Week in Review - Collegiate Edition: Neugebauer makes big leap forward
Texas junior breaks longstanding German record in decathlon victory in NCAA Track & Field Championships
After toiling much of the past two seasons in large shadows cast by Ayden Owens-Delerme of the University of Arkansas and Kyle Garland of Georgia, Leo Neugebauer of Texas did something in last week’s NCAA Track & Field Championships that bested his heretofore better-known collegiate rivals.
He scored more than 8,800 points in the decathlon — 8,836 to be exact — to win the grueling multi-event competition amid hot, and at times breezy, conditions.
Neugebauer’s performance at Mike A. Myers Stadium on the University of Texas campus gave him a 206-point margin of victory over Garland (8,630), crushed the collegiate record of 8,720 that Garland had set last year, and added 106 points to the highest score ever totaled by a German decathlete. Last, but certainly not least, it moved him to eighth on the all-time world performer list.
“I knew it was going to take a collegiate record to win this thing if it was me or Kyle,” Neugebauer told John Anderson of ESPN. “I pulled through. I just had to pretend it was a practice for me. Especially in my home stadium. The crowd pushed me so far. I’m just so happy.”
Defending NCAA champion Owens-Delerme would have been expected to contend for the decathlon title in Austin, but he had decided earlier in the year not to compete in the multi-event on the collegiate level, partly due to tendonitis in his knees. He had focused his attention on the 400-meter intermediate hurdles and was the yearly collegiate leader in that event, with a best of 48.26, entering the NCAA championships. But he was eliminated in his semifinal heat on the first day of the four-day meet.
Neugebauer, who will turn 23 on Monday, had raised his personal best to 8,478 points in winning the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays at the end of March. But he was still regarded as an underdog to Garland entering the NCAA meet as the Georgia senior had totaled 6,639 points — the second-highest total in history — in winning the heptathlon in the NCAA indoor meet in early March, in addition to compiling his collegiate-record score in the decathlon while finishing second in last year’s USA Track & Field Combined Events Championships.
However, Neugebauer began the meet with a bang by posting the fastest time in the competition — as well as a personal best — when he ran 10.61 seconds in the 100 meters. He then proceeded to produce marks of 7.68 meters (25 feet 2½ inches) in the long jump, 16.27 (53-4½) in the shot put, 2.04 (6-8¼) in the high jump, and 47.08 in the 400 to conclude the first day of competition with a 4,591-point total that was 146 points better than what he had totaled during the Texas Relays.
He also had a 21-point lead over Garland, which was not expected before the meet.
Garland re-took the lead, 5,605 to 5,553 points, after running 13.54 seconds in the 110-meters high hurdles to Neugebauer’s wind-aided 14.10 effort in the first event of the second day. But the German would outscore the American by 287 points over the next three events to take a commanding 235-point lead into the 1,500 meters, the final event of the decathlon.
Neugebauer’s surge started in the discus, where his best of 55.06 (180-6) was nearly two and half meters farther — and 50 points better — than what he threw in the Texas Relays.
He then cleared 5.21 (17-1) in the pole vault to top his Texas Relays effort of 5.10 (16-8¾). He had a 205-point lead over Garland at that point and it grew by another 30 points when he threw the javelin 57.45 (188-6) to top his Texas Relays effort (51.92/170-3) by five and a half meters and 83 points.
The 1,500 is not a strong event for Neugebauer, but his time of 4 minutes 48.00 seconds in the NCAA meet topped his Texas Relays time of 4:50.31 and propelled him past Jurgen Hingsen of West Germany as the highest-scoring German in history. It also helped move him to fourth on the all-time European performer list.
Hingsen raised the world record three times during his career and finished second to Daley Thompson of Great Britain in a classic duel — which I had the good fortune of witnessing as a spectator — in the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.
“I just kind of grabbed energy from the stadium from just being here at home,” Neugebauer said about his performance. “I just like to push myself from PR (personal record) to PR. I just love doing PRs.”
Check out my detailed reports from the final two days of the NCAA Track & Field Championships at Mike A. Myers Stadium at the University of Texas from June 9-10: Men Day Two, Women Day Two.
Underdog again?: Although Neugebauer could have the highest score in the world this year when the decathlon competition begins on Aug. 25 in World Athletics Championships in Budapest, Hungary, there is a good chance he will not be the pre-meet favorite.
That’s because experience matters a great deal in the decathlon and competitors such as defending World champion Kevin Mayer of France and defending Olympic champion Damian Warner of Canada will have loads of it if they compete in the meet as expected.
The 31-year-old Mayer set the world record of 9,126 points in 2018 and he won the World Championships in London in 2017. He also was the silver medalist in the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro and in the Games in Tokyo in 2021.
The 33-year-old Warner set a national record of 9,018 points in winning the Olympic title in Tokyo and he was also the silver medalist in the 2015 World Championships in Beijing, as well as the bronze medalist in the 2013 and ’19 World Championships, and in the 2016 Olympics. In addition, he was leading the decathlon after the first four events of the World Championships in Eugene, Oregon last July before a strained hamstring that he suffered during the 400 prevented him from finishing that race and forced him out of the competition.
The Bowerman update: To me, Neugebauer jumped over Arkansas freshman triple jumper Jaydon Hibbert when it came to which collegiate men’s athlete is most deserving of The Bowerman for this year.
The award, named after former University of Oregon men’s coach Bill Bowerman, was first awarded in 2009 as a way for the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association to annually honor the top performers in men’s and women’s track and field based on voting from a panel of national and regional media personnel, track and field statisticians, NCAA collegiate administrators, past winners, and presidents of affiliated organizations.
While Hibbert set collegiate records of 17.54 (57-6½) indoors and 17.87 (58-7½) outdoors in the triple jump this season, and won NCAA indoor and outdoor titles in each, those marks rank 25th and tied for 13th, respectively, on the all-time performer lists.
Conversely, Neugebauer’s 8,836-point total in the decathlon ranks eighth. And the fact that he accomplished that feat in the NCAA title meet, the most important competition of the season, makes it even more impressive.
On the women’s side, I would give the award to Julien Alfred of Texas.
The senior from St. Lucia won the 60 and 200 — setting collegiate records in each — in the NCAA indoor meet in early March and she won the 100 and 200, and ran the first leg on the victorious 400 relay team, while leading the Longhorns to their first team title since 2005 in the NCAA outdoor championships that concluded last Saturday.
Texas lowered the collegiate record in the 400 relay three times during the outdoor season, and Alfred also ran legs on relay squads that set collegiate bests in the 800 relay and in the sprint medley relay.
The Longhorns’ best of 41.55 in the 400 relay was a half-second faster than the collegiate record of 42.05 at the start of the season. Their 1:28.05 best in the 800 relay bettered the previous best of 1:28.78 by more than seven tenths of a second and their 3:36.10 clocking in the sprint medley relay slashed nearly three seconds off the previous best of 3:38.93.
I felt like Britton Wilson of Arkansas was the front-runner for The Bowerman for women entering the NCAA meet. But her second-place finish in the 400 and her seventh-place effort in the 400 hurdles — which was held 25 minutes after the 400 — weakened her case to win the award.
Double trouble: Junior Britton Wilson of Arkansas and sophomore Katelyn Touhy of North Carolina State should be given credit for thinking big, and trying to pull off victorious doubles that had never been accomplished in the NCAA championships before. But ultimately, both tasks proved too much for either of them to accomplish in the meet that ended last Saturday.
Wilson, who set a U.S. record of 49.48 in winning the 400 in the NCAA indoor meet on March 11, had lowered the collegiate record three times during the outdoor season and had run the five fastest times in collegiate history entering the NCAA championships last week.
Wilson’s best of 49.13, which ranks fourth on the all-time U.S. performer list, had come in the Southeastern Conference meet on May 13 and a day after she ran 49.40 in her qualifying heat. But Rhasidat Adeleke of Texas ran a brilliant race in the final of the NCAA meet to lower her own Irish record to 49.20 while defeating Wilson (49.64) by more than fourth tenths of a second.
An understandably depleted Wilson then finished seventh in the 400 hurdles 25 minutes later with a time (55.92) that was more than two and a half seconds slower than her season best of 53.23.
Tuohy’s attempted double in the 1,500 and 5,000 seemed less audacious than Wilson’s as the final of the women’s 1,500 was scheduled to start an hour and 43 minutes before the start of the 5,000. But it did not get off to good start on June 8 when Tuohy seemed irritated with the way things had gone in her semifinal when she placed fourth in 4:09.83 while advancing to the final two days later.
Then in the final itself, Tuohy took a 10-meter lead part way through the race, only to eventually finish seventh in 4:11.40 after being in first place coming out of the final turn.
She then did not start the 5,000, the race in which she was the defending champion.
After winning that race last year, Tuohy had gone on to win the NCAA cross country title in November and the 3,000 and 5,000 in the NCAA indoor championships in March. She was so dominant in that meet that I wondered if she might sign a professional contract this summer so she could be challenged on a more regular basis.
Now, she might feel like she has some unfinished business at the collegiate level before deciding if a move to the professional ranks makes sense for her prior to using up her eligibility at North Carolina State.
Perfect timing: Rhasidat Adeleke of Texas timed her peak perfectly during the outdoor season as the Longhorn sophomore’s 49.20 run in the NCAA final last Saturday lowered the Irish record of 49.54 that she had set in the NCAA West preliminary meet at Cal State Sacramento on May 27. That time had improved her previous best of 49.90 that she had run in the middle of April.
While Wilson’s historically good outdoor season made her everyone’s pick to win the NCAA title in the 400, Adeleke outran her over the final 100 meters of the one-lap race while moving to ninth on the all-time European performer list.
“I’m not going to focus on the noise or anything like that,” Adeleke said when ESPN’s John Anderson asked her how she had sized up her competition entering the race. “I can’t control anyone else so I have to trust myself. Trust God.”
Don’t bet against her: Ackera Nugent of Arkansas was not picked to win the women’s 100-meter hurdles entering the NCAA meet, but she turned back collegiate record-holder Masai Russell of Kentucky and pre-race favorite and defending champion Alia Armstrong of LSU in the final while recording the fastest collegiate time ever in the event.
Nugent, a junior from Jamaica, trailed Armstrong for the first five flights of hurdles. But when the fourth-place finisher in last year’s World Championships hit the fifth barrier hard, she lost valuable momentum and that allowed Nugent to take control of the race two hurdles later on her way to a wind-aided time of 12.25.
Russell, who had set a collegiate record of 12.36 in winning the Clyde Littlefield Texas Relays on April 1, placed second in 12.32, followed by Armstrong in 12.49.
The win gave Nugent her second NCAA straightaway hurdle title of the year after she had edged pre-meet favorite Russell for the 60-meter hurdle championship in the NCAA indoor meet in March.
Final wrap: Although Masai Russell of Kentucky was unable to win an NCAA title during an illustrious college career that included collegiate records in the 60- and 100-meter hurdles, she did account for 18 points in the NCAA championships that concluded last Saturday.
The grad student began the final day of the meet by running a leg on a Wildcat squad that placed second in the 400-meter relay in 42.46 before finishing second in the 100 hurdles in a wind-aided 12.32 and second in the 400 hurdles in a personal best of 54.66.
That was expected to be the final 400-hurdle race of Russell’s career, as she plans to focus on the 100 hurdles at the post-collegiate level.
In addition to her runner-up finishes on Saturday, she had placed second in the 60 hurdles in the past two NCAA indoor title meets.
Winning ingredients: Hot weather, favorable breezes, and talented fields led to a plethora of outstanding performance in the men’s sprint events in the NCAA championships.
In the 100, the 10 second-barrier was broken by five sprinters in the semifinals, topped by the 9.89 personal best of Florida’s Pjai Austin. Two days later the top seven finishers in the final broke 10, paced by the 9.89 personal best of Courtney Lindsey of Texas Tech.
In the 200, six competitors broke 20 seconds in the semifinals, led by a 19.74 clocking that moved Udodi Onwuzurike of Stanford to third on the all-time collegiate list. The number of sub-20 times in the final dropped to four, but Onwuzurike’s winning 19.84 effort led the first four finishers under 19.90.
In the 400, six men broke 45 seconds in the semifinals, led by the 44.54 personal best from Justin Robinson of Arizona State. The number of sub-45 times in the final dropped to five, but Robinson’s 44.51 placed him fourth in a race in which Emmanuel Bamidele and Ryan Willie of team champion Florida placed 1-2 in personal bests of 44.24 and 44.25, respectively.
Making their mark: Nigerian competitors made a big impact in the three men’s sprint events in the NCAA championships.
Nigerians Udodi Onwuzurike of Stanford and Emmamuel Bamidele of Florida won the 200 and 400 meters, respectively, in times of 19.84 and 44.24 seconds. In the 100, Godson Oghenebrume of LSU placed second in the 100 in 9.90, with fellow Nigerians Onwuzurike and Favour Ashe of Auburn finishing sixth and eighth, respectively, in times of 9.98 and 10.02.
Onwuzurike was born in Detroit and grew up in West Bloomfield, Michigan. The third of four children born to Nigerian parents, he has made numerous trips to Nigeria over the years to celebrate Christmas with extended family.
As someone with dual citizenship in the U.S. and Nigeria, he first represented his parents’ home country internationally in the 2021 World Athletics U20 (under 20) Championships in Nairobi, Kenya when he won the men’s 200 meters.
He then competed for the Nigerian senior team in the World Championships in Eugene, Oregon, last year. He was eliminated in the first round of the 100 and in the semifinals of the 200. He also was a member of the country’s 400 relay team, but the squad did not advance to the final after Onwuzurike and Oghenebrume dropped the baton on the third — and final — exchange in a qualifying heat.
Ground-breaking performances: The men’s 1,600 relay produced a scintillating battle for first place as Florida, anchored by Ryan Willie, ran a collegiate record of 2:57.74 to just hold off Arizona State, anchored by Justin Robinson, which ran 2:57.78.
The time by the Florida tandem of Nigerian Emmanuel Bamidele, Jamaican Jevaughn Powell and Americans Jacory Patterson and Willie trimmed two hundredths of a second from their previous collegiate record set in the SEC meet.
The Arizona State quartet of Dubem Nwachukwu, Jerimiah Curry, Jalen Drayden, and Justin Robinson moved to third on the all-time collegiate list with their clocking that was the fastest ever run by a collegiate team comprised entirely of Americans.
To put the Sun Devils’ time in perspective, it was faster than the 2:58.58 clocking that a Jamaican national team ran to win the silver medal in the World Championships last July.
Coming back strong: Three months after finishing a disappointing seventh in the men’s 800 meters in the NCAA indoor meet in March, Will Sumner of Georgia dominated the event in the outdoor meet last week with a devastating last lap.
The Bulldog freshman led the field through the first 400 meters in a modest 53.12 seconds before running the second lap nearly two seconds faster while on his way to a 1:44.26 clocking that crushed his previous best of 1:46.00 and moved him to fifth on the all-time collegiate performer list.
"I wasn't surprised," Sumner was quoted as saying about the early pace in a flotrack post. "I didn't really expect anyone to take it, so that's why I wanted to go position myself in the front. I could have done a little more to make it a little more honest, but I just wanted to be as relaxed as I could be, and 53 ended up being the number, I guess.”
He added he had been focused on improving his finish in training and everything came together in the race in which indoor champion Yusuf Bizimana of Texas placed second in 1:45.74 and Handal Roban of Penn State finished third in 1:45.95.
The top three finishers, as well as six of the top eight, ran personal bests.
Redemptive victory: One of the biggest upsets of the NCAA meet occurred in the men’s discus when Turner Washington of Arizona State won the event while defeating a field that included Mykolas Alekna of UC Berkeley and Lithuania, who raised his personal best to 71.00 (232-11) earlier this year.
Washington, the son of 1999 World champion Anthony Washington, had struggled enough last year that he briefly quit the sport after the end of last season before returning with the intention of ending his collegiate career on a high note.
After finishing second in the shot put on June 7 with a best of 21.04 (69-0½), Washington took the early lead in the final of the discus two days later with a throw of 64.03 (210-1) in the first round before improving to 64.25 (210-9) in the third round.
However, Roje Stona of Arkansas moved into the lead in the fourth round with a 65.55 (215-0) effort.
Washington, throwing after Stona in rounds four through six, fouled on his fourth and fifth attempts. But on the final throw of the competition — and the final throw of his collegiate career — he uncorked a season best of 66.22 (217-3) for the victory and his second titles in three years.
Alekna, the son of two-time Olympic and two-time World champion Virgilijus Alekna, fouled on his first two throws of the final before hitting 61.86 (202-11) on his third toss and 62.49 (205-0) on his fourth. The silver medalist in the World Championships fouled again in the fifth round before improving to 63.25 (207-6) on his final throw of the competition to finish third, one place ahead of defending champion Claudio Romero of LSU (62.67/205-7).
"It was just one of those things where it's the first time I've experienced people talking smack,” Turner was quoted in a post on flotrack when asked about his emotional celebration. “I knew what I could do the whole season, and I feel like I'm better than a 60. That was my last NCAA throw. It was like, let's put something together and let's create a moment."
No one’s perfect: In what was expected to be the final collegiate meet of her career, Jasmine Moore of Florida set a collegiate outdoor record in the women’s triple jump in the NCAA championships last Saturday after finishing third in the long jump two days earlier.
Moore is a junior when it comes to her athletic eligibility, but she was recently awarded her undergraduate degree and she had spoken previously about wanting to compete professionally after the NCAA meet.
She had entered the NCAA meet as the defending outdoor champion in the women’s long jump and triple jump, as well as the two-time defending indoor champion in both events. But she finished third in the long jump on June 8 when her best of 6.66 (21-10¼) left her well back of winner Ackelia Smith of Texas (6.88/22-7) and runner-up Alyssa Jones of Stanford (6.86/22-6¼).
However, she found redemption in the triple jump last Saturday when her best of 14.78 (48-6) left her more than nine inches in front of runner-up Smith’s personal best of 14.54 (47-8 ½), It also topped the previous collegiate outdoor record of 14.62 (47-11 ¾) that Keturah Orji of Georgia had set in 2018.
Moore’s performances in Austin offered further evidence about just how magical a meet she had at the NCAA indoor championships in Albuquerque when she won the long jump with a collegiate record of 7.03 (23-0 ¾) and took the triple jump with a collegiate and American record of 15.12 (49-7 ¼).
Different school, same result: Jorinde van Klinken of Oregon won her third consecutive title in the women’s discus in the NCAA meet last Saturday after winning the previous two when she was at Arizona State.
The fourth-place finisher in the World Championships last year, van Klinken had three throws in which she bettered the previous meet record of 65.01 (213-3) which she had set in 2021.
Her best effort of 65.55 (215-0) came in the third round and she also had throws of 65.34 (214-4) in round six and 65.20 (213-11) in round two. The Dutch competitor had also finished second in the shot put two days earlier with a best of 18.48 (63-3¼).
Personal-best fest: Charity Griffith of Ball State raised her outdoor personal best three times while winning the women’s high jump in the NCAA meet.
She was in third place after she cleared an outdoor personal best of 1.87 (6-1½), but she moved into first when she cleared 1.90 (6-2¾) on her second attempt, and she clinched the victory when she cleared 1.93 (6-4) on her first attempt and Elena Kulichenko of Georgia missed her only attempt at that height after passing her third try at 1.90.
Defending champion Lamara Distin of Texas A&M finished second at 1.87 after having won the two previous NCAA indoor titles.
Speed to burn: Ky Robinson of Stanford used his superior last-lap speed to win the men’s 5,000 and 10,000 meters in runaway fashion in the NCAA championships last week.
The Cardinal junior from Australia won the 10,000 in 28:10.96 on June 7 after running the last lap in 54.19 seconds to lead sophomore teammate Charles Hicks to a second-place time of 28:12.20.
Two days later he ran the final lap in 55.54 while winning the 5,000 in 14:04.77.
Robinson had placed 10th in the NCAA Cross Country Championships last November before finishing 23rd in the World Athletics Cross Country Championships outside Bathurst, Australia in February to lead the home country to a fourth-place finish in the men’s race behind Kenya, Ethiopia, and Uganda.
"Spectacular," Robinson was quoted as telling flotrack about his 1-2 finish with Hicks. "We look back at cross country, and Charles went number one. We work together, we train together, we live just down the hall from each other, and so we're best friends both on the track and off the track. To have someone your age and your best friend up there with you, and to finish 1 and 2, it's fantastic. Couldn't ask for anything more."
Three in a row: When Nathan Green of the University of Washington won the men’s 1,500 meters in 3:42.78 in the NCAA championships, it marked the third consecutive national title meet in which a Husky runner won the 1,500 or mile title.
Joe Waskom, second to Green in the final last week, had won the 1,500 outdoors last year.
Teammate Luke Houser, who was 10th in the 1,500 final last week, won the men’s mile title in the indoor championships in March in a race in which Waskom placed fourth and Green placed fifth.
Disappointing end: Elija Godwin and Matthew Boling, Georgia teammates who had won the men’s 400 and 200 meters, respectively, in the NCAA indoor championships, ended frustrating outdoor collegiate seasons last week.
Godwin, a senior who had run the first leg on the U.S. team that won the 1,600 relay in the World Championships last July, had run 44.73 to win his semifinal of the NCAA meet on June 8, but he did not start the final last Saturday.
Boling, a junior who has won a pair of NCAA indoor titles in the 200, was eliminated in the semifinals of the 200 when his fourth-place time of 20.25 in his heat made him the 10th-fastest finisher overall in a competition in which the top nine advanced to the final.
Boling had finished second to Joseph Fahnbulleh of Florida in the 200 in last year’s NCAA outdoor meet.
Intermediate hurdle casualties: Sean Burrell of LSU and Ayden-Owens Delerme of Arkansas saw their quests for a title in the men’s 400-meter intermediate hurdles end in the semifinals of the NCAA meet last week.
Burrell, who had run a personal best of 47.85 in winning his first NCAA title in 2021, clocked 48.70 in winning his second consecutive championship last year, but he struggled to get untracked this year. He entered the NCAA meet with a season best of 49.32 and his 49.84 clocking in the semifinals left him in 11th place overall, and two spots away from nabbing the ninth – and final – qualifying spot for the final.
In contrast to Burrell, Owens-Delerme appeared to be on a roll entering the NCAA meet.
A standout decathlete who placed fourth in the World Championships last year, he ran 50.28 in the first intermediate hurdle race of his collegiate career in late April before winning the SEC title in 48.26 two weeks later.
The time was the year’s fastest collegiate performance entering the NCAA meet, but Owens-Delerme did not get a chance to improve upon it in the final because his 49.82 run in his semifinal left him 10th overall.
In the final last Saturday, Alabama juniors Chris Robinson and Corde Long finished 1-2 with personal bests of 48.12 and 48.53, respectively.
Looking forward: The next three editions of the NCAA outdoor championships are scheduled to be held at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon, with the 2024 meet set for June 5-8.