Alexis Holmes anchors Americans to equal championship best of 3:08.80 in Tokyo ahead of Femke Bol’s Dutch team.

Possibly still smarting from their defeat at the hands of the Netherlands at the Paris Olympics, the United States made no mistake this time as they enjoyed a runaway victory.

Bryce Deadmon, Lynna Irby-Jackson, Jenoah McKiver and Alexis Holmes tied the championship record of 3:08.80 as they beat their Dutch rivals by more than a second with Belgium third.

Not even the flying Femke Bol on the anchor could rescue Dutch hopes. They had too much to do and instead battled hard to win silver in front of the Belgians as Poland took fourth and Britain finished a disappointing fifth with 3:10.84.

Competing in the final event of opening night (Sept 13) at the World Championships in Tokyo in front of a capacity crowd of 56,819, the Brits struggled to impose themselves in the medal hunt just 12 months after winning Olympic bronze in Paris.

After Lewis Davey’s opening leg, Emily Newnham found herself in sixth place on the second leg.

“It wasn't good enough for me,” said Davey. “I've had a stronger individual 400m this year, so I thought first leg would suit me.”

Newnham said: “I think I was just trying to keep us in contention as much as I could. Like, obviously, the girls got to the break first, so felt like I was just trying to catch up but felt like I held it and just tried to get the baton to Toby as quickly as possible.

On leg three, Toby Harries overtook several rivals down the back straight to move into second, but the 200m specialist paid for it in the home straight as he drifted back to sixth.

“Go hard or go home, I guess,” said Harries. “It was either that or get fifth or sixth anyway, really. So, if I was going to overtake those guys, being some of the best in the world on that leg, I knew I had to get in front of them. That's where the speed, that's where my advantage is – the speed in the first 200m – but I didn't have that in the last 30m, I just didn't have any more in the tank.”

By this stage the Americans were clear and GB anchor runner Nicole Yeargin was left to get stuck into a battle for the minor medals, although Bol and Helene Ponette proved strongest as they brought their teams into podium positions.

Yeargin reflected: “I knew I should have taken them on the back stretch. I was going too slow. I almost stepped on Femke like, twice on her heels, you know, I knew we were going too slow. I was hoping I'll catch them in the end. But I should have trusted myself to go earlier.”