World records rattled, Usain Bolt record falls, Olympic champs out at track and field trials

By OlympicTalkJun 26, 2021, 10:57 PM EDT

Grant Holloway and Rai Benjamin ran the second-fastest times in history in their hurdles events, Gabby Thomas ran the third-fastest 200m ever, a Usain Bolt record fell and a pair of Olympic gold medalists failed to qualify for Tokyo.

It was a news-making penultimate evening at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials.

Holloway, the world 110m hurdles champion, missed Aries Merritt‘s world record by .01 by clocking 12.81 seconds in the semifinals. He then won the final in 12.96 about 100 minutes later, joined on the team by Devon Allen and Daniel Roberts.

Holloway’s semi was stunning in part because his personal best was 12.98 seconds. He moved from joint-18th-fastest in history to No. 2 in one heat at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon.

“The goal was to execute at a very high level,” Holloway told Lewis Johnson on NBC after the semis. “I knew once I did that, the sky was the limit.”

TRACK AND FIELD TRIALS: Results | TV Schedule

Benjamin won the 400m hurdles final in 46.83 seconds, .05 off Kevin Young‘s world record from the 1992 Olympics, the longest-standing record in men’s track. Benjamin, the world silver medalist, is set for a showdown with two-time world champion Karsten Warholm of Norway and Abderrahman Samba of Qatar in Tokyo. They’ve been Nos. 2-4 in history behind Young since 2019.

“.05 isn’t anything in the grand scheme of things,” said Benjamin, who leads a men’s 400m hurdles team of Olympic rookies, joined by Kenny Selmon and David Kendziera. “It hurts a little bit that it was right there, and I couldn’t grab it, but it’s just more fuel for the fire. … If I got a world record now, would I be able to maintain that level of fitness [for the Olympics]?”

Thomas won the 200m in 21.61 seconds, a time only bettered by Florence Griffith Joyner in the 1980s (21.34 and 21.56). She lowered her personal best in all three rounds from 22.17.

“I’m speechless,” said Thomas, who graduated from Harvard with a neurobiology and global health/healthy policy degree and is pursuing a masters in epidemiology at Texas. “I’m still trying to gather my thoughts. I can’t believe it right now.”

Thomas was joined on the 200m team by Jenna Prandini and Anavia Battle. Allyson Felix was fifth in her baby event that she first raced at the Olympics at age 18 in 2004. She’ll race the 400m and up to two relays at her last Olympics in Tokyo.

ON HER TURF: Thomas’ atypical trip to Tokyo

World champion DeAnna Price won the hammer by twice breaking her U.S. record with 79.98- and 80.31-meter throws to rank No. 2 in history. Poland’s two-time reigning Olympic champion Anita Wlodarczyk holds the six best throws in history (was 15 best going into Saturday).

“Mind blowing,” Price said. “I was supposed to be a softball player.”

Price is joined on the Olympic team by Brooke Andersen and Gwendolyn Berry, who rank Nos. 2 and 3 in the world this year. Berry raised a fist on the podium after winning the 2019 Pan American Games in Lima, Peru.

Jenn Suhr, the 2012 Olympic pole vault champion who made the last 10 Olympic and world teams, finished fifth to miss the Tokyo team at age 39. Rio silver medalist Sandi Morris was third to grab the last spot on the team behind Katie Nageotte and Morgann LeLeux. Nageotte took three attempts at breaking Yelena Isinbayeva‘s world record from 2009.

Rio gold medalist Tianna Bartoletta finished 10th in the long jump final and will not defend her title in Tokyo. Brittney Reese, who earned gold and silver at the last two Olympics, won with a 7.13-meter jump.

In semifinals, 17-year-old pro Erriyon Knighton ran 19.88 seconds to break Usain Bolt‘s U20 world record of 19.93. Last month, Knighton broke Bolt’s U18 world record. On Saturday, Knighton edged world champion Noah Lyles by .03 in their heat as both made Sunday’s final. Knighton can become the youngest male U.S. track and field Olympian since miler Jim Ryun in 1964.

Dalilah Muhammad and Sydney McLaughlin, the two fastest women’s 400m hurdlers in history, advanced to Sunday’s final. McLaughlin ran an easy 53.03 to win her semifinal. Muhammad was passed by Shamier Little in the last straight in their semifinal, 53.71 to 53.86.

In the javelin, Maggie Malone made her second Olympic team and Kara Winger is going to a fourth Games.

ON HER TURF: History DeAnna Price can make in Tokyo

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Football takes significant step in Olympic push

By OlympicTalkMar 29, 2023, 2:18 PM EDT

Kirby Lee-USA TODAY Sports

Football took another step toward possible Olympic inclusion with the IOC executive board proposing that the sport’s international federation — the IFAF — be granted full IOC recognition at a meeting in October.

IOC recognition does not equate to eventual Olympic inclusion, but it is a necessary early marker if a sport is to join the Olympics down the line. The IOC gave the IFAF provisional recognition in 2013.

Specific measures are required for IOC recognition, including having an anti-doping policy compliant with the World Anti-Doping Agency and having 50 affiliated national federations from at least three continents. The IFAF has 74 national federations over five continents with almost 4.8 million registered athletes, according to the IOC.

The NFL has helped lead the push for flag football to be added for the 2028 Los Angeles Games. Flag football had medal events for men and women at last year’s World Games, a multi-sport competition including Olympic and non-Olympic sports, in Birmingham, Alabama.

Football is one of nine sports that have been reported to be in the running to be proposed by LA 2028 to the IOC to be added for the 2028 Games only. LA 2028 has not announced which, if any sports, it plans to propose.

Under rules instituted before the Tokyo Games, Olympic hosts have successfully proposed to the IOC adding sports solely for their edition of the Games.

For Tokyo, baseball-softball, karate, skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing were added. For Paris, skateboarding, sport climbing and surfing were approved again, and breaking will make its Olympic debut. Those sports were added four years out from the Games.

For 2028, the other sports reportedly in the running for proposal are baseball and softball, breaking, cricket, karate, kickboxing, lacrosse, motorsports and squash.

All of the other eight sports reportedly in the running for 2028 proposal already have a federation with full IOC recognition (if one counts the international motorcycle racing federation for motorsports).

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Helen Maroulis stars in wrestling documentary, with help from Chris Pratt

By Nick ZaccardiMar 29, 2023, 10:05 AM EDT

Getty

One of the remarkable recent Olympic comeback stories is the subject of a film that will be shown nationwide in theaters for one day only on Thursday.

“Helen | Believe” is a documentary about Helen Maroulis, the first U.S. Olympic women’s wrestling champion. It is produced by Religion of Sports, the venture founded by Gotham Chopra, Michael Strahan and Tom Brady. Showing details are here.

After taking gold at the 2016 Rio Games, Maroulis briefly retired in 2019 during a two-year stretch in which she dealt with concussions and post-traumatic stress disorder. The film focuses on that period and her successful bid to return and qualify for the Tokyo Games, where she took bronze.

In a poignant moment in the film, Maroulis described her “rock bottom” — being hospitalized for suicidal ideations.

In an interview, Maroulis said she was first approached about the project in 2018, the same year she had her first life-changing concussion that January. A wrestling partner’s mother was connected to director Dylan Mulick.

Maroulis agreed to the film in part to help spread mental health awareness in sports. Later, she cried while watching the 2020 HBO film, “The Weight of Gold,” on the mental health challenges that other Olympians faced, because it resonated with her so much.

“When you’re going through something, it sometimes gives you an anchor of hope to know that someone’s been through it before, and they’ve overcome it,” she said.

Maroulis’ comeback story hit a crossroads at the Olympic trials in April 2021, where the winner of a best-of-three finals series in each weight class made Team USA.

Maroulis won the opening match against Jenna Burkert, but then lost the second match. Statistically, a wrestler who loses the second match in a best-of-three series usually loses the third. But Maroulis pinned Burkert just 22 seconds into the rubber match to clinch the Olympic spot.

Shen then revealed that she tore an MCL two weeks earlier.

“They told me I would have to be in a brace for six weeks,” she said then. “I said, ‘I don’t have that. I have two and a half.’”

Maroulis said she later asked the director what would have happened if she didn’t make the team for Tokyo. She was told the film still have been done.

“He had mentioned this isn’t about a sports story or sports comeback story,” Maroulis said. “This is about a human story. And we’re using wrestling as the vehicle to tell this story of overcoming and healing and rediscovering oneself.”

Maroulis said she was told that, during filming, the project was pitched to the production company of actor Chris Pratt, who wrestled in high school in Washington. Pratt signed on as a producer.

“Wrestling has made an impact on his life, and so he wants to support these kinds of stories,” said Maroulis, who appeared at last month’s Santa Barbara Film Festival with Pratt.

Pratt said he knew about Maroulis before learning about the film, which he said “needed a little help to get it over the finish line,” according to a public relations company promoting the film.

The film also highlights the rest of the six-woman U.S. Olympic wrestling team in Tokyo. Four of the six won a medal, including Tamyra Mensah-Stock‘s gold.

“I was excited to be part of, not just (Maroulis’) incredible story, but also helping to further advance wrestling and, in particular, female wrestling,” Pratt said, according to responses provided by the PR company from submitted questions. “To me, the most compelling part of Helen’s story is the example of what life looks like after a person wins a gold medal. The inevitable comedown, the trauma around her injuries, the PTSD, the drive to continue that is what makes her who she is.”

Maroulis, who now trains in Arizona, hopes to qualify for this year’s world championships and next year’s Olympics.

“I try to treat every Games as my last,” she said. “Now I’m leaning toward being done [after 2024], but never say never.”

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