Aug. 27, 2004

Former George Mason track standout Maurice Wignall came within a hair's breadth of winning a medal at the 2004 Olympic Games but he will instead need to wait at least four more years to take some Olympic hardware to his Jamaican home. Wignall finished fourth on Friday in the 110-meter hurdles, missing a bronze medal by one one-hundredth of a second. Anier Garcia of Cuba, the 2000 Olympic gold medalist, took home the bronze with a time of 13.20 seconds. Wignall crossed the line in 13.21 seconds with Stanislavs Olijars finishing fifth, also in 13.21. Wignall was trying to make this the third-consecutive Olympic Games in which a former Mason athlete medaled. Greg Haughton, also a Jamaican, won the bronze in the 400-meters and 4X400-meter relay at Sydney in 2000 and he took home a bronze in the 4X400-meter relay at Atlanta in 1996. Wignall can take some comfort in the fact that an Olympic record was set and a world record tied in the final as China's Xiang Liu won the gold with a time of 12.91. That tied Colin Jackson's world record, set a little more than 11 years ago by the British hurdler. The Olympic record set by America's Allen Johnson in 1996 had been 12.95. Two other athletes with ties to Mason competed for Jamaica at this year's Olympics. Former Mason athlete Michelle Ballentine (800-meters) and rising senior Richard Phillips (110-meter hurdles) advanced to the semifinals in their events.