Sada Williams

Historic, Epic, extraordinary, remarkable, sensational all these words can describe Sada Williams 400m bronze medal performance at the World Athletics World Championships in Oregan on Friday night.

Williams became Barbados first female World Championship medalist when she ran her way to a bronze medal in the one lap race.

Williams has always been one of Barbados brightest stars in the track and field arena competing at Youth Olympics, world Indoor Championships, Pan Am Juniors, World Juniors, Under-20 World Championships, and Pan American games.

She was slated to compete at the Rio Olympics in 2016 before she picked up an injury in the final at the World Under-20 Championships.

Now she is back, having competed at the Tokyo Olympics and training in Jamaica.

Only concentrating on the quarter mile and no longer splitting her focus on the 200m and 400m, Williams ran out of lane 7 in the final and with no one other than one athlete to target she made the final bend only to see Shaunae Miller-Uibo leading.  Miller-Uibo went to win in 49.11 secs.

Williams was second with Marileidy Paulino of the Dominican Republic making the pass on the final straight to take the silver in 49.60. Williams claimed the bronze with a national record of 49.75. Williams replaced the old record which stood at 50.11 secs.

In the process she became the first woman to make the final and the first woman to medal at the world Championships.

She is the second person from Barbados to win a medal at World Championships with the other medalist being Ryan Brathwaite who won gold in the 110m hurdles in 2009.

“I just wanted to go out there and run under 50 seconds and if that got me on the podium, I’d be super happy about that.” Said Williams.