Noah Lyles' 200m 'world record' taken away as he ran just 185m

American Noha Lyles looked to have shattered the 200m world record set by Jamaican great Usain Bolt as he seems to have completed the track in just 18.90 seconds in the Inspiration Games before it was revealed that he only ran 185m.

Lyles’ 18.90 seconds would have broken the 19.19-second mark of world record holder Usain Bolt, who set the benchmark in 2009.

Lyles’ personal best is 19.50 seconds and as he was running into a strong headwind, the time clocked was immediately challenged.

"That cannot be right!" said BBC commentator Steve Cram while adding, "Even he has got his hands in the air wondering what is going on!"

But in what came as a shocking announced after around five minutes later, Cram revealed that world champions Lyles, who was running on his own in Florida, started from the wrong lane while running 15m less than his rivals at other tracks.

Lyles, 22, tweeted afterwards: "You can't be playing with my emotions like this...."

Lyles ran in socks featuring character Sonic the Hedgehog at the event.

The ill-fated ending to one of the event’s headline races comes as a massive disappointment and embarrassment to Inspiration Games organisers, who looked upon television and timing technology to make major international athletics event possible despite restrictions due to COVID-19 pandemic.

In what was a first, athletes competed from different venues around the world with starting guns being fired simultaneously while the athletes’ efforts were shown alongside each other in a split-screen broadcast.

Lyles, who bagged the 200m world title in Doha in the year 2019, reached the bend in Florida way ahead of his opponents Christophe Lemaitre and Churandy Martina, who were competing from Switzerland and the Netherlands respectively.

He steamed past the line but his ‘winning time’ was revealed to have been helped by an error in the placement of his starting blocks, giving him a 15m headstart.

Lyles’ younger brother and fellow athlete Josephus were the first two who reacted immediately with disbelief.

As a result of the mistake, Lyles was removed from the race results and Lemaitre was handed the win instead. Winners of each event at the meeting received a $10,000 (£7,930) prize.

The globe-spanning competition, pitching Europe against North America and the rest of the world, was the brainwave of organisers of the Zurich Diamond League, cancelled because of the coronavirus pandemic.