Olympic sprinter Jeremiah Azu faces disqualification in Paris after bizarre decision

Olympic sprinter Jeremiah Azu faced a crushing blow when he was disqualified from the 100m heats in Paris before even breaking into stride.

The 23-year-old Team GB athlete jumped the gun by a mere 0.073 seconds, triggering a false start and his subsequent disqualification from the event, dashing his hopes of competing further in the 100m qualifiers.

Azu, who had clocked an impressive 9.97 earlier in the season, was visibly confused and disappointed by the decision that prevented him from taking part in the race he had spent years preparing for.

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Following his disqualification, a bewildered Azu expressed his frustration to the press: "Honestly, I reacted to a sound. It's a shame, the crowd is so excited. The pole vault is going on and the French fans are in here. It's a shame they didn't let me run under protest, I'm not sure what rule is being used."

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He continued, "But they said I've got to go back and put an appeal in, so I'm going to go through the process and see what happens. I was saying I wanted to run under protest. Any other race they allow you to run and then after you review it, but I don't know, it's the Olympics so it's clearly different rules. So I'm just going to get back, try and get this protest done as quick as possible so hopefully I can get back out here and get into the semi-final."

Azu has faced a tough year in the 2024 season, forced to pull out of both the World Indoor Athletics Championships in March and the European Athletics Championships in May because of ongoing injury woes, but he's aiming for glory in Paris.

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The young athlete, only 23 years old, may have been ruled out of the solo 100m dash, yet he'll get another shot at Olympic fame - he's slated to run in the Great Britain team's 4x100m relay races coming up.

The athletics world felt a mix of sympathy and responsibility when talking about Azu's setback, with ex-sprint champ Michael Johnson commenting on the situation.

Speaking with the BBC, Johnson remarked: "You are at the Olympic Games, you know that you can't start before the gun and that was a blatant false start. The pressure is not the issue because this is the Olympic Games, you are a professional athlete, this what you do. The issue is whether or not he did hear something, because if he did that is a legitimate excuse. Nobody else heard it though, that's his problem [with the appeal], he was the only one."

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