Grace Upshaw of the US in the Long Jump qualifying round (© Getty Images)
The men’s Mile was the highlight of Saturday’s final day of the Brutus Hamilton Invitational in Berkeley (25), as three runners broke the four-minute barrier, two for the first time in their careers.
The race, named for Don Bowden, the first American to surpass the benchmark time for the Mile, has become an eagerly anticipated event at this annual fixture.
David Torrence, the Berkeley runner who had won the last two contests in sub-four times, was expected to be the man to beat. In the end, it was his training partner, Michael Coe, who captured the headlines with a stunning 3:56.18 performance. It was a PB drop of more than eight seconds for the 21-year-old Coe, who is enjoying his first season of injury-free running in the last three years.
Going down the final back straight, Torrence had held a small lead, but Coe moved past him on the last curve and showed a powerful finish, as Torrence finished second in a PB 3:57.04. Perhaps Coe’s strength was not such a surprise, given a 3000-metres performance during the indoor season which ended in an extremely narrow (0.08 sec) loss to US phenom German Fernandez.
Also joining the “Sub-Four” club with Coe was Tommy Schmitz with 3:58.92.
Upshaw's final round win
Two world-leading performances came from the Women’s Long Jump. Olympian Grace Upshaw led off with 6.72, after which Beijing Heptathlon silver medallist Hyleas Fountain began slowly chipping away at that mark. In the last round, Fountain finally overtook Upshaw with a world-leading 6.79, only to have Upshaw answer with 6.80 to take the victory on the final jump of the day.
Fountain later won the invitational 100m Hurdles in 13.02, just ahead of Kimyon Broom’s 13.08.
Atkins - 10.17
Two years ago, Bahamian sprinter Derrick Atkins came to Berkeley for the first time and became the first runner to break ten seconds in the 100 metres in Edwards Stadium with a 9.98 performance. It was a prelude to his silver-medal performance at the Osaka World Championships later the same season. Since then, Atkins has made Berkeley a routine stop.
With cool temperatures (ca. 16C) and dancing winds vexing the sprinters, Atkins was held to 10.17 in his third-straight win, as Jason Heard placed second with 10.29. At the end of the afternoon, Atkins came back in the 200, but was nipped at the finish by Rubin Williams, 20.51 to 20.59.
After her fourth-place finish with 11.69 in the Women’s 100 metres (won by Cherrelle Garrett in 11.40), Ashton Purvis came back late in the day to win the 200 metres with 23.76w.
In other results, Jazz Trice rode a 2.5 wind to a 13.65w victory in the Men’s 110m Hurdles, US record holder Kim Kreiner took the Women’s Javelin in 56.85, and Croatia’s Martin Maric had almost an eleven-metre cushion in his 59.67 Men’s Discus win.
Ryan Shuler used a jump-off situation to equal his PB 5.20m in a Men’s Pole Vault win over Kasey Burlingham (5.05), as Allison Stokke won the women’s event at 4.11.
Ed Gordon for the IAAF
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