With Femke Bol, who had taken the World Indoor Record in the 400 metres earlier in the season, as their anchor leg, Netherlands came in as a favorite. Defending champion Poland had a rougher time getting into the final, their anchor leg Patrycja Wyciszkiewicz-Zawadzka finding herself on the deck at the beginning of her leg in a multi-athlete collision on the exchange. After finishing last, Poland was added as a 9th finalist by the referee.
With only one substitution allowed between the heats and the final, Netherlands put their fresh athlete Liemarvin Bonevacia on the first leg. He did what was asked of him, holding his own against USA's Justin Robinson to hand off barely behind. Netherlands' other 400 star, Lieke Klaver, pushed the turn to barely beat Rosey Effiong to the break. Effiong didn't go away until the final metres, Klaver handing off with a slight lead. GBR was 5 metres back with France another 10 metres back. USA's next runner was their substitute, Matthew Boling, a step behind Klein Ikkink. Boling ran on the outside of lane 1 to pass Ikkink by the end of the first turn. Ikkink stuck to Boling until the final straight when he edged by to hand off to the star, Bol. With a personal best a full second slower than Bol, Alexis Holmes ran a step behind and wouldn't go away. Coming off the final turn, Holmes tried to put a kick on Bol and was gaining down the home stretch. The gap narrowed and narrowed as Holmes pulled even. Ten metres from the finish, Bol started to lean for the finish and crashed to the track, Holmes completing the final steps for a USA victory. Bol righted herself, but before she could cross the finish line, Yemi Mary John passed Bol to give GBR silver, the British four having maintained a third place position from the first leg, and running their second national record of the day. Bol was able to get across the line in third place, but in the fall she had dropped the baton, which landed inside the track across the finish line. Crossing the finish line without the baton made NED officially a DNF, did not finish. The Czech Republic took the bronze medal.
Almost lost in the finish line drama, the USA set a new World Record in the relatively new event, taking over a half second off the time set by another American winning team at the inaugural mixed relay in 2019.
Records
Before the competition records were as follows:[2]
The standard to qualify automatically for entry was to finish in the first 8 at 2022 World Athletics Championships, completed by 8 top lists' teams.[3]
Schedule
The event schedule, in local time (CEST), was as follows:[4]
