EUGENE, Ore. – In one corner of Hayward Field, a trio of American hurdlers stood behind their blocks, poised for both elation and heartbreak. On the other side of the oval, a pair of American pole vaulters, Katie Nageotte and Sandi Morris, posed with American flags across their backs and gold and silver medals around their necks. On the infield, Ryan Crouser, the shotput world record holder, paused before he stepped into the circle. A raucous stadium, in the thrall of a procession of American victories, hushed.
As U.S. dominates world championships, Devon Allen is handed heartbreak
Crouser, in the rare position of trailing, would have to wait for his next throw to provide silence for the start of the 110 meters hurdles final. He peered across the track and heard one starting gun. Then he heard another. It had been a perfect night for the United States, but Crouser has been around long enough not to be surprised. “In big meets,” Crouser said, “you always know something will go wrong.”
In this track-mad town, they have waited decades for a night such as Sunday. On Day 3 of the world championships, Americans clogged podiums and hogged medals. U.S. athletes won four golds, and in each of those events at least one teammate joined the winner on the podium, a haul of nine medals total. They needed a traffic cop to sort out the victory laps.
Crouser and Nageotte validated the Olympic gold medals they won in Tokyo. Grant Holloway reclaimed his throne as the fastest 110-meter hurdler in the world, rebounding from the bitter silver he won last summer by edging teammate Trey Cunningham, 13.03 seconds to 13.08. Those rapid-fire golds at night piled atop the hammer throw gold medal Brooke Andersen won in the morning.
Even on its greatest nights, track and field will break hearts. The sport produces dark clouds over celebrations. It will leave both its participants and adherents angry and confused, particularly when it implements technology. “It’s athletics,” said Grant Holloway, wearing a gold medal around his neck and an American flag on his back. “S— happens.”
Roars moved through Hayward Field like an electric current, interrupted only by boos after the removal of a crowd favorite. Oregon alum and Philadelphia Eagles wide receiver Devon Allen hoped he would win a 110-meter world championship just weeks after the sudden death of his father. Race officials, relying on a system that measures reaction time electronically, ruled Allen had started .001 seconds faster than humanly possible, disqualifying him from the race and preventing a U.S. podium sweep.
“I’m one one-thousandths slower, and everybody’s happy — ‘Hey, great race, world champ,’ ” Allen said. “It’s a little frustrating. It’s so absolute, which kind of sucks.”
When Allen heard the gun stop the race, he had no concern that he had been flagged. He thought perhaps Holloway hadn’t been set and they would restart the race. He was stunned when the public address announced Lane 3 — his lane — as the culprit.
“I know for a fact I didn’t go until I heard the gun,” Allen said.
Holloway marched toward Allen and told him, “Go protest.” Allen pleaded his case to no avail. World Athletics relies on a system that measures how fast a runner leaves his blocks. If an athlete leaves his blocks in less than 0.1 seconds, it’s an automatic false start. Allen left in 0.09.
“With the false start fiasco, we didn’t think he false started,” Cunningham said. “None of the athletes did. We really wanted him to run. We were just confused. No one was outraged about someone jumping or anything. We thought he should have stayed. Even the people next to us were like, ‘He should have been in the blocks.’ ”
Allen became the second gaping absence in the final. Jamaican Hansle Parchment, the reigning Olympic gold medalist, injured himself warming up for the final and did not start. He would have run in Lane 5, which left Holloway in Lane 4 with vacant lanes on both sides. “It felt like I was at practice,” Holloway said.
Once Holloway stormed to his second consecutive world championship, Crouser restarted his routine for his fifth throw. He trailed Joe Kovacs, the Olympic silver medalist and reigning world champion, before he unleashed a 22.94-meter (75-foot, 3-inch) bomb. Crouser, Kovacs and Josh Awotunde, a first-time global medalist, repeated the podium sweep of the U.S. men’s 100 meter team from Saturday night.
“There’s definitely a sense of momentum,” Crouser said. “Team USA has been competing over the world for so long. To have the first world championships in the U.S., it’s an excellent opportunity to showcase the depth and talent of Team USA.”
The U.S. celebrations and victory laps were pierced at the end by honking vuvuzelas, a signal that a Jamaican — or three — has just run a short distance very fast. Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce led a repeat of the Jamaican sweep of the 100-meter podium from the Tokyo Olympics, winning her fifth world championship in the event in a blazing 10.67 seconds to go with her two Olympic gold medals.
Fraser-Pryce, a 35-year-old mother, added more evidence for her case as the greatest female sprinter in history. Shericka Jackson and Elaine Thompson-Herah, the reigning Olympic champion, finished just behind her.
But the day belonged to the host country. It finished the night with 14 medals, six of them gold, over three days. No other nation has claimed more than three total medals. The table is likely to grow more lopsided. In Michael Norman, Athing Mu, Sydney McLaughlin, Valarie Allman and the combination of Noah Lyles and Erriyon Knighton, the United States possesses the heavy favorite in the men’s 400 meters, women’s 800 meters, women’s 400-meter hurdles, women’s discus and men’s 200 meters. Three of the four relays are the United States’ to lose, too.
But Allen’s elimination provided a blemish. He played football at Oregon, catching 41 passes for 684 yards and seven touchdowns as a freshman in 2014 before he tore a knee ligament on the opening kickoff of the Rose Bowl. He shelved football after college as he forged his track career, finishing fifth at the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and fourth in Tokyo nine months after major surgery. He alerted NFL teams of his intention to return to football by working out at Oregon’s pro day in April, and the Eagles, enamored with his speed, signed him days later. He reports to training camp July 26, but his football focus will not mean a pause in the hurdles.
“A lot of people say it’s going to be a choice,” Allen said last month. “As long as I’m young and healthy — which is until I’m 35 — I’m going to be able to do both.”
Introduced at the starting line Sunday night as “a U of O legend,” Allen received one of the loudest cheers of any athlete here. This past week, a fan walked through the Hayward concourse wearing an Eagles jersey with Allen’s name on the back and No. 110. “I got to get one of those,” Allen said. “I wish I could wear 110.”
The morning he qualified for worlds at the U.S. championships, Allen learned his father, Louis, had died suddenly at 63. He never considered dropping out of the race, choosing instead to compartmentalize.
“It would have been kind of a waste to not [make the team],” Allen said after his prelim heat Saturday. “My dad would be excited for me to win worlds and break the world record and play for the Eagles and catch touchdowns. So I’m going to keep doing exactly that.”
The sport produces joy and anguish in equal measure, sometimes in one experience. After Nageotte won a gold medal in Tokyo, she spent months thinking about it, talking about it and capitalizing on the opportunities it presented. Without realizing it, it exhausted her. She took a physical break from pole vault, but not a mental break. She crashed. She would cry during practices. Her performance suffered. As late as May, she considered retirement. She recovered, though, and Sunday night she sobbed on top of the podium.
“I was wondering, ‘Is this what it feels like when you’re 31 and ready to retire?’ ” Nageotte said. “I just needed time for it to bounce back, and I’m so grateful that it did.”
When Andersen graduated college four years ago, she followed her coach to Kansas with a nearly empty bank account — the financial reality so many U.S. track and field athletes face. She worked 30 to 35 hours per week at Chipotle and another 20 at GNC. She fit practices and workouts around her shifts.
“I knew I still had a lot left to give to the sport,” she said.
Andersen made her first Olympic team last year and finished 10th in Tokyo. This year, she recovered from nagging injuries and transformed from one of the best current U.S. hammer throwers to one of the best in the world — ever. In April, she launched a 79.02-meter (259-foot, 3-inch) throw that was the fourth best of all time. She won her first national title last month.
Andersen, who lives in Phoenix, still rings up customers at Chipotle 30 hours per week, although the Nike contract she signed days before worlds may allow her to make throwing her only job. She entered Sunday as the favorite. When Canadian silver medalist Camryn Rogers couldn’t pass her with her final try, Andersen had secured victory one day after Chase Ealey gave U.S. women a throwing gold in the shot put.
“I wanted to start crying because I knew what had just happened,” Andersen said. “But the competitiveness in me was like: ‘You still have another throw. You can throw farther.’ ”
Andersen made the last throw her longest, unleashing a 78.96-meter heave, putting more distance between her and American bronze medalist and Janee’ Kassanavoid. Andersen jogged around the Hayward Field track with an American flag wrapped around her shoulders. The sport can be cruel to those who love it. It can also keep you coming back.
“It’s all worth it in the end,” Andersen said. “If this is the outcome, I’d do it a million times over.”
Source: WP
