Luguelin Santos en route to victory in the New York 400m (© Victah Sailer)
Felix Sanchez has been the standard bearer for his country's athletics for more than a decade but the Dominican Republic could soon have a new hero to hail in the shape of the lean teenager Luguelin Santos.
At the age of just 18, the 400m runner has shown this summer that he can hold his own with the very best in the world, regardless of their age and experience.
Santos announced his arrival as someone to watch at the age of 16 when he won at the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore in 47.11.
Although he had run almost a second faster on home soil earlier in the summer, that performance had largely been under the radar. However, his outings in Singapore showed that it was no flukes and the timing equipment had been calibrated correctly.
His upward trajectory continued in stunning fashion at the Pan American Games in the Mexican city of Guadalajara last October.
He firstly clocked a national junior 400m record of 45.41 in his heat and then left observers open-mouthed in the final when he sped to a time of 44.71 for a world-age 17 best as well as a silver medal behind Costa Rica's soon-to-be World Indoor Championships winner Nery Brenes.
Sanchez in the shade
Santos also performed a little act of lèse majesté with his Guadalajara run by depriving Sanchez of his national record over one lap of the track without the barriers, the 2004 Olympic Games 400m hurdles champion having run 44.90 in 2001.
There has been no stopping Santos this this summer either.
After some warm up races in the Caribbean, he went under 45 seconds again with 44.88 at the Samsung Diamond League meeting in Doha in May, only being defeated by American star LaShawn Merritt.
Santos then rubbed out Merritt's own world age-18 best of 44.66, set in 2005, from the record books when he won in 44.45 at the IAAF World Challenge meeting in Hengelo, The Netherlands, on 27 May.
An outright Samsung Diamond League victory in New York on 9 June followed.
The prodigiously talented young man from the town of Bayaguana, which lies just a few miles from the Dominican Republic capital Santo Domingo, is now third on the world 400m all-time junior lists behind the United States' Steve Lewis, who won the 1988 Olympic Games 400m title while still only 19 and Grenada's 2011 IAAF World Championships gold medallist Kirani James.
Following his early season assault on the clock, Santos now has two specific goals in mind for the rest of 2012: victory at the forthcoming World Junior Championships in Barcelona - where the championship best of 44.66, which has been in the name of Saudi Arabia's Hamdan Odha Al-Bishi cince 2000, could be under threat – and a medal at the Olympic Games in London.
Unique non-American accolade
"I always wanted to be where I am in my life right now but I never dreamed that I would be as fast as I have become so soon," said Santos rather modestly.
"However, I'm just starting on my career and I want to be the only non-American to run 43 seconds; so far only Americans (nine in fact) have finished in under 44 seconds, I want to be the first from somewhere else."
Talking briefly to Santos earlier this season at the IAAF World Challenge meeting in Ostrava, just two days before his Dutch exploits, he revealed a steely determination and commitment to hard work that many teenagers elsewhere in the world might find hard to fathom.
"I can remember exactly when I made up my mind that I wanted to be the best in the world, not just in the Dominican Republic. It was after the national school championships in 2008. I started training seriously that year.
"The next year, I didn't do very well at the Pan American Junior Championships in Trinidad but it gave me an idea of who I would have to face in the future."
What he omitted to say was that, at 15, Santos was one of the youngest athletes at that latter championship and was he was running against boys up to three years older than himself.
Chasing James
Santos also got his first look of James there, who was the eventual gold medallist in Trinidad, and now he is looking to follow in James' footsteps after his win at the last World Junior Championships in Moncton, Canada, two years ago.
A gold medal, barring any dramatic incident such as an injury, seems almost assured in the historic Olympic Stadium Lluís Companys de Montjuïc, whose most famous 400m feat witnessed so far has been Quincy Watts winning at the 1992 Olympic Games in 43.50, which remains the stadium record 20 years later.
It might be too soon in his career for Santos to contemplate revising that particular statistic, despite him racking up a stunning list of superlatives this summer.
As Santos and his coach Jose Rubio Ludwig have both said several times is the last two months, when questioned "It could now be three or four years before I go under 44 seconds."
However, the Spanish have a renowned love for fireworks and Santos could still be the man to provide them at the World Junior Championships in Barcelona.
Phil Minshull for the IAAF
At the age of just 18, the 400m runner has shown this summer that he can hold his own with the very best in the world, regardless of their age and experience.
Santos announced his arrival as someone to watch at the age of 16 when he won at the 2010 Youth Olympic Games in Singapore in 47.11.
Although he had run almost a second faster on home soil earlier in the summer, that performance had largely been under the radar. However, his outings in Singapore showed that it was no flukes and the timing equipment had been calibrated correctly.
His upward trajectory continued in stunning fashion at the Pan American Games in the Mexican city of Guadalajara last October.
He firstly clocked a national junior 400m record of 45.41 in his heat and then left observers open-mouthed in the final when he sped to a time of 44.71 for a world-age 17 best as well as a silver medal behind Costa Rica's soon-to-be World Indoor Championships winner Nery Brenes.
Sanchez in the shade
Santos also performed a little act of lèse majesté with his Guadalajara run by depriving Sanchez of his national record over one lap of the track without the barriers, the 2004 Olympic Games 400m hurdles champion having run 44.90 in 2001.
There has been no stopping Santos this this summer either.
After some warm up races in the Caribbean, he went under 45 seconds again with 44.88 at the Samsung Diamond League meeting in Doha in May, only being defeated by American star LaShawn Merritt.
Santos then rubbed out Merritt's own world age-18 best of 44.66, set in 2005, from the record books when he won in 44.45 at the IAAF World Challenge meeting in Hengelo, The Netherlands, on 27 May.
An outright Samsung Diamond League victory in New York on 9 June followed.
The prodigiously talented young man from the town of Bayaguana, which lies just a few miles from the Dominican Republic capital Santo Domingo, is now third on the world 400m all-time junior lists behind the United States' Steve Lewis, who won the 1988 Olympic Games 400m title while still only 19 and Grenada's 2011 IAAF World Championships gold medallist Kirani James.
Following his early season assault on the clock, Santos now has two specific goals in mind for the rest of 2012: victory at the forthcoming World Junior Championships in Barcelona - where the championship best of 44.66, which has been in the name of Saudi Arabia's Hamdan Odha Al-Bishi cince 2000, could be under threat – and a medal at the Olympic Games in London.
Unique non-American accolade
"I always wanted to be where I am in my life right now but I never dreamed that I would be as fast as I have become so soon," said Santos rather modestly.
"However, I'm just starting on my career and I want to be the only non-American to run 43 seconds; so far only Americans (nine in fact) have finished in under 44 seconds, I want to be the first from somewhere else."
Talking briefly to Santos earlier this season at the IAAF World Challenge meeting in Ostrava, just two days before his Dutch exploits, he revealed a steely determination and commitment to hard work that many teenagers elsewhere in the world might find hard to fathom.
"I can remember exactly when I made up my mind that I wanted to be the best in the world, not just in the Dominican Republic. It was after the national school championships in 2008. I started training seriously that year.
"The next year, I didn't do very well at the Pan American Junior Championships in Trinidad but it gave me an idea of who I would have to face in the future."
What he omitted to say was that, at 15, Santos was one of the youngest athletes at that latter championship and was he was running against boys up to three years older than himself.
Chasing James
Santos also got his first look of James there, who was the eventual gold medallist in Trinidad, and now he is looking to follow in James' footsteps after his win at the last World Junior Championships in Moncton, Canada, two years ago.
A gold medal, barring any dramatic incident such as an injury, seems almost assured in the historic Olympic Stadium Lluís Companys de Montjuïc, whose most famous 400m feat witnessed so far has been Quincy Watts winning at the 1992 Olympic Games in 43.50, which remains the stadium record 20 years later.
It might be too soon in his career for Santos to contemplate revising that particular statistic, despite him racking up a stunning list of superlatives this summer.
As Santos and his coach Jose Rubio Ludwig have both said several times is the last two months, when questioned "It could now be three or four years before I go under 44 seconds."
However, the Spanish have a renowned love for fireworks and Santos could still be the man to provide them at the World Junior Championships in Barcelona.
Phil Minshull for the IAAF
