KINGSTON, Jamaica — As was the case for the on-going Olympic Games, 14 of the 16 teams in all three relays at next year’s World Athletics Championships in Tokyo, Japan, September 13-21, will be decided at the World Athletics Relay Championships to be held in Guangzhou, China from May 10-11.

In a release on its website on Thursday, World Athletics announced the schedule and the qualifying standards that will be required for athletes to participate in the 49 events, 24 for each gender and a Mixed 4x400m relay.

Once again, the qualification for the relay events, 4x100m and 4x400m for men and women and the Mixed 4x400m relays will see the majority of the places being filled at the World Relays.

Fourteen of the 16 places in the relays will be decided in China with two others decided by their placing in the rankings at the end of the qualifying period.

With a number of the top athletes sitting out this year when the World Relays were held in the Bahamas, Jamaica only qualified for four of the five relays, missing out on the men’s 4x400m, despite two other attempts.

The men’s 4x100m team was the only one to qualify from the first round, while the women’s 4x100m, women’s 4x400m and the Mixed Relays secured their spots in the second round.

The format used in the Bahamas, saw the first two teams from each of the first round races, qualifying for the Olympics Games as well as the final on the second day.

Teams had a second chance on the second day to qualify for the Olympics, again the top two from each heat punching their tickets to Paris.

-Paul A Reid