Elaine Thompson-Herah broke Florence Griffith Joyner’s 33-year-old Olympic record in the women’s 100 meters, pointing at the scoreboard even before crossing the line in 10.61 seconds Saturday to defend her title and lead a Jamaican sweep of the medals.

Griffith Joyner set the old record of 10.62 at the 1988 Seoul Olympics. The time was just 0.12s short of the all-time women's 100m record also set by Griffith-Joyner.

Thompson-Herah beat her top rival, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, by .13 seconds. Shericka Jackson, who moved to the shorter sprints for the Tokyo Olympics, won bronze in 10.76.

This had been shaping up as a fast race for days, if not months. In June, Fraser-Pryce ran the fourth-fastest time in history at 10.63 seconds.

And when the sprinters arrived in Japan, they discovered a fast track at Olympic Stadium. In the semifinals earlier Saturday, the Jamaicans all cracked 10.8 to get on the list of the 10 best times in Olympic history.

Then, it was Thompson-Herah’s turn to make history.

Flo Jo’s records are older than virtually every sprinter in the women’s game, save Fraser-Pryce, who was born about 18 months before the American set the marks. Griffith Joyner’s world record, the 10.49, is still out there, and no other woman has ever broken 10.6.

Fraser-Pryce came in thinking it could be her, and when she crossed the line in second, she flashed a look of disbelief, then stood stone-faced with her hands on her hips looking at the scoreboard.

Thompson-Herah, who is now the second-fastest woman in history with the 10.61 seconds, was looking left toward the clock as she approached the line. She was pointing even before she got there, conjuring memories of Jamaican great Usain Bolt, who celebrated with 10 metres to go when he broke the men's world record in Beijing at the 2008 Games.

"I've been struggling with my injury back and forth," she told BBC Sport. "I see all the bad comments, and for me to stay focused, hold my composure... I take all of my losses, all of my defeats and I use them as my motivation."

Fraser-Pryce said: "It wasn't the best 30m because I had a stumble at about the third step and I never recovered from it.

"Nevertheless I am grateful to be able to come out here and represent what God has given me.

"I am excited because, as a mother and [at] my fourth Olympics, to be able to stand again on the podium is just a tremendous honour. I am hoping wherever in the world, mothers, athletes, females, we understand that there is so much more we can achieve.

"It is crazy, but you know my emotions are still very raw right now. I am sure I will go home and there will be some tears. I have been through this many, many times, so I am just really excited about what I have been able to do tonight."

Marie-Josee Ta Lou of the Ivory Coast, one of five athletes to clock a time below 10.8s this year heading into the Games, finished just outside the medal positions with 10.91s.

Swiss pair Ajla del Ponte and Mujinga Kambundji finished fifth and sixth, while the United States' Teahna Daniels was seventh and Daryll Neita eighth.

Neita's British team-mate Dina Asher-Smith, who took silver at the 2019 IAAF World Athletics Championships in Doha, did not qualify from her semi-final and then withdrew from the 200m – in which she is world champion – as she recovers from a hamstring tear.

Thompson-Herah will now attempt to complete a second Olympic double, with Fraser-Pryce, Jackson, Ta Lou and Kambundji among the athletes all set to join her in a return to the track for the 200m heats on Sunday night Jamaica time.