Week in Review: Wilson's historical triple steals spotlight
Arkansas sophomore first to win 400 and 400 hurdles in SEC championships
In a league full of collegiate track and field stars, no one shined brighter than Britton Wilson of Arkansas on the final day of the Southeastern Conference Championships at the University of Mississippi on Saturday.
Favour Ofili of LSU won two highly anticipated duels with Abby Steiner of Kentucky in the women’s 100 and 200 meters, and ran the second leg on the victorious 400 relay team. But it was Wilson’s superb display of speed, endurance, and hurdling technique that led to her selection as the U.S. Track & Field and Cross County Coaches Association national women’s athlete of the week.
The 5-foot-5 sophomore from Mills Godwin High School in Henrico, Virginia, became the first woman in SEC history to win the 400 and 400 hurdles in the same conference championship meet when she ran personal bests of 50.05 seconds in the former and 53.75 in the latter.
She won the 400 by pulling away from yearly collegiate leader Charokee Young of Texas A&M in the home straightaway and did likewise to Anna Hall of Florida in the 400 hurdles an hour later.
She then finished off her terrific triple an hour and a half later by running a 48.60 anchor leg on Arkansas’ 1,600 relay team that ran the fourth-fastest time in collegiate history at 3 minutes 22.55 seconds, but finished third in a scintillating race in which Kentucky – led by a 48.78 third leg from Steiner – lowered the collegiate record to 3:21.93, and Texas A&M – anchored by Young’s 48.90 – placed second in 3:22.01, which also bettered the previous record of 3:22.34 set by Texas A&M in the NCAA Championships last year.
Wilson’s split was the fastest ever in a collegiate race, topping the previous best that Steiner recorded less than a minute earlier on her leg.
“If you didn’t witness it, you would look at the results and say that is impossible,” Arkansas’ women’s head coach Lance Harter said in a story about Wilson on the university’s website. “I was there live and witnessed it. Britton is a phenomenal talent and an even greater competitor. She is so poised in spite of her youth. She never panics and is the consummate team player. She really cares to try to help contribute to the team, and maybe accept a few wins on the way.”
Wilson’s ability to maintain her composure during the heat of competition was on display in all three of her performances Saturday as she stayed within herself for the first 200 meters of each race before making up ground on her fellow competitors in the final half lap.
Young, who ran 49.87 and 50.00 earlier this season, led the field through the first half of the 400, but Wilson began to whittle away at the Jamaican’s lead midway through the second turn. The pair was virtually even entering the home straightaway, but Wilson had opened a noticeable gap on Young with 75 meters to go and extended it all the way through the finish line as her 50.05 clocking crushed her previous personal best of 50.97, moved her to sixth on the all-time collegiate performer list, and defeated Young by four tenths of a second.
Hall, who won the heptathlon in the USA Track & Field Combined Events Championships that were held from May 6-7, led third-place Wilson by 5-6 meters at the midway point of the 400 hurdles. But just as she had done in the 400, Wilson made a strong move through the second turn, motored past Hall entering the home straightaway, and crossed the finish line in a time that was the fastest in the world, moved her to sixth on the all-time collegiate performer list, and left runner-up Hall (55.36) well back of her.
“I just really dug deep and I knew I got it in me,” Wilson told the SEC Network’s John Anderson in a trackside interview after the race. “We’ve been working for this. I’m just really happy I got the opportunity to show everyone what I could do.”
Arkansas trailed first-place Kentucky by more than a second and a half when Wilson received the baton for her anchor leg in the 1,600 relay, but she managed to make up a second of time on Kentucky anchor runner Alexis Holmes, who ran an outstanding 49.60 on her carry.
“I told her we would take one event at a time,” Arkansas associate head coach Chris Johnson said of Wilson. “Let’s get through one thing at a time and have a singular focus rather than a triple focus on the 400, 400 hurdles and the relay.”
Big victories: Ofili tied her personal best in the women’s 100 and ran the second fastest time of her career in the 200 in defeating Steiner in the two most anticipated races in the SEC Championships.
Ofili had finished .34 seconds behind Steiner in placing second in the 200 in the NCAA Indoor Championships in March, and .08 seconds back of her in the 100 in the Joe May Invitational at LSU on April 9. But the 19-year-old sophomore from Nigeria had since run 10.93 in the 100 and a collegiate record of 21.96 in the 200.
On Saturday, she got off to a better start than Steiner in the 100 and was never seriously challenged for first by her senior rival as she recorded a 10.93 to 11.02 victory in a race that was run into a slight breeze of 0.7 meters per second (1.6 miles per hour).
The 200 was much closer as Ofili ran 22.04 to Steiner’s 22.07.
Ofili came off the curve with a slight lead over Steiner and extended her advantage midway down the straightaway, but Steiner made up a lot of ground on her in the final 30 meters of the race.
The winner was ecstatic after holding off Steiner, clapping her hands after seeing the results on the video scoreboard, pumping her right fist, jumping up in the air, and letting out a celebratory scream.
Ofili had started her afternoon by running the second leg on LSU’s 400 relay team that edged Kentucky, 42.59 to 42.63, for the win.
Working together: Kentucky might have surprised some college track and field fans with its collegiate record of 3:21.93 in the women’s 1,600 relay, but the Wildcat quartet of senior Karimah Davis, junior Dajour Miles, Steiner, and senior Alexis Holmes had had their eyes on the record for a while.
“I told these ladies before I ran that I was going to run my heart out for them,” Steiner told dyestat.com. “We’ve been wanting this record for a long time... It really all just came together at the right time and I couldn’t be more excited.”
Kentucky was in third place when Steiner received the baton from Miles and she was 15-17 meters behind first-place Arkansas entering the backstretch. But she closed her deficit to about 12 meters with a 200 to go, took the lead with 70 meters remaining on her leg, and gave Holmes an eight-meter advantage over Texas A&M at the final exchange after her 48.78 split.
Young, who had been upset by Wilson in the 400 earlier in the meet, ran a superb 48.90 on her anchor leg for A&M, but Holmes held her off by running 49.60 – her fastest ever split – on her leg.
Overshadowed: Although the men did not produce as many fireworks as the women in the SEC Championships, there were several noteworthy performances.
Favour Ashe of Tennessee and Nigeria won the 100 in a personal best of 10.04, Matthew Boling of Georgia won the 200 in 20.01, Champion Allison of Florida won the 400 in a career best of 44.74, and Mario Garcia Romo of Mississippi won the 1,500 in 3:36.91.
Ashe defeated second-place Dedrick Vanover of Florida by six-hundredths of a second in the 100.
Boling, after finishing a disappointing fourth in the 100 in 10.13, ran the second fastest time of his career to win the 200 ahead of defending NCAA champion Joseph Fahnbulleh (20.13) of Florida and Liberia.
Allison edged runner-up Elija Godwin by seven hundredths of a second in the 400.
Spaniard Garcia Romo, winner of the mile in the NCAA Indoor Championships, defeated collegiate record holder Eliud Kipsang of Alabama and Kenya by more than two seconds in the 1,500.
Florida, anchored by Allison’s 44.79 carry, won the 1,600 relay in 2:59.44, followed by Kentucky at 2:59.93.
Florida, which lowered the collegiate record to 2:58.53 in winning the Tom Jones Memorial meet on April 15, became only the second team – Texas A&M was the first in 2017 – in history to break three minutes in the 1,600 relay twice in the same season.
Kentucky, which became the fourth SEC men’s program to have a team run under 3:00 in the 1,600 relay, did it with a squad that is not brimming with high-level 400 sprinters.
Dwight St. Hillaire has run 45.41 for the Wilcats, but none of his fellow relay team members are ranked among the top 25 collegiate competitors in the nation. However, Kentucky received a 44.55 third leg from Kennedy Lightner, who has run 20.70 in the 200 this season, and a 44.50 anchor carry from Brian Faust, who has run 46.03 in the 400.
No more question marks: There are no longer any questions about who holds the collegiate record in the men’s discus throw.
Mykolas Alekna of UC Berkeley saw to that Sunday when he won the event with a throw of 68.73 meters (225 feet 6 inches) on the final day of the Pacific 12 Conference Championships at Hayward Field at the University of Oregon.
Alekna, the son of two-time Olympic and two-time World champion Virgilijus Alekna of Lithuania, had thrown his previous best of 67.68 (222-1) in a dual meet at Stanford on April 30.
According to the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association (USTFCCCA), that mark topped the previous collegiate best of 67.66 (222-0) set by Hans Hopley of Southern Methodist and South Africa in 2004.
However, Track & Field News had listed the collegiate record at 68.16 (223-7) set by Julian Wruck of UCLA and Australia in 2013.
The USTFCCCA listed Wruck’s mark as an exhibition performance because it came in a meet that wasn’t run in a manner consistent with NCAA protocols.
Alekna’s throw came in the fifth round of the competition after he had thrown 62.06 (203-7), 65.55 (215-0), 65.42 (214-7), and 66.93 (219-7) on his first four attempts.
The 19-year-old freshman’s top effort moved him to second on the yearly world performance list behind defending Olympic champion Daniel Stahl of Sweden, who has thrown 69.11 (226-9).
It also exceeds any of the marks Alekna’s dad produced until he turned 26 in 1998.
“In the first round or two, he was forcing things a little bit,” Cal throws coach Mohamad Saatara said of Alekna. “You can get a little fired up in a big meet. But you need to be loose to throw far. He was able to relax after that.”
Alekna was not an unknown talent when he came to Cal last August, as he had won the discus in the World U20 (under 20) Championships in Nairobi earlier that month while throwing a 1.75-kilogram (3.9 pounds) implement. But he has improved rapidly this year after beginning the season with a personal best of 63.52 (208-5) with the two-kilogram (4.4 pounds) discus.
“His technical work is some of the best in the world,” Saatara said. “Rhythm and tempo are very important in the discus and the way he puts together the whole movement is so great.”
Double victor: Micah Williams of Oregon had a nice double in the Pac 12 Championships, running personal bests in winning the men’s 100 in 9.93 and the 200 in 20.05 for the team champion Ducks.
Williams, who finished third in the 100 as a freshman in the NCAA Championships last year, had run a wind-aided 9.83 to win the invitational race of the Mt. San Antonio College Relays on April 16. But the 9.93 lowered his previous non-wind-aided best of 10.00 set in the NCAA West Preliminary meet last year.
The 20.05 clocking in the 200 crushed his previous best of 20.35 that he ran to win the Desert Heat Classic in Tucson, Arizona, on April 30.
Favorable ingredients: A mixture of talented athletes, aiding winds, and an altitude of nearly 1,000 meters (3,280 feet) led to some impressive performances in several sprint, hurdle, and jumping events in the Big 12 Championships at Texas Tech.
Julien Alfred of team champion Texas ran a Saint Lucian record of 10.81 in a qualifying heat of the women’s 100 on Saturday before winning the final in a wind-aided 10.83 on Sunday.
Her 10.81 clocking was the fastest collegiate time of the year and moved her to third on the all-time collegiate list.
She also teamed up with fellow sophomores Rhasidat Adeleke and Kevona Davis, and senior Kynnedy Flannel in the 400 relay to run a school-record 42.35, the fastest collegiate time in the nation this year.
Junior Demisha Roswell of Texas Tech won the 100 hurdles in 12.44 to edge freshman and fellow Jamaican Ackera Nugent of Baylor by a hundredth of a second.
The times moved Roswell into a tie for fourth on the all-time collegiate performer list and Nugent to sixth.
Senior Monae Nichols of Texas Tech won the long jump with a yearly collegiate-leading mark of 6.97 (22-10½) to move into a tie for third on the all-time collegiate performer list with Carol Lewis, who had set a collegiate record for Houston with an identical jump in 1984.
Junior Jonathan Jones of team champion Texas, freshman Nathaniel Ezekiel of Baylor, and senior Du Mapaya of Texas Christian produced yearly collegiate leading marks in the men’s meet by winning the 400 in 44.43, the 400 intermediate hurdles in 48.42, and the triple jump at 16.84 (55-3).
Jones’ mark lowered his own national record for Barbados in the 400, and Ezekiel’s time in the intermediate hurdles broke the Nigerian record of 48.50 set by Henry Amike in a semifinal of the 1987 World Championships in Rome.
Senior Micaiah Harris of Texas won the 100 and 200 with wind-aided marks of 9.93 and 19.72.
Pair of collegiate leaders: Katelyn Tuohy and of North Carolina State and Ethan Dabbs of Virginia produced yearly collegiate-leading marks in winning the women’s 1,500 meters and the men’s javelin in the Athletic Coast Conference Championships at Duke.
Tuohy, a sophomore who finished second in the 3,000 and 5,000 in the NCAA Indoor Championships, ran a meet record of 4:06.84 in the 1,500 on Saturday to crush her previous best of 4:12.55 set last year.
Dabbs, a junior, set a meet record of 82.92 (272-0) in the javelin on Thursday during a competition in which he raised his personal best and conference record to 81.17 (266-3) in the second round before improving to his winning effort in the third round.
Trey Cunningham of Florida State did not run a yearly collegiate-leading time in the men’s 110 high hurdles, but the senior’s 13.16 clocking was the best mark of the meet and his fourth-fastest time of the year.
He ran a career best of 13.10, the fastest time in the world this year, to win the North Florida Invitational on April 30.
Helpful winds: Heavy breezes that forced the men’s pole vault to be postponed for a day and moved to an indoor facility provided a huge assist to the men’s javelin throwers in the Diamond League meet in Doha, Qatar, on Friday.
Anderson Peters of Grenada, the 2019 World Champion, won the event with a throw of 93.07 (305-4) to move to fifth on the all-time world performer list and obliterate his pre-meet best of 87.31 (286-5).
Jakub Vadlejch of the Czech Republic, the Olympic silver medalist, finished second with a best of 90.88 (298-2) after entering the meet with a best of 89.73 (294-4).
Anderson led after a first-round throw of 88.96 (291-10), but Vadlejch moved into first in the fourth round with an effort of 89.87 (294-10).
He improved that mark to 90.86 (298-1) in the fifth round before Peters unleashed his winning throw of 93.07 (305-4) in the sixth – and final – round.
Round 1: Alison Dos Santos of Brazil defeated Rai Benjamin of the U.S. in the men’s 400-meter intermediate hurdles in Doha.
It was the first race of the season between Olympic bronze medalist Dos Santos, who ran a yearly world-leading time of 47.24, and Olympic silver medalist Benjamin, who timed 47.49.
Quick 200s: U.S. Olympic bronze medalists Noah Lyles and Gabby Thomas produced notable times in winning the men’s and women’s half-lap races in Doha.
Lyles ran a wind-aided 19.72 to edge Fred Kerley by three hundredths of a second in the men’s race, and Thomas clocked 21.98 to defeat runner-up Shericka Jackson of Jamaica, who ran 22.07.
Olympic rematch: Soufiane El Bakkali of Morocco won the 3,000-meter steeplechase in Doha in a race that included the top five finishers from the Olympic Games.
Olympic gold medalist El Bakkali ran a yearly world-leading time of 8:09.66 to edge Olympic silver medalist Lamecha Girma of Ethiopia by a hundredth of a second.
Crouser watch: Ryan Crouser has been relatively quiet this season compared to a year ago, but the two-time defending Olympic champion in the men’s shot put had a solid series in winning the event in the Puerto Rico International Athletics Classic in Ponce last Thursday.
Crouser hit his winning mark of 22.75 (74-7¾) in the first round, but he also had puts of 22.03 (72-3¼) in the third round and 22.28 (73-1¼) in the sixth round.
Major upset: Alaysha Johnson of the U.S. was a surprising winner in the women’s 100 hurdles in Ponce as she edged defending Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn of the host country.
Johnson clocked a career best of 12.50 to finish two hundredths of a second ahead of Camacho-Quinn, who has struggled some this season after a dominant 2021 campaign in which she won nine of 10 finals and ran a career best of 12.26 in the semifinals of the Olympic Games to move into a tie for fourth on the all-time performer list.
Moving up the list: Rodrick Pleasant of Serra High School in Gardena, California, had an outstanding day in the Southern Section divisional finals at Moorpark High on Saturday.
Pleasant ran a leg on a Serra team that won the boys’ Division IV 400-meter relay in 40.89 before clocking a wind-aided 10.16 in the 100 and a personal best of 20.40 in the 200.
His time in the 100 was aided by a wind of 2.7 meters-per-second and his clocking in the 200, the fastest high school time in the nation this year, came with a wind reading of 2.0, the maximum allowed for record purposes.
Pleasant moved to second on the all-time California and Southern Section performer lists in the 200, trailing only Michael Norman, who ran 20.14 for Vista Murrieta High in Murrieta in 2016.
