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It’s July Where Are We?
This has been a very interesting year so far. Lots of transition going on throughout the sport. Rising athletes. Injured athletes. Athletes returning from injury. More transition than usual in the year following the Games it seems. Then of course there are the usual off the track issues such as drugs, which never seem to go away. So many things that I don’t know where to begin, so rather than say a lot about one thing, today I’m going to take a stab at saying a little about a lot of things – starting with the Diamond League which gives us a Fourth of July meet in Lausanne in two…
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Rollins’ 12.26 Leads Weekend at Nationals
As I thought prior, this was one of the hottest National Championships in a long time – and it was lead by women and youth. Don’t get me wrong, the men got the job done and we’re sending a nice male squad to Moscow. But the women were doing spectacular things everywhere you turned – and none were any more spectacular than Brianna Rollins. Rollins started looking like gold at the NCAA Championships when she screamed collegiate records of 12.47 & 12.39 – but that was just a warm up for Des Moines. This weekend saw her run 12.33w, 12.30w before blazing 12.26 (1.2) in the final for a new…
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NCAA to USATF Who Will Perform Best?
With the NCAA Championships behind them the collegiate stars are at one of the toughest parts of the season - trying to be even better in an attempt to make the World Championships team. After weeks of conference, regional and of course the NCAA Championships, they must try to hit yet another peak against the best the US has to offer. Depending on your event that task could be nearly impossible with some events in the US being as deep as at Worlds. Even so, I did come up with ten collegiate athletes that I feel have a pretty solid shot at earning air fair to Russia. Especially on the…
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NCAA Regionals On Tap This Week
The championship portion of the collegiate season kicks into high gear this week with the Division I East (Greensboro NC) and West (Austin TX) Regionals. These meets are the precursor to the NCAA Division I Championships in Eugene in June. In many ways these meets are also a preview of the USATF National championships and World Championships, as many of the top collegiate programs are peppered with elite, world class athletes. So let’s take a look at the top programs and athletes that will be on display this week. Following are the top ten men and women’s programs as ranked by the US Track and Field and Cross Country Coaches…
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Bryshon Nellum Leads Weekend Highlights
Doha kick started the track season into high gear on Friday with a meet full of stellar performances and competition. It seems like the rest of the sport was inspired, especially the college kids, as they lit the track up the rest of the weekend. This was conference weekend, and all across the country the chase for NCAA titles began. From the Pac12 on the west coast to the SEC on the east coast, young college stars went head to head for team titles before heading to the regional meets. For my money the best of these, in a weekend full of outstanding performers was Bryshon Nellum of USC who…
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March Closes Out in Style
Now that’s the way to end a month of track and field – with some stellar competition! The Texas Relays officially signals the start of the relay season and went off in fine style. As is often the case, the it was the hot meet of the weekend – and as usual speed was on display. Take a look at the following results and comments. On the other side of the country, the Stanford Invitational saw tons of very good high school action with a smattering of high level elite competition thrown in. Scanning the results sheets I also noted some interesting/outstanding performances from several other meets this weekend. Following…
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Collegiate Champs Send Us Outdoors in Style
This weekend saw us "spring forward" into Daylight Savings Time, which means more hours to train as athletes transition from the indoor season to the outdoor season. For several college athletes their final competition of the winter was this weekend’s NCAA Championships which featured several outstanding athletes and performances. Below are my highlights from the meet, but before I get to that I have to comment on the 200 meters. This race is one of my favorite events outdoors, but it loses much in the transition from outdoors to indoors – and this meet demonstrated why. For starters, on the one lap banked tracks lane draw is EVERYTHING in the…
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Trials Preview – Women’s 200 Meters
While the men’s 100 is potentially the most “story” laden event heading into the Trials, it’s certainly not alone in terms of story lines and depth. One of my favorites in this regard is the women’s 1500, which I discussed in detail earlier. However, also recently entering into the “drama zone” with the aforementioned 100 & 1500 is the women’s 200 as it’s suddenly become the middle ground for several of our best female sprinters. Let’s start with the woman for whom this distance is her specialty – Allyson Felix. Felix won three World titles in a row in this event (’05, ’07, ’09) before taking bronze in Daegu last…
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The Top Collegians Heading Into the Trials
It’s finally here – the Olympic Trials. The biggest meet outside of the Games themselves. And with the first half of the Diamond League and the NCAA Championships concluding this past weekend, I think I’ve seen enough to stick my neck out there and make my predictions on the crap shoot that is the Trials. The toughest road to London may be the one taken by those still in college. College athletes are part of programs that compete for indoor titles, and outdoor titles before they finally get to line up to take their shot at making the Olympic team. So while the elite athletes get to take their time…
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Early Weekend Results – Oslo / NCAA
It’s only Friday, but we’ve already had enough track to fill a weekend – and we’re just getting started! The early results are in, and while Oslo wasn’t quite as hot as I had hoped, the "kids" we definitely ahead of expectations at the NCAA Championships! Let’s start with Oslo where vets Usain Bolt (JAM) and Sally Pearson (AUS) confirmed their status as early London favorites. Fresh off his 9.76 in Rome last week, Bolt cranked out a 9.79 in Oslo. Again his only competition came from teammate Asafa Powell who was second in 9.85. Powell seemed more relaxed today as he wasn’t right next to Bolt, and no one…