Category: track and field

olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad: Waffle Cup … and greetings, Season!

Posted on by Beau Dure

Has soccer made it in America? We debate this topic every four years, and I’m officially declaring the conversation dead.

Why? These two tweets:

(HT: D.C. Sports Bog)

The week in myriad sports includes a reminder that the best U.S. athlete of the year might be a triathlete, along with a reminder to turn off auto-correct when writing beach volleyball stories.

BEST U.S. ATHLETE OF THE YEAR NOMINEE

Gwen Jorgensen is in her fifth year as a triathlete, and she has already won six World Series races, three in a row. If you don’t build up a massive lead after the bike phase, just wave as she goes by.

Meanwhile, Jorgensen’s teammate put a wry smile on less happy news:

NEATEST SHOE TRICK

HOTTEST EVENT

World Cup game? Nope. USA Track and Field Championships in Sacramento.

https://twitter.com/chrisnickinson/status/483342565853261824

BEST BREAKOUT PERFORMANCE

Devon Allen is a promising wide receiver who redshirted his freshman year at Oregon. He’s also the NCAA champion in the 110-meter hurdles. And the U.S. champion.

Jenny Simpson held off Mary Cain to win the women’s 1,500.

The women’s 5,000 had a fun back-and-forth finish between Molly Huddle and Shannon Rowbury.

And yes, it was a near replay of the women’s 10,000, with Kim Conley rallying past Jordan Hasay.

The Monday Morning Run has the rest of the action.

BEST VOLLEYBALL DIG/KILL

BEST BEACH VOLLEYBALL DIG/KILL

Karri Walsh Jennings and April Ross went on to win the FIVB Grand Slam in Stavanger, Norway.

WORST BEACH VOLLEYBALL TYPO

Can U.S. beach volleyball men get some respect? Say, for example, Season Rosenthal?

Yes, that’s actually Sean Rosenthal, but no, the wires didn’t catch the error.

Anyway, Sean and Phil (Pill? Philosopher?) Dalhausser won the men’s bracket in Stavanger.

BEST SONG WITH “BRASILIA” IN THE TITLE

No contest. (Maybe in the literal sense.)

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, June 16: High jump record must fall

Posted on by Beau Dure

How do you stand out in track and field in a non-Olympic, non-World Championship year?

A world record is the best way to do it, and high jumpers are getting closer and closer. That’s the highlight of this week’s Daily Relay Monday Morning Run, which starts with the Diamond League event in New York, the first in which two men cleared 2.42 meters (that’s 3/4 inch shy of 8 feet). Ukraine’s Bohdan Bondarenko and Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim each took their shots at a new record of 2.46 meters (that’s 3.4 inch over 8 feet) but fell shy.

The funny thing is that they might not even be the best high jumpers in the world at the moment. Russia’s Ivan Ukhov and Canada’s Derek Drouin missed the New York meet. They’ve jumped 2.40 and 2.41 this year. USA’s Erik Kynard has gone over 2.37. Ukhov also cleared 2.42 indoor, while fellow Russian Aleksey Dmitrik got over 2.40.

Meanwhile, we’re promised a few record attempts at the Golden Spike meet tomorrow in Ostrava, Czech Republic. Slight asterisk there, though — they’re in the rarely contested distances of 1,000 meters, 2,000 meters and 20,000 meters. (For the latter, the “one-hour run” mark is also at risk.)

Other best and worst of the week in myriad sports:

BEST U.S. NATIONAL TEAM WIN

U.S. women’s water polo, World League champions despite losing Kami Craig in the final with a lacerated hand.

MOST OVERACHIEVING U.S. NATIONAL TEAM

U.S. women’s field hockey, fourth place at World Cup.

BEST ATHLETE

He’s the best decathlete in the world, so Ashton Eaton already has a pretty good claim to the “best athlete” title. But now he has won an individual Diamond League event: 400-meter hurdles.

BEST ITEM IN OLLIE’S ROUNDUP 

“World governing body Fila, fed up with being mistaken for a form of pastry best employed with spinach, is …” read the rest.

BEST EXCUSE FOR SOCCER REFEREES

Hey, at least we don’t allow 12 players on the field like those charlatans in field hockey.

BEST DEFENSIVE START TO A WORLD CUP QUALIFYING CAMPAIGN

England’s women: Seven games, seven wins, 36 goals scored, 0 goals conceded. (OK, so Germany has scored 56. They conceded three. Slackers.)

MOST SURPRISING CYCLING WIN

Now you know why the big guns always chase down the breakaways — American Andrew Talansky won the Dauphine Libere when Alberto Contador and Chris Froome waited too long to catch him in the final stage.

FASTEST SKATER AMONG MINOR LEAGUE BASEBALL PLAYERS

Short-track skater Eddy Alvarez is going into the Chicago White Sox farm system.

WORST TRANSLATION

WORST DIVE OF ALL TIME

Still the champion …

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, June 9: Horse-athlon

Posted on by Beau Dure

Heading into the weekend, I cast some doubt on the hype for the modern pentathlon World Cup final, which included the peculiar boast that it was expected to draw a U.S. audience of 25 million on NBC Universal. I couldn’t even find actual broadcast info after checking several sources.

Then I suggested the following:

That probably wouldn’t go over well in the host city(ies) of Sarasota/Bradenton, where the local writeup headline is “Equestrian event ignites interest.”

In the morning, less than 30 spectators watched athletes begin their quest for pentathlon glory during the fencing and swimming events at the Selby Aquatic Center.

OK, granted, the fencing is hard to follow. And you can catch half (well, two-thirds, in a sense) of the pentathlon at one venue later in the day.

More than half the number of spectators that filled the grandstands to watch the show jumping portion of the event left by the time the combined running and shooting event started.

You know, if you just want to see show jumping, you can.

I had a lot of fun covering pentathlon in Beijing. Maybe one day it’ll be appreciated for what it is. Though this is a nice first step:

Best and worst from myriad sports this week:

BEST WORLD CUP PERFORMANCE

USA 4, Germany 1.

USA 2, Argentina 2.

OK, so it’s women’s field hockey, not men’s soccer. Still very impressive. And the USA is likely headed to its first World Cup semifinal in 20 years.

BEST U.S. TEAM PERFORMANCE INVOLVING A NET

BEST JUDO TRIP TO CUBA

BEST PERFORMANCE IN EMERGING SPORT

Is 3v3 basketball the next beach volleyball? Given the comparative histories of the sports, probably not. But the U.S. women continue to dominate, taking World Championship gold. The men lost in the round of 16 but got a bronze medal in the dunk contest.

BEST AQUATIC EVENT THIS WEEK

BEST AQUATIC PERFORMANCE BY 50SOMETHINGS

WEIRDEST CHORD

F#-A-E … A#? Or is Omar Gonzalez just using his ring finger to mute the G string? Or playing in alternate tuning?

BEST TRIATHLON TRANSITION

From short-track speedskating to long triathlon:

WORST INJURIES

Scotland beat the USA in rugby, four injuries to nil.

BEST ROUNDUPS

– Ollie Williams’ Frontier Sports: More on Team Chris Froome vs. Team Bradley Wiggins, Rio promising clean water for sailing, first steps toward women’s Nordic combined, a triathlon misprint, Rulon Gardner forgetting he’s nearly my age.

– Daily Relay’s Monday Morning Run: The Tori Bowie phenomenon, some youngsters ready to challenge Mary Cain, decathlon champion Ashton Eaton blasting through the 400 hurdles.

– Team USA Sports Scene: More World Cup medals — in shooting this time.

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olympic sports, track and field, winter sports

Monday Myriad, June 2: French Open fun

Posted on by Beau Dure

Best and worst from myriad sports over the week …

BEST U.S. ATHLETE AT THE MOMENT

That would be triathlete Gwen Jorgensen. She won again in the World Triathlon Series, this time on the Olympic course in London. And she’s leading the series.

Fellow American Sarah Groff was second.

BEST CHANNELING OF PREFONTAINE

Galen Rupp just keeps getting better. Friday at the Prefontaine Classic, he took down the U.S. record at 10,000 meters. The time: 26:44.36. Oregon fans appreciated it.

BEST RACE

Grenada’s Kirani James ran a world-leading 43.97 in the men’s 400, tied for 10th-best of all time. In second place, LaShawn Merritt … in a world-leading 43.97, tied for 10th-best of all time.

BIGGEST SURPRISE

Tori Bowie transformed from relatively unknown long jumper to the fastest 200-meter runner in the world this year in precisely 22.18 seconds.

ALSO AT THE PREFONTAINE

– Shot put (men): Reese Hoffa won with throw of 21.64 meters, with Joe Kovacs and Christian Cantwell also over 21.

– Triple jump (men): Will Claye needed a meet-record 17.66 to beat Christian Taylor (17.42).

– 2-mile run (women): It’s not run often, but it’s still impressive to see two area records set in a meet by the people who finished third and fourth. The latter, the American record, goes to Shannon Rowbury. (DUKE!)

– 100 meters (men): Justin Gatlin won in 9.76 seconds. The wind will keep it out of the top-10 lists. Michael Rodgers crossed in 9.80 seconds.

– Mile (men): Djibouti’s Ayanleh Souleiman ran the fastest time in the world this year. And in Prefontaine history. And Diamond League history. And Djibouti history. That’s 3:47.32, edging Kenya’s Silas Kiplagat.

– Maggie Vessey wore this in the women’s 800:

https://twitter.com/jf717/status/472576965099421696

BEST RETURN

2012 silver medalist Trey Hardee scored 8,518 points in the IAAF Hypo Meeting decathlon won the win in his first full event since London.

BEST PAPER AIRPLANE THROW

BEST CORRECTION TO A STORY INVOLVING THE BEST PAPER AIRPLANE THROW

From The Guardian: “This article was amended on 2 June 2014 because the original said Riojas was unarmed, rather than unharmed.”

BTW, England won 3-0.

BIGGEST QUESTION AFFECTING ME AND FEW OTHERS

So if Discovery is buying Eurosport, does that mean I can drive around the Beltway to their offices and watch it?

MOST CURIOUS TENNIS DEVELOPMENT

BEST REACTION TO MOST CURIOUS TENNIS DEVELOPMENT

SECOND MOST CURIOUS TENNIS DEVELOPMENT

Let’s say you’re getting married by the beach, and all of a sudden, Serena Williams walks by. And just think, if she were still playing in France, this would’ve been impossible.

BEST REACTION TO SECOND MOST CURIOUS TENNIS DEVELOPMENT

THIRD MOST CURIOUS TENNIS DEVELOPMENT

(He went on to beat Roger Federer.)

BEST U.S. RECORD (tie)

BEST BEACH VOLLEYBALL CAREER

Kerri Walsh Jennings won her 67th AVP event, breaking the record she shared with longtime partner Misty May-Treanor. Earlier this year, she set the record for FIVB wins.

BIGGEST UPSET

Field hockey World Cup: USA 2, England 1. A couple of highlight-reel saves from U.S. goalie Jackie Kintzer in this one:

BEST COUNTRY FOR CYCLING PRODIGIES

WORST HOT POTATO

We already know no one wants to host the 2022 Olympics. But 2024? No, Philly? No, NYC?

LEAST SURPRISING OLYMPICS NEWS

WORST TIMING

What would he have done if he had lost?

THE ROUNDUPS

– Team USA Sports Scene: Sam Mikulak leads the U.S. gymnastics men, U.S. men beat Brazil in water polo.

– Ollie Williams’ Frontier Sports:  2022 and 2024 bidding update, U.S. engineering archer, plenty of cycling news, good story on once-homeless English soccer player Fara Williams, the other view of the USA’s shocking field hockey win, lots or rowing.

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, May 26: Relay the World …

Posted on by Beau Dure

Best and worst from myriad sports over the week …

BEST EVENT

World Relays. So simple, so wonderful. National teams in 4×100, 4×200, 4×400, 4×800 and 4×1,500, all in the track-crazed Bahamas.

Alan Abrahamson was on the scene:

Unlike, for instance, the first few days of last year’s world championships in Moscow, where Luzhniki Stadium was way too empty, here Robinson was alive and jamming. It was 79 years to the day that Jesse Owens had done his thing, tying or setting four world records in the space of 45 minutes at the Big Ten championships, and all of a sudden Sunday track and field was vital again.

They went crazy here, cheering loud and long for the consolation final in the men’s 400, won by the Belgians. The consolation final!

Daily Relay’s Jesse Squire can’t wait until next year.

The inaugural IAAF World Relays was a sellout on both of its days and the stadium was buzzing with energy. The interest among international fans was keen. Virtually every single athlete seemed to love it. The meet is coming back to Nassau next year and it might become an even bigger deal. No doubt about it, this was the best innovation by the IAAF in three decades. I am seriously considering making a trip to the Bahamas for this meet next year.

Maybe the U.S. men’s sprinters will learn to pass the baton by then.

Other than the two botched handoffs, the meet went pretty well for the Americans. The men’s distance runners were second (4×1,500) and third (4×800). The women won four of the five races and took second in the 4×1,500. And the men and women swept the marquee event — the 4×400.

BEST RETURN

Ollie Williams is back with the daily links in Olympic sports. Highlights today: A surprise loss for Indian boxing legend Mary Kom that will keep her out of the Commonwealth Games, British dominance in sprint canoe/kayak, and a wrap of gymnastics’ European Championships.

BEST TRIP TO CHINA

In two races in China, Gatlin ran the two fastest times of the year.

BIGGEST UPSET

Japan beat perennial champion China at the Thomas Cup (men’s badminton), then took care of Malaysia (featuring world No. 1 Lee Chong Wei) in the final.

BEST ASSIST

Columbus’ Federico Higuain sends a through ball that only has eyes for Ethan Finlay.

WORST VOID

Waking up on Saturday mornings without NBCSN’s EPL programming. Can the same crew do a cricket show or something?

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, May 19: I win… oops …

Posted on by Beau Dure

Remember: Cross the finish line before you celebrate.

Two people forgot that lesson this week. The first one, Spanish cyclist Eloy Teruel, had an excuse. The finish for this particular stage of the Tour of California had multiple laps, and he didn’t realize he had one more.

And he maintained a sense of humor.

Less excusable: Taoufik Makhloufi. It’s only 800 meters. Don’t raise your arms after 795.

Also in track and field this week: Most of the Diamond League women’s steeplechase field decided not to go with the pacemaker. Too fast. American Emma Coburn took off with her. Everyone else waited for Coburn to crack and come back. She didn’t.

Daily Relay sums up what we learned from the Diamond League stop in Shanghai. The main takeaway: Blessing Okagbare is a legitimate triple threat.

Back to cycling: The overall winner of the Tour of California already has quite a few honors, even in his name.

The rest of the best and worst …

Best triathlete in Yokohama: Gwen Jorgensen won in the Japanese city for the second straight year.

xxx

Best catch: No, not baseball. Cricket. Your typical “catch, fling it in the air because you’re going over the boundary, jump back in and catch it again” play.

 

xxx

Best shooting mom: Olympic multimedalist Kim Rhode, who had a baby in the time between London 2012 and now, won her second straight skeet shooting World Cup.

xxx

Longest squash rally: As squash points go, this was the jam band/prog rock version.

xxx

Best equestrian 1-2:

xxx

Most exciting event to watch tomorrow: 

xxx

Worst water: Olympic sailing in 2016 doesn’t look like a lot of fun.

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, May 12: Wild chess

Posted on by Beau Dure

The Diamond League is the lead story this week, with a few athletes already in midseason form.

– The men’s high jump was insane, with Russia’s Ivan Ukhov just 0.04 meters off the world record and just 0.04 meters ahead of the next three jumpers.

– Kenya’s Asbel Kiprop set a meet record and nearly reached the top 10 of all time in the men’s 1,500 meters, finishing in 3:29.18. The top six were all under 3:31.

– Hellen Obiri, also of Kenya, ran the fastest 3,000 meters of all time aside from four people in a sketchy meet in China in 1993. She finished in 8:20.68.

– The USA’s LaShawn Merritt tied his own 2014 world lead (44.44 seconds) in the 400 meters.

Check out the Daily Relay wrap and GIFs of the track and field weekend, then read on …

*****

Best chess news: The U.S. Championships have been entertaining.

Worst chess news: Hello? World Championship here? Anyone want to host?

*****

Most apprehensive BMX rider: Funny thing — she won silver.

https://twitter.com/Flynfelicia/status/465612889576177664

*****

Best U.S. performance that hasn’t been rounded up: Three diving medals in the Puerto Rico Grand Prix.

*****

Biggest breakout win: U.S. men’s rugby exorcised a few demons …

*****

Best geopolitical statement: Russian team Dinamo Kazan wins world club volleyball championship with U.S. player Jordan Larson.

*****

Two bad IOC decisions that are in no way related, maybe: 

1. They’re almost making progress on the golf course Rio has to build because golf was added to the Olympics.

2. The 2016 Olympics are almost definitely probably not moving to London.

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track and field

Track and field Diamond League: Is this good?

Posted on by Beau Dure

Today is the opener of track and field’s Diamond League, which will be the best competition we have in this non-Olympic, non-World Championship year. (Watch on Universal Sports at noon ET.)

I’m excited, and I know most of you aren’t.

I think part of the problem is that we don’t really know what qualifies as a “good” performance. We see that someone ran the 100-meter hurdles in 12.62 seconds. That doesn’t capture the imagination.

So I’m experimenting with a chart that will help you figure out what’s what. You’ll see the world records (some of them set in an era of sketchy or nonexistent drug testing), the best performance of the 10th-best performer of all time, the U.S. record, the best performance of 2013, the best performance of the 5th-best performer of 2013, and the best performance of 2014 (through May 7).

Then you’ll see what the complex IAAF scoring tables, set by statistical analysis way above my mathematical abilities, tell you are elite-level performances — the 1,300- and 1,200-point levels. In several disciplines, no one has ever reached the 1,300-point level. But in most disciplines, a 1,200-point performance is needed to win.

Then I tossed in the worst time (or distance or height) of the winning Diamond League performances from 2013. Take those with a grain of salt. Every now and then, you get a sprint into a headwind, a field event in driving rain, or a “tactical” distance race in which everyone goes slowly (by their standards) and figures they’ll win with a big kick at the end.

But those Diamond League marks can sometimes tell you we’re about to see things rev up in a big way. See those events in which the best performance of 2014 (so far) is worse than the worst winning performance of last year’s Diamond League? Yeah. Time to go faster, higher, farther.

[gview file=”http://www.sportsmyriad.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/Track-and-field-performance-Sheet1.pdf”%5D

For more on today’s Diamond League, see Nick Zaccardi’s preview for NBC or the weekend preview at the Daily Relay.

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, May 5: Field hockey’s big dance

Posted on by Beau Dure

A new track circuit, some beach volleyball news and a cute dog from Sochi are in the Myriad wrap this week.

Best U.S. team performance/clincher of a berth in 2016 Champions Trophy:

***

Best roundup of a neglected competition format: The year in college track and field dual meets, from DailyRelay.com.

Best roundup of the rest of the track and field world: Again, DailyRelay.com, which has a few words to explain why Meb Keflegizhi’s Boston win wasn’t a shock, an upset that could shake up the LaShawn Merritt-Kirani James rivalry in the men’s 400, a stunning U.S. performance in the men’s 5,000, the bewildering application of justice in the Tyson Gay doping case, Christian Cantwell’s rebound from 2013 in the shot put … just read the whole thing. We’ll wait.

Most accessible track circuit debut: Fans are close to the action in the new American Track League. Music by Velveteen Playboys — that’s Friend of SportsMyriad Paul Souza in the awesome suit.

***

Boldest women’s sports projection:

***

Best fencing performance by a three-time Olympian and two-time gold medalist:

The women’s team took silver, beating Ukraine in the semis and losing to Russia in the final.

***

Biggest U.S. beach volleyball event: July’s ASICS World Series of Beach Volleyball combines the competitive heft of an FIVB event with some uniquely American trappings.

Worst spelling of “unforced”:

***

Cutest dog: Lindsey Jacobellis already had a dog before she left for the 2014 Olympics. That’s the one on the right. The one on the left is named Sochi, for obvious reasons. (HT: For The Win)

http://instagram.com/p/njRbsAhMRb/

***

Worst undying controversy: So it wasn’t the suits that caused the US Speedskating flop in Sochi! It was altitude training, skate polishing, and the fact that the skaters weren’t used to … well, the suits.

Least impressed person in wake of US Speedskating report: Unless something is seriously lost in translation, Shani Davis has had it with the federation. (HT: @nzaccardi)

***

Least surprising world champion:

The U.S. women finished tied for 21st; the men were tied for 49th. Full recap and videos.

***

Best ongoing Hollywood love affair with an Olympic sport: Archery isn’t just for the Hunger Games films.

***

Best conversation about darts: 

https://twitter.com/Reda_Eurosport/status/462246435548037120

***

And finally, the most frightening training routine: Mo Farah running away from things, meet Mo Farah jumping over people …

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olympic sports, track and field

Monday Myriad, April 29: Spike and swim

Posted on by Beau Dure

(Delayed by urgent family business)

Kerri Walsh Jennings? Michael Phelps? What is this — 2008?

That’s the modern-day Olympic athlete for you. It ain’t over until they’re my age.

Best team: 

Best team visiting China: U.S. archers grabbed five medals at a World Cup stop in Shanghai.

Best race:

Closest race: They had to break out the thousandths to determine that Kristi Castlin upset world champion Brianna Rollins in the Drake Relays 100 hurdles.

Best race in water: And to think that Katie Ledecky is best known for her long-distance swims …

Best mental matchup: The USA’s Hikaru Nakamura loves to challenge world chess champion Magnus Carlsen. Just went astray this time.

Weirdest closing position: Hey, if it takes 101 moves and this weird double-phalanx position to get a draw with world chess champion Magnus Carlsen, knock yourself out, Teimour Radjabov. Looks like the pieces are collapsing toward the center of a black hole.

Best 1-2: 

Best 3-4 (week) and 4-5 (season): Gwen Jorgensen and Sarah Groff are getting used to being in triathlon contention. 

Best comeback:

Best record: Kerri Walsh Jennings, now paired with April Ross after the retirement of longtime partner Misty May-Treanor, has a record 47 FIVB beach volleyball titles.

Biggest domination: World Series of Diving stopped by the London 2012 Olympic venue (just a week after I was there), and … it was a lot of China.

Biggest throw: This brief judo matchup comes from the always essential Frontier Sports roundup:

Best punchline setup: Also from Frontier Sports: “Rio’s mayor says sports are making too many “unnecessary demands” ahead of the Games.”

Like … having places to play games, run, swim, etc.

Least convincing denial / best humblebrag:

Worst handoff: It’s only fair that the Bahamas beat the USA in the Penn Relays men’s 4×400 after the U.S. anchor tried to run off with their baton.

https://twitter.com/dailyrelay/status/460147994583920640

Full wraps:

– Penn Relays/Drake Relays (and several marathons) at Daily Relay’s Monday Morning Run. Also includes a GIF of the messed-up baton handoff.

– Sailing: Stacked World Cup competition in France.

– TeamUSA.org: All the swimming, plus equestrian and field hockey.

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