Jackie Joyner-Kersee Track Meet : Foster, Nehemiah, Kingdom Have High Hopes

“The Hurdlers,” a long-running real life soap opera that was canceled for a while, will be renewed today in the McDonald’s Jackie Joyner-Kersee track meet at Drake Stadium.

The familiar cast has been reassembled: Greg Foster, who is making a comeback from another broken arm; Renaldo (Skeets) Nehemiah, who has been on a perpetual comeback since his pro football days with the San Francisco 49ers ended in 1986, and Roger Kingdom, the Olympic gold medalist, who has nothing to prove.

Foster, 30, and Nehemiah, 30, have been competing against one another since the late 1970s. They were not regarded as friendly rivals when Nehemiah was dominating the competition before he took a fling at pro football as a wide receiver.

Nehemiah is still the world record-holder in the 110-meter high hurdles at 12.93 seconds, a standard that has endured since 1981. Moreover, his Drake Stadium record of 13 flat has remained in tact for a decade. It was a world record at the time.

However, since leaving the 49ers and returning to track, he has not regained the style that made him virtually unbeatable. Injuries have frustrated him and, perhaps, the long layoff from a highly technical event and the physical pounding he absorbed in football may prevent him from ever regaining his world-class form.

Nonetheless, Nehemiah is confident that he can be a factor again.

In Nehemiah’s absence, Foster flourished, becoming the world’s top-ranked hurdler and winning at the World Championships in 1983 and 1987.

He was upset, though, by Kingdom in the 1984 Olympic Games at the Coliseum. Kingdom, now 26, subsequently had conditioning problems before asserting himself again to get his second gold medal last September at Seoul.

Foster couldn’t challenge him. He suffered a broken left arm July 4 while training for the U.S. Olympic trials and then courageously competed in the trials with his arm in a cast until he was eliminated.

He then broke the same arm again Jan. 31 while playing in a pickup basketball game.

“I have two, 12-inch plates in my arm,” said Foster. “And I notice it because it aches once in a while.”

Foster says his goal is to regain his No. 1 world ranking in a most competitive event. Nehemiah is just striving for respectability again.

Nehemiah says he was an arrogant 22-year-old athlete when he left track for pro football, acknowledged as the greatest high hurdler of all time. Now, in a sense, he’s competing against the image of his younger self and he ruefully said, “I’m not as graceful as I used to be. This body is different than the 13-flat body.”

Nehemiah was encouraged when he recorded a time of 13.48 in August of 1986, but he suffered a torn Achilles’ tendon and, in hindsight, said he returned to competition too soon.

“I started running with less than adequate physical ability,” he said. “Even though I could run, it altered my technique drastically. I started experiencing some things I didn’t know I could do, such as running sideways. That’s been my biggest struggle the last year and a half.”

So Nehemiah’s technique is flawed, contributing to his frustration.

“I think I’m doing admirably well despite all my setbacks,” he said. “I want so much to prove to myself and to everybody that I can make the comeback.”

Track Notes

Today’s meet begins at noon and a world-class field has been assembled, including collegiate champion Dawn Sowell of LSU in the women’s 100 meters; Larry Myricks, Mike Powell and Mike Conley in the long jump; Jackie Joyner-Kersee in the 100- and 400-meter hurdles; Andre Phillips and Danny Harris in the 400; Joe Falcon, Doug Padilla and Jeff Atkinson in the mile; Olympic gold medalist Louise Ritter in the high jump; silver medalist Randy Barnes in the shotput and Kory Tarpenning and Joe Dial in the pole vault.

Greg Foster said he would be disappointed if the hurdlers don’t run under 13.35 seconds. Foster said he has been training harder than he ever has with over-distance work, adding that he was timed in 20.39 in a 200 in a training race in Provo, Utah. . . . Renaldo Nehemiah has five of the 10 fastest times in the 110-meter hurdles; Roger Kingdom has four.