Norway's 4x400-m relay team returns gold medal after engraving gaffe

Norway's 4x400-metre mixed relay team refused to accept their European Championships gold medals because the wrong winning time was engraved on them. The Norwegians, led by hurdles star Karsten Warhol, completed the mixed relay on Monday in 3 minutes 09.62 seconds. However, the time engraved on the medals was 3:10.47 minutes, which was the time set by silver medallists Great Britain. "We refused to accept it," Warholm told Norwegian broadcaster NRK. He stressed that the situation was "absurd." "We fought hard for this time, so it should be on the medal," said Warholm's team-mate Henriette Jæger. "When you win gold, it's really cool to have the correct time on it." The team reportedly received the new medals as early as Tuesday and the organizers of the event in Birmingham also apologized. "When we realized something was wrong, we corrected it as quickly as possible. It was very unfortunate that the medals weren't correct from the start," said Ken Burkett, one of the competition officials.