There's life in the American athletics club programme, after all.
In the view of many, club track, American-style, was destined for the scrap heat once the era of corporate team domination took hold. But, as the fifth edition of the USA Track and Field National Club Championships, staged Friday-Saturday, July 15-16 at the state-of-the-art Icahn Stadium on Randalls Island, vigorously proved, reports of club track's demise are both premature and off the mark.
With a cast of over 600 athletes, representing 30 states and 65 club teams, the National Club Championships proved itself a rousing success.
With the glory of their clubs on the line, and national bragging rights at stake, National Club Championships competitors erased 17 meet records and tied another.
Staged previously in Indianapolis (2001 through 2004), the meet moved East to considerable fanfare and more than lived up to expectations.
Just as designed, the meet's primary focus was on team points - each of the 23 events for men and women was scored 10-8-6-5-4-3-2-1. And the scrapping for team titles proved intense.
An old-line club, the Shore Athletic Club of New Jersey - whose history dates back to the 1930s and whose past rosters included the likes of track greats Eulace Peacock, Herb McKenley, Andy Stanfield, John Borican, Blaine and Wayne Rideout and Elmore Harris - took the National Club men's title, in a spirited battle with the New York Elite Club, 140 points to 136. There was nail-biting drama in the men's team race until the very last event.
With everything hinging on the results of the 4x400-meter relay, a New York Elite Club quartet took the gold in 3:07.92. But Shore AC, which had run 3:12.81 in the previous section, held on to take second over-all in the relay and the eight points that nailed down the team crown.
"We had a lot of heroes today, everybody contributed, they knew they weren't running for themselves but for the team, and that's why they came through as successfully as they did," said Tim Brennan, the Shore AC team coach.
"Shore AC's been in existence for over 70 years," said Brennan. "Eulace Peacock of Shore AC beat Jesse Owens twice, in the 100 and Long Jump, at the 1935 Nationals; Shore AC's Blaine Rideout beat Glenn Cunningham in the 1500 meters at the 1939 Nationals; Bill Reilly anchored Shore AC to the National AAU distance medley relay title in 1965, and Tora Harris of Shore AC high jumped in the Athens Olympic Games.
"But I really, honestly feel that this has to be one of Shore AC's greatest moments in all those years."
LeMans Track Club of New York City - whose origins are of far more recent vintage than Shore AC's - collected the women's team championship trophy, 160.5 points to 148.5 points, over the Greater Boston Track Club.
Each winning team had major standouts.
For Shore AC, it was Jimmie Hackley, just back from the European circuit, with a 47.13 400m triumph, followed by a second place to New York Elite Club's Kenneth Baxter, 20.83 to 21.18, in the 200m final…Hackley had equalled the meet's 200m record with a 20.82 clocking in the qualifying round.
But Vincenzo Insingo (Discus winner at 52.31, Shot Put bronze medallist at 15.29), Aaron Braxton (Shot Put winner at 15.38, Discus bronze medallist at 47.54) and Long Jump champion (Okie Giwa-Agbomeirele at 7.77m) were major Shore AC contributors, too.
Still, it took a strong anchor 400 by Bryant McCombs for Shore AC to come home in 3:12.81 and hold on (after a quick check of the big scoreboard) to second place in the 4x400 relay for the clinching points.
"You might say I was a little nervous, when that race went off," said Brennan.
Nolle Graham, the Jamaica-born graduate of Taft High School in the Bronx (just a few miles from Randalls Island) and New Jersey's Seton Hall University, was the biggest gun in the LeMans Club's title drive to the women's division.
All Graham did was win the 100 (11.66), place second in the 200, win the Long Jump (6.21) and take a gold in the 4x4100 relay and a bronze in the 4x400.
Along with the contributions of former Seton Hall teammate Bridgette Ingram (who took golds in the Shot Put and 4x100 relay, and added points in the 100 Hurdles, 4x400, High Jump and Long Jump), LeMans was able to hold off Greater Boston Track Club for the women's team title.
On the men's side of the meet record book, New York Elite baton-passers set meet marks in the 4x400 (3:07.92), 4x800 (7:35.42), 200-200-400-800 sprint medley (3:24.28) and 1200-400-800-1600 distance medley (10:16.24.)
New York Elite's Kenneth Baxter lowered the 100-meter meet record to 10.41, then upset Hackley (20.83 to 21.18) in the 200 final.
The first-year Executive Track Club, based on Long Island, produced two record-breakers, Unyime Akpan in the 110m High Hurdles (13.78) and its 4x100 team (40.41.)
Three-time Pan American Games Pole Vault champion Pat Manson of the Indiana Invaders raised the meet record to 5.21 before missing three cracks at 5.50.
Two-time USA Olympian Tim Seaman of New York Athletic Club skimmed the 5000m Race Walk record to 20:34.13. Olympian Joanne Dow of the New England Walkers Club lowered the women's 5000 Race Walk record to 22:54.73.
All three women's barrier events produced record runs - New York Elite's Antoinette winning the 100 Hurdles in 13.15, Norfolk Real Deal Club's Elizabeth Bayne taking the 400 hurdles (59.14.), and Pacers Club's Dawn Cromer the 3000 steeplechase (10:11.82).
Greater Boston's Sherita Williams spanned 13.14 for a Triple Jump record, and clubmate Kateema Riettie extended the Javelin record to 47.66.
While all five relay records fell on the men's programme, just one relay mark was toppled on the women's side, with a Greater Boston quartet running 9:14.31 in the 4x800m.
No team titles are now awarded in the USA National Championship meets indoors and outdoors - which are usually dominated by the contract pros representing the athletic shoe and apparel companies.
Team titles were legislated off the meet protocol once it was determined that there was greatly diminished opportunity for the "real" clubs - almost all of them community-based teams - to make a dent in the scoring or the attention, of the money-backed corporate squads.
The intent of the USATF's National Club Championship meet was to plug that gap, and the plan is working like a charm.
"Let's face it, the vast majority of these athletes are never going to make the Olympics, or a World Championships team," said Shore AC's Brennan.
"So this becomes their own Olympics, their own Worlds. And the battle for team points makes it even better."
Elliott Denman for the IAAF
