50 stunning Olympic moments: Great Britain's 4x100m gold – in pictures

The 4x100m sprint final at the 2004 Olympic Games was over before it had even begun, according to commentators and punters. The USA, with an illustrious squad featuring the likes of Maurice Greene, were due to cruise to gold. Meanwhile, any faint hopes of success for the British team were seemingly nulified by Darren Campbell's injury woes going into the race Photograph: Bob Thomas/Getty Images

The British and American teams matched one another stride for stride over the first two legs; Jason Gardener ran smoothly from the blocks for the Brits, before handing over to Campbell down the back straight, who then fed Marlon Devonish for the second bend. The Americans, however, fumbled their second hand-over at the 200m marker, giving Britain's Mark Lewis-Francis (pictured) a marginal lead over his rival Greene as he grasped the baton with 100m to go Photograph: Ian Waldie/Getty Images

Greene chased Lewis-Francis down within 50 metres and looked as if he would effortlessly burst to victory Photograph: Shaun Botterill/Getty Images

But Lewis-Francis somehow kept pace through the closing stages and the two men crossed the line simultaneously, as far as the naked eye could see Photograph: Toby Melville/Reuters

Lewis-Francis celebrated immediately, believing that he had beaten Greene on the dip Photograph: Bob Thomas/Getty Images

And sure enough he had ... albeit by only 1/100th of a second, as shown by the official slit-scan taken at the finsh-line Photograph: EPA

The British sprinters were overjoyed as the result flashed up on the screens around the stadium, confirming their stunning victory in a time of 38.07sec Photograph: Tom Jenkins for The Guardian

Team GB won a total of nine gold medals in Athens that year, but none was won by such a fractional margin or with such theatre as this Photograph: Bob Thomas/Getty Images