April 2004 Issue

Speed Like Nowhere Else: OT m100 Preview

by Sieg Lindstrom

No other event in sprinting quite matches the U.S. Olympic Trials 100. The long-held truism—as true for Athens as for any recent Olympics—is that predicting the dash finalists for the Games themselves is easier once the U.S. team is determined than reading the tea leaves on who will make the OT final; especially its top 3.

“The big thing you have to look at here is that at the U.S. Trials everybody’s going to be ready, and if you’re a smart man, you’d better be on top of your game also,” says Florida coach Mike Holloway—who guides John Capel, the No. 1 World Ranked dash man last year, and national champion Bernard Williams.

Couldn’t have said it better ourselves, so without further ado, some skinny on the men to watch…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

T&FN Gives Best Odds to Gatlin & Capel

(odds of finishing in top 3)

Capel .... 3-2
Gatlin ... 3-2
Williams ........

(for our odds on the 13 top U.S. sprinters, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

The Rival Sprint Camps

Training groups are nothing new in the sport, but the rise of truly professional track has brought with it sprint camps among which the rivalries run hot and fierce.

John Smith and Emanuel Hudson’s HSI, Trevor Graham’s Sprint Capitol and Mike Holloway’s pair of post-collegians are the top camps—groups with more than one men’s 100 star—going into this Trials. Each has a slightly different philosophy.

“We’re keeping a low profile this year, just cooking along and working every day,” says HSI manager Hudson. “This season we’re taking the approach of ‘walk softly and carry a big stick’…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Dan Pfaff Now Coaching Marion Jones

by Jon Hendershott

Dan Pfaff always has considered himself to be a teacher. He spent nearly three decades of his coaching life directing athletes in high-caliber collegiate programs such as Houston, UTEP, LSU and most recently Texas.

And while he tutored myriad NCAA champions, especially in the field events, Pfaff also worked with a who’s-who of world-class talent, mainly sprinters. Most notably, he directed Donovan Bailey to the ’96 Olympic 100 title in World Record time.

But last fall the 50-year-old Pfaff undertook a radical departure in his coaching career: he veered away from the college system to became coach for megastar Marion Jones and her partner, 100 WR holder Tim Montgomery, plus a few other select athletes based in Raleigh, North Carolina.

“Some people called the change my mid-life crisis,” …

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

World Indoor Championships Men

by Jonathan Berenbom

The 10th World Indoor Championships was highlighted by strong field event performances and nobody was better on the field than the Swedes.

Top billing went to Christian Olsson, whose 58-6 equalled the World Record in the triple jump. Not since ’89, when the meet was previously held in Budapest, had a men’s field event mark been set in the WIC…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

A Different Allen Johnson In The Final

by Jon Hendershott

There’s something about racing for a championship that does remarkable things for Allen Johnson. But after his first two races at the World Indoors, the 33-year-old veteran needed something—anything—special.

Johnson went to Budapest to defend his global indoor title having won all five of his meets this winter, including taking Millrose in a season-pacing 7.43.

But he finished 3rd in both his heat and semi at the Worlds, looking very unJohnsonlike in both efforts.

“It was just a rhythm thing and my technique was a bit off,” …

(for more about how Johnson bounced back to win another gold, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Christian Cantwell Now Shot’s Big Man

by Jim Dunaway

“Every morning for breakfast I’d have a whole loaf of bread for toast, a dozen eggs, a package of bacon, a couple of chicken breasts and a big bowl of cereal”…

(for more on how the 6-foot-4, 320-pound Cantwell became world shot champion, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Will Jason Gardner’s 60 Success

by Paul Gains

…Gardener’s challenge now is to emulate Maurice Greene—the only world indoor 60 champ ever to win the Olympics—in Athens. Carl Lewis, Linford Christie and Donovan Bailey, recent Olympic champions all, never won the world indoor title.

Yet relatively obscure names like Lee McRae, Andrés Simon and Háris Papadiás have won the short dash. The transformation to the longer race is, therefore, hardly a certainty.

“This past year not many athletes have been running under 10 seconds,” Gardener argues in his defense, “and I have run consistently under 6.50 five times and I think that is the most important thing—consistency at that level.

“If I can consistently go through the 60m checkpoint in the 100m race under 6.50 it doesn’t take much sense to work out that I will run well over 100m…”

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

World Indoor Championships Women

by Kevin Saylors

Veni, Vidi, Vici! The phrase, “I came, I saw, I conquered,” attributed to Julius Caesar, was an appropriate mantra for the Russian women in Budapest, a town originally established by the Romans.

The team of 26 collected 14 medals, with victories in 7 of the 14 events, including 3 gold-silver sweeps and 5 World Records.

WR-level performances were produced by horizontal jumper Tatyana Lebedeva and vaulter Yelena Isinbayeva, as well as the one team race--the 4 x 400—which produced another WR, 3:23.88…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Yelena Isinbayeva Threatens 16ft & 5m

by Sieg Lindstrom

Is Yelena Isinbayeva poised to relegate her rivalry with Svetlana Feofanova to the dust bin of history?

Trading World Records this winter the two Russians made it clear there was no love lost between them.

After Isinbayeva’s 15-111/4 (4.86) salvo to win in Budapest, one countryman joked to the press, “It’s a good thing Stacy Dragila took 2nd so she could stand between them on the podium.”…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

USATF Championships

by Roy Conrad

If one World Championships berth is good, then two are twice as good. That was the motto followed by 30-somethings Gail Devers and Jen Toomey as each earned two team positions for Budapest with historic doubles.…

(for the full details, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Q&A With Jen Toomey

by Sieg Lindstrom

…Q: After your Indoor double, will you race more 1500s?

A: You know, it’s funny. I’ve been told for a really long time that I should move up to the 1500, but I never got it, I never understood how to run it, I never liked it. But running the 1500 Sunday, all of a sudden things just clicked for me. I’m like, “Hmmm, I can do this.”

I’d like to say that I’ll focus on the 8 more than the 15, but I think that I’m focusing on both. My training doesn’t need to change all that much to do one or the other. My coach right now has me training for the 15, but that’s only helped my 8…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Nationals Lead To HS Athlete Of Year Selections

Athlete Of The Year choices figured to be decided as the high school season wrapped up with the staging of the coincident two “national championship” meets, the National Scholastic Indoor Championships (NSIC) and the Nike Indoor Classic (NIC).

And when all was said and done, quartermiler Elzie Coleman and versatile Devon Williams had established themselves as No. 1s in the nation, but not without a fight from superstars the ilk of Xavier Carter and Scott Sellers…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

Nationals Lead To HS Athlete Of Year Selections

Athlete Of The Year choices figured to be decided as the high school season wrapped up with the staging of the coincident two “national championship” meets, the National Scholastic Indoor Championships (NSIC) and the Nike Indoor Classic (NIC).

And when all was said and done, quartermiler Elzie Coleman and versatile Devon Williams had established themselves as No. 1s in the nation, but not without a fight from superstars the ilk of Xavier Carter and Scott Sellers…

(for more, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

As Rod Stewart sang, “Every picture tells a story, don’t it.” There are thousands of words—most of them good ones—in every issue of T&FN, but as the old adage goes, a picture is worth a thousand of them.

There’s something about track & field that brings out the Peter Pan in me (I’ll never grow old!), and I suspect it does in you too. Even if your competitive days are long behind you, don’t you live vicariously through the athletes on the field of play? Sprint with every sprinter, jump with every jumper, throw with every thrower?

But if you’re like me, your vicarious living doesn’t just happen when you’re actually at a meet; it also happens as you thumb the pages of T&FN, right? I frequently go off on wonderful flights of fantasy using T&FN pictures as my vehicle…

(for the full details, read the April Issue of Track & Field News)

And in the May issue…

Would you believe that 50 years have passed since May 6, 1954, when Roger Bannister became the first to break the 4:00 barrier in the mile? With miling being the issue’s theme, we’ll revisit that that legendary day, take a look at the current crop of U.S. milers and have a special on-site report from Hicham El Guerrouj’s training camps in Morocco.

Look too, for our annual Camps Roundup, giving all you youngsters the details on the best places to find summer instruction in T&F.