Week in Review: A sweep in the works?
U.S. seems capable of winning all four hurdle races in Paris following Olympic Trials
For anyone who is wondering, there has never been an Olympic Games in which athletes from one nation have combined to win all four hurdle events in the same Olympiad.
Competitors from the U.S. did sweep the hurdles in the 1995 World Championships in Goteborg, Sweden, but that’s the only time it has ever happened in a global championship meet.
The subject of a possible single-nation sweep in this year’s Olympic Games in Paris was not on my mind as recently as last Saturday. However, it became front and center on Sunday night shortly after the conclusion of the fantastic final day of the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in Eugene, Oregon.
During the last half hour of the meet at the University of Oregon’s Hayward Field, American athletes produced yearly world-leading marks in the women’s 100 hurdles, the men’s 400 intermediate hurdles, and the women’s 400 hurdles, which was a world record as well.
Masai Russell’s 12.25 clocking in the women’s 100 hurdles was tied for the seventh fastest in history and moved her into a tie for fourth on the all-time performer list.
Rai Benjamin’s time of 46.46 in the men’s intermediate hurdles, which occurred about 20 minutes after the women’s 100 hurdles, was the fifth fastest in history.
Approximately 10 minutes later, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone capped the eight-day meet with a 50.65 effort in the women’s 400 hurdles that bettered the previous world record of 50.68 that she had set in the 2022 World Athletics Championships that were also held at Hayward Field.
And two days earlier, Grant Holloway concluded the sixth day of the meet by winning the men’s 110-meter high hurdles in 12.86, the fourth-fastest time in history.
Read daily reports about the U.S. Olympic Trials: Day One, Day Two, Day Three, Day Four, Day Five, Day Six, Day Seven, and Day Eight.
And don’t miss Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone’s world record in the women’s 400-meter hurdles, which even left her “amazed, baffled, and shocked."
As someone who has been following track and field since the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, I realize there is a big difference between turning in a superb performance to win the U.S. Olympic Trials and replicating it in the pressure cooker that is the Olympic Games.
However, I thought it would be interesting to examine the competitive records of the four aforementioned Americans and give my humble opinion about their respective chances of winning a gold medal during the athletics portion of the Games in Paris that will take place from August 1-11.
Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone is only 24 years of age, but she is already regarded as the greatest women’s 400-meter hurdler of all time.
She has set five world records in the event, is the defending Olympic champion and has not been beaten in a 400 hurdles race since the 2019 World Athletics Championships in Doha, Qatar, when her 52.23 clocking left her a scant seven hundredths of a second behind compatriot Dalilah Muhammad, who won the race with a then-world record time of 52.16.
Although she has only run in nine finals in the 400 hurdles since the 2019 season, she has the three fastest times in history, as well as four of the top five and seven of the top ten.
While Muhammad only finished .12 seconds behind her in the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2021, McLaughlin-Levrone was more than a second and half ahead of silver medalist Femke Bol of the Netherlands in the 2022 World Championships.
Bol won her first World title in the 400 hurdles last year when McLaughlin-Levrone focused her attention on the 400, but her personal best of 51.45 is eight tenths of a second off the world record held by Super Syd.
Bol did lower the world indoor record in the women’s 400 meters to 49.17 seconds in the World Athletics Indoor Championships in Glasgow, Scotland, on March 2, but she appears to lack the flat speed of McLaughlin-Levrone, who ran 22.05 in the 200 in defeating a high-quality field in the USA Track & Field Los Angeles Grand Prix at UCLA on May 18.
While it would be unwise — and disrespectful to Bol — to call McLaughlin-Levrone a lock to win the gold medal in Paris, as of right now, she is a heavy favorite.
Grant Holloway won the first of three consecutive World titles in the men’s 110-meter high hurdles in Doha in 2019, but he finished second in the Olympic Games in Tokyo when Hansle Parchment of Jamaica overtook him during the final 20 meters of the race.
When speaking about the Olympics in a taped interview with NBC Sports’ Ato Boldon last week, the 26-year-old Holloway said that while he ran his worst race of the season in the final in Tokyo, Parchment ran his best. But the bottom line is he can be caught from behind if he does not get off to one of his typically superb starts.
He was at his best in the Trials as he ran a sizzling 12.92 to win his first-round heat on June 24 before clocking 12.96 in a semifinal three days later and 12.86 in the final last Friday. His time in the final was the second fastest of his career and made him the first man to have produced three sub-13 clockings during the course of a single meet.
While Parchment cannot be counted out when it comes to the Games in Paris, he finished third in the Jamaican Championships in Kingston on Sunday with a 13.19-second clocking that puts him 10th on the yearly world list of high hurdlers who are expected to compete in the Olympics.
Holloway’s biggest challengers could end up being compatriots Freddie Crittenden and Daniel Roberts, or perhaps Lorenzo Ndele Simonelli of Italy.
Roberts finished third and Crittenden was fourth in last year’s World Championships in which Holloway and Parchment placed first and second, respectively. But Crittenden ran 12.93 and Roberts clocked 12.96 to finish second and third in the Trials.
Simonelli had a personal best of 13.21 at the end of May, but he ran 13.20 in his semifinal of the European Championships in Rome on June 8 before destroying that time later in the day when she won the final in 13.05.
I give Holloway a very good chance at winning the Olympic title, but there are more potential winners in the men’s high hurdles than in the women’s 400 hurdles.
Rai Benjamin is the second-fastest intermediate hurdler in history with a best of 46.17 and he has run under 47 seconds an impressive eight times during his career. But the field in Paris is expected to include defending Olympic champion Karsten Warholm of Norway, the world record-holder at 45.94, and 2022 World champion Alison dos Santos of Brazil, whose personal best of 46.29 is the third-fastest time in history.
The fact is, Warholm, Benjamin, and dos Santos have combined to run the 15 fastest times ever.
In addition to his Olympic title, Warholm has won three of the last four World championships. However, the 26-year-old Benjamin ran 46.39 to Warholm’s 46.53 in the Prefontaine Classic at Hayward Field last September, and dos Santos timed 46.63 to the Norwegian’s 46.70 in the Bislett Games in Oslo on May 30.
With three silver medals and a bronze in the last four global championship meets, Benjamin has loads of big-meet experience and seems primed to win his first gold medal in Paris. But Warholm and dos Santos are so talented and tested that I would rate Benjamin’s chances of an Olympic victory as decent.
Masai Russell is a wild card.
She set a collegiate record of 12.36 seconds in the 100 hurdles for the University of Kentucky last year before finishing second in the NCAA meet in June and third in the USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships in July. But she was eliminated in the semifinals of the World Championships in Budapest, Hungary, in August, when she failed to finish the race after clobbering some hurdles.
She was on anything but a roll entering the Trials as she had a season best of 12.63 and had finished second once, fourth once, fifth once, sixth twice, and ninth once in the six finals in which she had finished. She also had a DNF (did not finish) in her season-opening outdoor meet in the Tom Jones Memorial Invitational in Gainesville, Florida, in mid-April.
However, she caught fire in the Trials.
First, she lowered her personal best to 12.35 in winning her first-round heat last Friday. Then she backed up that performance with a winning 12.36 in her semifinal on Saturday.
She was not amongst the top four hurdlers out of the blocks on Sunday, but she ran faster than anyone during the second half of the race on her way to a 12.25 clocking that put her a solid six hundredths of a second in front of second-place Alaysha Johnson and third-place Grace Stark of the University of Florida, who each ran personal bests of 12.31.
A cynic might view the 24-year-old Russell’s performances in Eugene as a case of a hurdler catching lighting in a bottle, with her chances of her reproducing them in Paris remote. But an optimist could see the Trials as a breakthrough meet for her, one in which she was finally able to incorporate some of the things she had been working on in training into the races themselves. And now that she’s done that in one meet, it should be easier to do it again.
In comparison to the other three hurdle events, the battle for the women’s 100 hurdles title in Paris is expected to be a rather wide-open affair.
In addition to the times posted by Russell, Johnson, and Stark in Eugene, Ackera Nugent won the Jamaican Championships in 12.28 on Sunday, and Cyrena Samba-Mayela of France clocked 12.31 in winning the European Championships.
Tobi Amusan of Nigeria has a season best of 12.40 this year, but she set a world record of 12.12 in the semifinals of the 2022 World Championships before winning the final in a wind-aided 12.06.
With a season best of 12.45, Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of Puerto Rico currently sits ninth on the yearly list of expected competitors in Paris, but she is the defending Olympic champion and placed second in last year’s World Championships.
Danielle Williams finished a distant second to Nugent in the Jamaican Championships when she ran 12.53, but she won her second World title — and first since 2015 — last year with a 12.43 clocking that ranked only ninth on the yearly world performer list.
Taking all of the above information into consideration, I would rate Russell’s chances of winning the gold medal as fair. This is not a knock against her, but of the four Americans currently sitting atop the yearly world lists in the hurdles, she is the least experienced and has never run in a global title race outdoors.
Tribute time: In what she said was her final U.S. Olympic Team Trials, Dalilah Muhammad ran 54.27 seconds to finish sixth in the final of the women’s 400-meter hurdles on Sunday.
Although the 34-year-old Muhammad has been slowed by injuries and illnesses the past three seasons, she has had a superb career that is topped by victories in the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro and the 2019 World Championships in Doha, Qatar, and a pair of world records in 2019.
Muhammad led the U.S. to a 1-3 finish in the 2016 Games when she ran 53.13 seconds and she and 20-year-old American teammate Sydney McLaughlin finished first and second, respectively, in the 2019 World Championships when her world record of 52.16 left her just in front of McLaughlin at 52.23.
Muhammad’s first world record had come in the USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships about five weeks earlier when she ran 52.20 to McLaughlin’s 52.88 while lowering the previous global best of 52.34 that had been set by Yuliya Pechonkina of Russia in 2003.
In 2021, she finished second in the U.S. Olympic Trials when McLaughlin set her first world record in the 400 hurdles with a time of 51.90, and again in the Games in Tokyo when she led the race until the final 20 or 25 meters when McLaughlin overtook her for a 51.46 to 51.58 victory.
That time remains Muhammad’s personal best and is still the sixth fastest ever run.
In addition to all of the above accomplishments, she won silver medals in the 2013 and 2017 World Championships, as well as a bronze medal in the 2022 meet.
“It’s been a really good career longevity wise,” she said in a post-race interview posted by Citius Mag. “It’s had its ups and its downs, but I think looking back over it as a whole, it’s been nothing but positives.”
Familiar trio: When Noah Lyles, Kenny Bednarek, and Erriyon Knighton finished first, second, and third in the men’s 200 meters in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials last Saturday, it meant that for the fourth year in a row, they will be representing the U.S. in a global title meet when they compete in the Olympic Games in Paris.
Bednarek, Lyles, and Knighton had placed second, third, and fourth, respectively, in the Olympic Games in Tokyo in 2021 in a race that was won by Andre De Grasse of Canada.
Lyles, Bednarek, and Knighton then finished 1-2-3 in the World Championships in 2022 before Lyles and Knighton went 1-2 in last year’s meet in which Bednarek placed fifth.
The 25-year-old Bednarek struggled at times last year, but he recorded personal bests in both the 100 and 200 in the Olympic Trials while finishing second to reigning World champion Lyles in both races.
His 9.87-second clocking in the 100 left him four hundredths of a second behind Lyles when that race was run on June 23 and his 19.59 effort in the 200 left him sixth hundredths back of Lyles’ yearly world-leading time of 19.53. However, Bednarek felt as though he had missed a golden opportunity to defeat three-time defending World champion Lyles in the 200 after leading the race for the first 180 meters.
“With this race, I had it,” he told Lewis Johnson of NBC Sports. “But I tightened up a little bit, so I’m going to get him the next time.”
Quite a change: Gabby Thomas finished a distant second to gold medalist Shericka Jackson of Jamaica in the women’s 200 meters in last year’s World Championships in Budapest, Hungary. But the American is the current favorite for the Olympic title after posting the two fastest times in the world this year in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials.
The 27-year-old Thomas ran 22.11 to win her first-round heat of the Olympic Trials on June 27 before clocking a yearly world-leading time of 21.78 in her semifinal last Friday and a winning 21.81 in the final on Saturday.
Thomas cane off the turn with a small lead before increasing her advantage during the last 50 meters of the race while finishing in front of second-place Brittany Brown, who ran a personal best of 21.90, and third-place McKenzie Long, who ran 21.91.
Sha’Carri Richardson, who won the 100 in a yearly world-leading time of 10.71 on the second day of the meet, finished fourth in the 200 in 22.16 after she had tied her personal best with an eased up 21.92 effort in her semifinal.
It was the second consecutive Olympic Trials title for Thomas, who won the bronze medal in the Olympic Games in Tokyo.
“It is incredible,” she said while Johnson asked her about making the Olympic team while he interviewed her, Brown, and Long. “I know I needed to get today done and this is the first half. And there is no gold medal in Paris without making the team today. So I’m just ecstatic to be alongside these people.”
It will be interesting to see how things unfold in the Olympics as Jackson has struggled by her illustrious standards this season. She has a yearly best of 22.29 seconds after winning her second consecutive World title in Budapest with a 21.41 clocking, the second-fastest time in history.
They deserve a hand: Yared Nuguse and Elle St. Pierre finished second and third, respectively, in the men’s and women’s 1,500 meters in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials, but thanks to their front-running efforts, the all-time national lists underwent a significant re-writing during the meet in Eugene.
Nuguse had entered the Trials as the favorite in the men’s 1,500, but he was wary of letting the race come down to a kick off a slow pace as he knew that would favor defending Trials champion Cole Hocker.
Therefore, he led the field through 400 meters in 56.32 seconds, 800 in 1:55.30 (58.98), and 1,200 in 2:51.33 (56.03).
Hobbs Kessler, Vincent Ciattei, and Hocker were running 2-3-4 at that point in the race, but Hocker surged into the lead midway down the backstretch and he was never seriously challenged for the lead after that as he crossed the finish line in a personal best of 3:30.59 after running his final lap in 52.63 seconds.
Nuguse made his second Olympic team by finishing second in a season best of 3:30.86 and Kessler, only three years removed from his senior year of high school, placed third in a personal best of 3:31.53.
The next five finishers all set personal bests, with Ciattei placing fourth in 3:31.78, Nathan Green of the University of Washington taking fifth in 3:32.20, and Henry Wynne finishing sixth in 3:32.94.
Hocker’s time tightened his hold on sixth on the all-time U.S. performer list, while Kessler now ranks 11th, followed by Ciattei at 13th, Green in a tie for 16th, and Wynne at 18th.
The 23-year-old Hocker had outkicked defending Olympic champion Matthew Centrowitz in the final straightaway of the Trials in 2021, but he told Johnson of NBC Sports after his victory last week that he was “just ready for anything today. I know I’m the strongest I’ve ever been. In 2021 I was able to depend on my kick. Today, it was going to take a little bit more than just a kick and that was absolutely true. I just know that once I made a decision, commit to it, and that’s what I did.”
St. Pierre had won the 5,000 on June 24 after edging Elise Cranny in a thrilling homestretch duel, but she had taken the lead after the first 100 meters of the 1,500 on Sunday and led the field through 400 meters in 61.82 seconds, 800 in 2:06.19 (64.37), and 1,200 in 3:09.06 (62.87).
However, World indoor bronze medalist Emily Mackay had taken the lead entering the final curve, followed by Heather MacLean, St. Pierre, and World indoor runner-up Nikki Hiltz.
MacLean fell back to fourth place by the end of the turn and it was a three-person race for first between Mackay, St. Pierre, and Hiltz at the start of the home straightaway.
Hiltz was in third with 60 meters left in the race, but swung out to lane two with 50 meters to go and won going away with a meet-record time of 3:55.33 that was the second-fastest time in U.S. history behind the 3:54.99 that Shelby Houlihan ran in finishing fourth in the 2019 World Championships.
Hiltz, who entered the race with a personal best of 3:59.61, ran the last 300 meters in 46.27 seconds while winning a race in which the top eight finishers set personal bests and also broke four minutes.
Mackay finished second in 3:55.90, followed by defending Trials champion St. Pierre in 3:55.99, Sinclaire Johnson in 3:56.75, Cory McGee in 3:57.44, Cranny in 3:57.87, and MacLean in 3:58.31.
Mackay’s time was the third fastest in U.S. history while St. Pierre’s was the fourth fastest.
Johnson moved to sixth on the all-time U.S. performer list with her time, while McGee, Cranny, and MacLean now sit at 10th, 11th, and 12th.
The 27-year-old Hiltz, a transgender and nonbinary runner, told Johnson afterward that their victory “is bigger than just me. It’s the last day of pride month… I wanted to run this one for my community. All the LGBT folks, yeah, you guys brought me home that last hundred. I could just feel the love and support.”
In an Instagram post on Monday, Hiltz wrote the following: woke up an Olympian 🥹
Yesterday afternoon in Eugene Oregon a childhood dream of mine came true. I’m not sure when this will fully sink in… All I know is today I’m waking up just so grateful for my people, overwhelmed by all the love and support, and filled with joy that I get to race people I deeply love and respect around a track for a living 🙏
They deserve a hand II: The women’s 3,000-meter steeplechase was another race in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials in which the all-time national list underwent an extensive revision after a pair of runners forced the pace at different points in the contest.
Annie Rodenfels was more than three seconds ahead of second-place Courtney Wayment when she came through the first kilometer in 3:00.53, but Wayment was in the lead when she passed 2,000 meters in 6:08.23 and she would remain there for the following 700 or so meters. However, Valerie Constien was never far behind Wayment and she had taken the lead entering the final backstretch and ran the final 300 meters of the race in 49.26 seconds while on her way to a winning time of 9:03.22 that moved her to third on the all-time U.S. performer list.
In the battle for the final two spots on the team, NCAA runner-up Olivia Markezich of Notre Dame had a small lead over Wayment and Marisa Howard heading over the final water jump, but Markezich fell back to fourth after she landed awkwardly in the pit.
Nonetheless, she was not far behind Wayment and Howard as they approached the final barrier in the home straightaway, but she crashed to the track after either hitting the barrier or just coming down awkwardly after clearing it.
While Wayment went on to finish second in 9:06.50 and Howard placed third in 9:07.14 to move to fourth and fifth, respectively, on the all-time U.S. performer list, a completely spent Markezich crossed the finish line in sixth place with a time of 9:14.87 that made her the 11th-fastest American ever.
Gabbi Jennings, who was considered one of the pre-race favorites by many, placed fourth in 9:12.08 to move to seventh on the all-time U.S. performer list and Kaylee Mitchell finished fifth in 9:14.05 to move to 10th.
Constien, who had undergone ACL surgery in May of last year, had previously said that she thought it would take a sub-9:10 clocking to place among the top three finishers in the race, but she was pleasantly surprised to have run much faster than that.
“I knew it was going to be fast,” she said. “Did I think I was going to run 9:03? No.”
Although Courtney Frerichs and Emma Coburn, the two fastest Americans in history at 8:57.77 and 9:02.35, respectively, did not compete in the Trials because they are working their way back from surgeries, their absences should not take away from the performance of Constien, who moved to third on the yearly world performer list with her effort.
“I feel like I am just starting to reach my potential and figure out how good I am and hopefully I can keep it going,” she said.
Consistency personified: When Valarie Allman threw a season best of 70.89 meters (232 feet 7 inches) in the qualifying round of the women’s discus in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials on June 24, it marked the fifth year in a row that she had thrown more than 70 meters (229-8) in the event.
Prior to the start of Allman’s current streak, Sandra Perkovic of Croatia had topped 70.00 in five consecutive seasons from 2014-18.
Perkovic, whose last name is now Elkasevic after getting married at the end of last year, won consecutive Olympic titles in 2012 and ’16.
Allman won the gold medal in the Games in Tokyo in 2021 and is favored to win her second consecutive Olympic championship in Paris next month.
Overcoming adversity: This has not been a normal outdoor season for Ryan Crouser, but he nonetheless won his third consecutive title in the men’s shot put in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials.
Competing in the event final on the second day of the meet on June 22, the two-time defending Olympic and World champion had a winning effort of 22.84 (74-11¼) and he also had three other puts that would have been good enough to win the competition. Joe Kovacs, a two-time World champion and the silver medalist in the last two Olympics, finished second at 22.43 (73-7¼) and Payton Otterdahl placed third at 22.26 (73-0½).
The 31-year-old Crouser, who had been slowed by injuries since winning his first title in the World indoor championships on March 1, took the lead with a first-round put of 22.44 (73-7½) before hitting 22.51 (73-10¼) and 21.66 (71-0¾) on his next two efforts. He then unleashed his best effort of 22.84 (74-11¼) in the fourth round before following that with a put of 22.56 (74-0¼) in the fifth round and a foul in the sixth.
Kovacs, who had produced puts of 23.13 (75-10¾) and 23.03 (75-6¾) in the Prefontaine Classic at Hayward Field on May 25, registered his best of 22.43 (73-7¼) in the first round on Saturday, but he was unable to top that mark in the last five rounds.
“It was a tough spring, to say the least,” Crouser told Johnson. “So I was just happy to be out here competing again. You never want to open the season at the Olympic Trials if you can help it, but that’s kind of what it required and [I] battled these guys.
“It was a tough comp and [I] surprised myself a little bit so it’s a good sign. We’re sending a fantastic team to Paris.”
Rough meet: Caleb Dean of Texas Tech University ran the race of his life in the winning the men’s 400-meter intermediate hurdles in the NCAA championships on June 7, but he did not finish the final of the event in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials on Sunday when he clipped the ninth hurdle with his trail leg before tumbling to the track.
Dean, who had capped his collegiate career in the NCAA meet with a 47.23-second clocking that moved him to sixth on the all-time U.S. performer list. had posted first-place times of 49.45 and 48.92 in his first-round and semifinal races of the Olympic Trials. He got out well in the final that was held two days after the semifinals and was in the lead after the fourth of 10 hurdles. But he was in fifth place after the eighth barrier before he went down while trying to clear the ninth.
Rai Benjamin, the second-fastest performer in history at 46.17 seconds, won the race in 46.46. He was followed by CJ Allen in 47.81, Trevor Bassitt in 47.82, and NCAA runner-up Chris Robinson of the University of Alabama in 47.96.
Calvin Robinson, one of two Texas Tech coaches who work with Dean, wrote in a text that “he just got a little lazy with the trail leg toe and clipped the hurdle at a point where he was trying to make a move. An unfortunate and bad set of circumstances at the wrong time. He is handling it as best as you can imagine but he will be fine.”
Rough meet II: A long season that included numerous fast races appeared to catch up with Sadie Engelhart of Ventura High School in California in a first-round heat of the women’s 1,500 meters in the U.S. Olympic Trials on June 27.
Engelhardt, a junior who has made an oral commitment to North Carolina State University, entered the meet with a best of 4:08.86. But she finished 12th — and last — in her heat with a time of 4:19.66.
The race started out slowly and Engelhardt was in the 10th place when she came through the first 400 meters in 71.00 seconds and 800 in 2:19.08 (68.08). But her chances at automatically advancing to the semifinals with a top-seven finish went out the window on the third lap when her 67.41 split left her more than three and half seconds behind seventh-place Anna Gibson with 300 meters left in the race.
While Heather MacLean won the race in 4:07.31 and Gibson placed seventh in 4:10.73, Engelhardt fell further and further behind.
“I think it was a long season and she was just cooked,” Ventura distance coach Josh Spiker wrote in a text. “She had had a lot of big races in the last few weeks on top of a long season and I think the body was just done.”
He than added that it’s “hard mentally when excited but body doesn’t show up.”
In addition to her best of 4:08.86 in the 1,500, Engelhardt lowered the national high school outdoor record in the girls’ mile to 4:28.46 this season and also ran 2:03.48 in the 800.
Her 4:28.46 effort in the mile had come in the women’s race of the Hoka Festival of Miles in St. Louis on May 30 when she ran her final 400 meters in 62.98 seconds while moving from eighth place to second, and finishing a stride behind winner Jenn Randall, who ran 4:28.23.
No need to change the system: For the record, I am a big Athing Mu fan and think she is one of the most physically gifted runners on the planet. But I see no reason to revamp the way the U.S. Olympic Team Trials operate because she finished ninth — and last — in the final of the women’s 800 meters on June 24 after taking a tumble to the track 200 meters into race while running in the tightly bunched pack.
While I feel for Mu and the fact that her fall prevented her from having a chance to finish in the top three in the race, and therefore defend her Olympic title in Paris, she is not the first high-profile athlete who has not made the U.S. national team because they did not finish among the top three finishers, for whatever reason, in their respective event in the Trials.
Mu had taken the track and field world by storm in 2021 when she won the Olympic title less than two months after completing her freshman collegiate season for Texas A&M. She then won the World title in 2022 during her first full season as a professional.
She finished a disappointing third in last year’s World Championships, but rebounded to lower her American record to 1:54.97 in winning the Prefontaine Classic in September.
However, she had been slowed by hamstring issues earlier this season, and in a Sports Illustrated post on June 28, it was revealed that a torn hamstring had kept her out of this year’s Prefontaine Classic on May 25. The post added that she had sustained the injury four weeks before the Olympic Trials and did not engage in any real running until a week before the meet began.
Nonetheless, she finished third in her first-round heat in Eugene with a time of 2:01.73 and then won her semifinal in 1:58.84 two days later. But disaster struck in the final the following evening.
That led her representatives to file an appeal with USA Track & Field in which they asked that the final be run again because they contended that Mu had been clipped from behind before going down and therefore impeded. USATF denied the appeal. When that decision was appealed, it again went nowhere with USATF.
If Mu had fallen during a qualifying heat or a semifinal, officials could have advanced her to the next round if they thought circumstances warranted it. But to re-run the final after Nia Akins, Allie Wilson, and Juliette Whittaker had finished first, second, and third to make their first Olympic team would have been absurd and unfair.
The set-up of the U.S. Olympic Trials might not be a perfect way to select an Olympic team. But there is a simplicity in athletes knowing that if they finish among the top three finishers, and they have met the automatic qualifying standard for the Games, they’re headed to the Olympics.
More there?: A year and a half after starting the 2023 season with a personal best of 10.21 seconds in the 100 meters, Kishane Thompson ran 9.77 in winning the event in the Jamaican Athletics Administration Association (JAAA) Senior Championships in Kingston last Friday.
The time was the fastest in the world this year, bettered his personal best of 9.82 that he had run in a first-round heat a day earlier, and moved him into a tie for ninth on the all-time performer list and made him the fourth-fastest Jamaican in history.
It also came in a high-caliber race in which Oblique Seville finished second in 9.82 and Ackeem Blake placed third in 9.92.
Seville’s time tied his personal best that he had set in winning the Racers Grand Prix meet on June 1 when he defeated Noah Lyles of the U.S. by three hundredths of a second.
“This year is the best I’ve ever been health-wise,” the 22-year-old Thompson was quoted as saying in a World Athletics post. “Running the three rounds at this championship has helped me better understand my body and the sport. I was never short on confidence, but I believe I have much more to do as I can run way faster. Deep down, I look forward to some great competition and nice vibes from the top sprinters.”
Thompson, who also ran 9.84 in winning his semifinal in the Jamaican championships, first broke 10 seconds in the 100 when he ran 9.91 in a first-round heat of the Jamaican championships last year. But he did not run in the semifinals due to what has been described since as an injury precaution.
However, he closed the season with a pair of strong performances, first running 9.85 to place second in a Diamond League meet in Xiamen, China, on Sept. 2 and then clocking 9.87 to finish fourth in the Prefontaine Classic two weeks later.
According to his World Athletics profile, he did not finish his season-opening race in the JAAA Olympic French Foray 1 meet in Kingston in mid-May, but he performed brilliantly last week.
Making progress: Shericka Jackson posted season bests of 10.84 seconds in the 100 and 22.29 in the 200 in winning those events in the Jamaican championships last week.
The two-time defending World champion in the 200 had entered the meet with season bests of 11.03 and 22.69 but she looked more like herself in winning both events for the third year in a row.
Jackson turned back second-place Tia Clayton (10.90) and third-place Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce (10.94) in the 100-meter final last Friday after the 19-year-old Clayton had run a personal best of 10.86 in a semifinal earlier in the day to edge Jackson by a hundredth of a second.
Jackson, 29, ran 22.67 to win a first-round heat of the 200 on Saturday before clocking 22.29 in the final on Sunday while turning back second-place Lanae-Tava Thomas at 22.34 and third-place Niesha Burgher at 22.39.
Big loss: Deandre Watkin ran a personal best of 44.48 seconds in winning the men’s 400 meters in the Jamaican championships last Friday, but reigning World champion Antonio Watson pulled up midway through his qualifying heat the previous day.
According to a jamaicaobserver.com post, there had been doubts about Watson’s participation in the meet and his coach, Glen Mills, had said last week that his charge’s fitness was in doubt.
Watson, 22, had been one of the surprise performers of 2023 as he lowered his personal best from 46.17 seconds at the start of the season to 44.13 by the end.
The 44.13 effort had come in a semifinal of the World Athletics Championships and he followed it with a victorious time of 44.22 in the final. That victory made him the first Jamaican to win a global title in the men’s 400 since Bert Cameron clocked 45.05 in the inaugural World Championships in Helsinki in 1983.
Watson opened his season in February with a second-place time of 46.10 before running 46.75 in the first JAAA All Comers Series meeting of the year on May 4 and 45.61 in the Jamaica Athletics Invitational Meet in Kingston a week later.
However, he had pulled out of the Racers Grand Prix meet on June 1.
Nice double: Marco Arop was credited with his third victory of the season without a loss when he ran 1:43.71 to win the men’s 800 meters in the Canadian Track and Field Championships in Montreal last Saturday. However, the defending World champion turned in a pair of sub-1:44 clockings on consecutive days as he had run 1:43.53 in his qualifying heat the day before the final.
Since Arop won the heat by more than three seconds, I’m guessing he wanted to push himself in his heat to see how his body would respond when he did so again in the final.
The 25-year-old Arop had a comfortable margin of victory in the final as Zakary Mama-Yari finished second in 1:46.59.
Winning big: Defending World champions Ethan Katzberg and Camryn Rogers had large margins of victory in the men’s and women’s hammer throw, respectively, on the first day of the Canadian Track and Field Championships on June 26.
Katzberg’s best throw of 82.60 (271-0) left him nearly seven meters ahead of second-place Rowan Hamilton (75.83/248-9), who had won the NCAA title for California on June 5.
It was the eighth victory of the season without a loss for the 22-year-old Katzberg, the sixth meet in which he has thrown more than 80 meters (262-5), and the third competition in which he has posted a mark of 81.98 (268-11) or farther.
Valeriy Pronkin of Russia currently ranks second on the yearly world performer list with a best of 81.53 (267-6).
The 25-year-old Rogers, who won a silver medal in the 2022 World Championships before her victory in last year’s meet, had a best of 75.05 (246-2) in Montreal while posting her fifth victory in six meets this season.
Rogers, who finished more than eight meters in front of second-place Kalia Butler (66.39/217-9), currently ranks second on the yearly world performer list with a best of 77.76 (255-1). However, world leader Brooke Andersen fouled on all three of her throws in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials on June 23 and will not be a member of the U.S. contingent that will compete in the Olympic Games in Paris.
Andersen, who has a season best of 79.92 (262-2), and Rogers had split their two meetings this year.
Two liners: Jordan Alejandro Diaz Fortun of Spain remained unbeaten in the men’s triple jump this year when he bounded 17.71 meters (58 feet 1¼ inches) in his country’s national championships in La Nucia on Sunday. Diaz Fortun had moved to third on the all-time performer list when he jumped 18.18 (59-7¾) in winning the European Athletics Championships in Rome on June 11. . . . . Molly Caudery of Great Britain won the women’s pole vault at a height of 4.83 (15-10) in her country’s national championships in Manchester last Saturday. It was the ninth victory in 11 meets this season for the World indoor champion and came a week after she had cleared a yearly world-leading height of 4.93 (16-1¾) in a meet in Toulouse, France, to move to seventh on the all-time performer list that combines performances made indoors and outdoors. . . . . Miltiadis Tentoglou of Greece posted his ninth victory in 10 meets this year when he leaped a wind-aided 8.42 (27-7½) in the men’s long jump in his country’s national championships in Volos on Sunday. The defending Olympic and World champion had moved into a three-way tie for seventh on the all-time performer list when he spanned 8.65 (28-4½) in winning the European Championships on June 8. . . . . Emmanouil Karalis of Greece added a centimeter to his national record in the men’s pole vault when he cleared 5.93 (19-5½) in his country’s national championships last Saturday. His previous best of 5.92 (19-5¼) occurred when he finished second in the Irena Szewinska Memorial in Bydgoszcz, Poland, nine days earlier. . . . . Carey McLeod of Jamaica set an outdoor personal best of 8.38 (27-6) in winning the men’s long jump in his country’s national championships in Kingston last Saturday. The fourth-place finisher in last year’s World Athletics Championships defeated a field on Saturday that included World silver medalist Wayne Pinnock in third (8.27/27-1¾) and bronze medalist Tajay Gayle in fourth (8.18/26-10). . . . . Nickisha Pryce of Jamaica ran 50.01 seconds to win the women’s 400 meters in her country’s national championships on Sunday. Pryce had set a national record of 48.89 in the NCAA championships in Eugene, Oregon, on June 8 when she led the University of Arkansas to an unprecedented 1-2-3-4 finish in the event. . . . . Pawel Fajdek of Poland threw a season best of 80.02 (262-6) in winning the men’s hammer throw in his country’s national championships in Bydgoszcz last Friday. All four of the five-time World champion’s fair throws would have been good enough to win the competition in which defending Olympic champion Wojciech Nowicki finished second at 75.89 (248-11). . . . Haruka Kitaguchi of Japan posted her fifth victory in six meets this season in the women’s javelin with a throw of 62.87 (206-3) in her country’s national championships in Niigata last Friday. The reigning World champion has a season best of 64.28 (210-11). . . . . Christopher Morales Williams remained unbeaten during the outdoor season when he won the men’s 400 meters in 45.44 in the Canadian Track and Field Championships in Montreal last Saturday. Morales Williams, who had run a Canadian record and yearly world-leading time of 44.05 for the University of Georgia in the SEC championships in early May, won the NCAA title on June 7 with a time of 44.47. . . . . Owen Ansah became the first German to break 10 seconds in the men’s 100 meters when he ran 9.99 to win the event in his country’s national championships in Braunschweig last Saturday. Ansah’s time bettered his personal best of 10.08 from 2022 and lowered the national record of 10.01 set by Julian Reus in 2016. . . . . Femke Bol of the Netherlands lowered her personal best in the women’s 200 meters to 22.80 seconds while finishing third in her country’s national championships in Hengelo on Sunday. The reigning World champion in the 400 hurdles and the world indoor record-holder in the 400 at 49.16, Bol followed Tasa Jiya (22.62) and Lieke Klaver (22.72) across the finish line.
No Olympic title defense: Elaine Thompson-Herah of Jamaica, the two-time defending Olympic champion in the women’s 100 and 200 meters, announced last week that an Achilles tendon injury had forced her to withdraw from the 100 meters in the national championships that were held in Kingston from June 27-30.
The 32-year-old Thompson-Herah was not entered in the 200.
Thompson-Herah is the second-fastest woman in history in the 100 with a best of 10.54 seconds and she ranks third on the all-time performer list in the 200 at 21.53. But she has been slowed by injuries during each of the past three seasons and her performances have been negatively impacted in a greater way each year.
In 2022, she finished third in the 100 and seventh in the 200 in the World Championships.
She did not compete in an individual event in the World Championships last year after finishing fifth in the 100 in the Jamaican championships, but she ran a season best of 10.79 to place third in the Prefontaine Classic in Eugene, Oregon, in September.
Injuries severely hampered her this year as she opened her season with an 11.30 clocking in the 100 that left her in ninth — and last — place in the Prefontaine Classic on May 25.
She then finished ninth in the USA Track & Field New York City Grand Prix on June 9 when she ran 11.48. She had eased up near the end of that race and had to be carried off the track as she wrote in an Instagram post that she “couldn’t apply any pressure to the leg whatsoever.”
Onward to the professional ranks: Nico Young, who finished third in the men’s 10,000 meters in the U.S. Olympic Team Trials on June 21, announced three days later than he had signed a professional contract with Adidas.
The signing means he will forgo what would have been his senior year of athletic eligibility at Northern Arizona University, although he had graduated from NAU this spring with an undergraduate degree.
After finishing sixth in the NCAA Cross Country Championships in November, the 21-year-old Young has set a slew of personal bests on the track during the indoor and outdoor seasons.
Topping those career bests are collegiate records of 26:52.72 in the 10,000 and 12:57.14 in the 5,000 indoors. However, he has also run 3:34.56 in the 1,500 and 7:37.37 in the 3,000 indoors.
In addition, he won the 3,000 and 5,000 in the NCAA indoor championships in March and placed second in the 5,000 in the outdoor meet in early June.
The runner-up in the NCAA cross country meet in 2022, Young had previously placed ninth in the 5,000 in the U.S. Olympic Trials in 2021 when he was 18.