THE final day of athletics at the Paris Olympics saw one of the fastest Men’s 4x400m time ever run. However, Jamaica didn’t get the opportunity to be part of the event. This still angers one of the country’s great quarter-milers, Bertland Cameron.

Jamaica failed to qualify for the relay event at the Summer Games for the first time since 1948, after failing to run faster than the 2.59.12 minutes set by 16th-ranked Zambia who actually went on to make the final in the French capital for the first time since 1988, finishing eighth.

After being unable to acquire the automatic mark at the World Athletics Relay in May, Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association (JAAA) arranged two attempts to make the cut — one at the NACAC New Life Invitational in The Bahamas on Sunday June 16, and the final at the JAAA/Puma National Senior Championships at the National Stadium on Sunday June 30. However, both attempts were unsuccessful as the times of 2:59.73 in Nassau and 2:59.87 in Kingston were not good enough to make the trip to Paris.

The USA won gold in a time of 2:54:43 on Saturday, breaking the Olympic record set back in 2008 in Beijing. Botswana’s team also bettered the 2008 record but had to settle for silver in 2.54.53, while Great Britain took bronze in 2:55.83.

Three-time Olympian Cameron, who helped Jamaica win silver in the 4x400m at the Seoul Games in 1988, says he was discouraged that the country’s streak competing in the event, spanning over 70 years, was broken.

“For me, it’s one of the biggest disappointments because I look back from 1948 until now, Jamaica has always had a relay team,” Cameron told the Jamaica Observer. “We might not win gold medals but we always represented well. So, for us to go to the Olympics and not even have a say in the 4x400m is disappointing.

“I love watching the 400m and 4x400m relay so it’s a dark cloud over my face knowing that four of the top quarter-milers in Jamaica — that is in the top 20 — and we were not represented in the 4x400m. It’s a big letdown.”

The former World Athletics Championships and Commonwealth Games gold medallist in the 400m says the JAAA should take the blame for their absence.

The athletes are not the ones who let us down,” he said. “It’s the management and the coaches because they knew from a long time what it was going to take for us to be in the 4x400m, and they neglected that and tried to do other things.

“I take it that some of those people who are doing that and making these decisions, especially the selectors, they’ve never put on a spikes and go out there and run. They don’t know how it feels just to go out there at the Olympics or the World Championships so they just do whatever they feel like and put a mediocre team out there and try to make it up later.”

Jamaica will once again have to go through the qualification process for next year’s World Championships in Tokyo. World Athletics announced that 14 of the 16 places will be decided at the World Relays, set for May 10-11 in China.