]

Rank	Heat	Name	Nationality	Time	Notes
1	1	Michael Norman	United States (USA)	44.30	Q
2	1	Matthew Hudson-Smith	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	44.38	Q
3	3	Champion Allison	United States (USA)	44.71	Q
4	2	Kirani James	Grenada (GRN)	44.74	Q
5	3	Wayde van Niekerk	South Africa (RSA)	44.75	Q
6	3	Jonathan Jones	Barbados (BAR)	44.78	q
7	2	Bayapo Ndori	Botswana (BOT)	44.94	Q
8	1	Christopher Taylor	Jamaica (JAM)	44.97	q, SB
9	2	Muzala Samukonga	Zambia (ZAM)	45.02	PB
10	3	Alex Haydock-Wilson	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	45.08	PB
11	1	Zakhiti Nene	South Africa (RSA)	45.24
12	3	Kevin Borlée	Belgium (BEL)	45.26
13	2	Michael Cherry	United States (USA)	45.28
14	1	Dylan Borlée	Belgium (BEL)	45.41
15	3	Liemarvin Bonevacia	Netherlands (NED)	45.50
16	3	Mikhail Litvin	Kazakhstan (KAZ)	45.63	PB
17	2	Fuga Sato	Japan (JPN)	45.71
18	1	Julian Jrummi Walsh	Japan (JPN)	45.75
19	2	Alexander Doom	Belgium (BEL)	45.80
20	2	Christopher O'Donnell	Ireland (IRL)	46.01
21	3	Isaac Makwala	Botswana (BOT)	46.04
22	1	Lidio Andrés Feliz	Dominican Republic (DOM)	46.19
23	1	Alex Beck	Australia (AUS)	46.21
	2	Nathon Allen	Jamaica (JAM)		DNF

Final

The final took place on 22 July at 19:35.^[6]

Rank	Name	Nationality	Time
	Michael Norman	United States (USA)	44.29
	Kirani James	Grenada (GRN)	44.48
	Matthew Hudson-Smith	Great Britain & N.I. (GBR)	44.66
4	Champion Allison	United States (USA)	44.77
5	Wayde van Niekerk	South Africa (RSA)	44.97
6	Bayapo Ndori	Botswana (BOT)	45.29
7	Christopher Taylor	Jamaica (JAM)	45.30
8	Jonathan Jones	Barbados (BAR)	46.13