Bonevacia ran a moderate time for him (46.50), which may have cost the Netherlands a gold medal. “I think there should be more respect for my performance,” he said. “I sacrificed myself on Friday for the team and for the Netherlands. You should be proud that we won the silver medal.”
The 33-year-old clearly needs to make a statement. “The rules have changed, only one athlete can be changed for the final. I decided to run twice on Friday, both the series and the final. In this series, I blew myself up to go really fast (44, 93) if we didn’t make it to the series, maybe we didn’t make it to the final. I knew the final was going to be difficult for me, because my muscles were sore and my legs were still tired, but I also knew that your femmecball would do its job.”
Paul replaced Evelyn Salberg in the final, and already made an amazing lap, closing the gap to the United States and the Dominican Republic in the final meters and losing the gold medal by just 0.08 seconds.
Bonevacia was clearly in better shape on Sunday. He finished second in his series with a time of 45.82, which was enough to advance to the semi-finals that will be held on Wednesday. “It was easy. I started really hard and raced right away. I didn’t have to go all the way. I would have to go even harder in the semi-finals and run my best race. I think I did. To drop in 44 seconds to get to the final.”
