Runyan Achieves Her Goal: an American Indoor Record

Marla Runyan, the first legally blind athlete to make a U.S. Olympic team, went to New York on a mission. She wanted to break the American indoor record in the women’s 5,000 meters.

She accomplished the feat Sunday at the Armory Track and Field Center while running the final 2,800 meters by herself, being timed in 15 minutes 7.33 seconds--more than 15 seconds faster than the previous mark of 15:22.64 by Lynn Jennings at Hanover, N.H., in 1990.

“My focus was going to be on the 5,000 this year,” said Runyan, the eighth-place finisher in the 1,500 meters at the Sydney Games--the best performance ever by an American in that event at the Olympics. “With a new coach, we wrote this [chasing the record] down as a goal in November.”

Three other runners began the race with Runyan, but none went more than 2,200 meters. The other three were as confident as Runyan that she would break the 5,000 record.

“Judging from her confidence and warming up with her today, I could tell she was on,” said Allis Harvey, a former Pan American Games gold medalist.

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Gabriela Szabo of Romania broke the world indoor record for the women’s 3,000 meters, bettering a mark that had stood for 12 years. Szabo, the world and Olympic champion at 5,000 meters, was timed in 8 minutes 32.88 seconds at the Norwich Union British Grand Prix meet in Birmingham, England. She bettered the mark of 8:33.82 set in 1989 by Elly van Hulst of the Netherlands in Hungary.

Winter Sports

Make it a record 10 consecutive World Cup slalom victories for Janica Kostelic of Croatia. Kostelic, bouncing back from a disappointing fifth-place finish at the World Championships in Austria earlier this month, powered down the slope at Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany, for a combined two-run time of 1 minute 19.96 seconds.

She defeated France’s Christel Saioni by nearly a second after a second heat that was .44 seconds better than any other competitor.

The victory raised Kostelic’s hopes of becoming one of the youngest World Cup champions in history at 19. It gave her 1,172 points. Defending champion Renate Goetschl of Austria is second with 1,055 points with six races left.

Pierrick Bourgeat has moved France among the world’s elite in men’s slalom skiing. Bourgeat, sidelined during the 1999-2000 season because of leg injuries, won his second World Cup title in two days at Shigakogen, Japan.

Bourgeat had a winning time of 1:48.00. Heinz Schilchegger of Austria finished second at 1:48.15 and Jure Kosir of Slovenia was third in 1:48.59. American Erik Schlopy fell midway through the race, but got up and finished in 1:57.49 for 24th place.

Three-time Olympic medalist Jari Isometsa of Finland will probably not compete in next year’s Winter Olympics after failing a drug test and losing his silver medal in the men’s pursuit at the World Nordic Championships in Lahti, Finland.

The International Ski Federation is expected to impose a two-year ban on Isometsa at its next meeting. It would keep him out of the Salt Lake City Games.

FIS said tests after Thursday’s 15-kilometer race showed Isometsa used hydroxyethyl starch (HES), an intravenous plasma volume expander. HES is mainly used to mask the possible use of other banned substances by lowering hemoglobin levels.

Meanwhile, Virpi Kuitunen used a fast finish to win the women’s pursuit and give Finland its first gold medal in the event.

Tennis

Amelie Mauresmo won her second title in less than a week, winning the inaugural Terazura Open at Nice, France, with a 6-2, 6-0 victory over Magdalena Maleeva of Bulgaria. Mauresmo was coming off winning the Gaz de France tournament at Paris, defeating Anke Huber of Germany in the final. . . . Yevgeny Kafelnikov of Russia celebrated his 27th birthday by defeating France’s Sebastien Grosjean, 7-6 (5), 6-2, to win the Marseille Open in France. . . . Tim Henman of Britain defeated defending champion Andreas Vinciguerra of Sweden, 6-3, 6-4, to win the Copenhagen Open. . . . Martina Hingis of Switzerland defeated Sandrine Testud of France, 6-3, 6-2, to win the Qatar Open at Doha.

Miscellany

The XFL, the new football league NBC-TV jointly owns with the World Wrestling Federation lost another quarter of its television audience on the network, according to preliminary Week 3 ratings, after a 50% drop the previous week.

The preliminary overnight rating for Saturday night’s broadcast was 3.8, meaning an average of 3.8% of television homes in the country’s largest 49 markets were tuned in at any given time.

That represents a 25.5% decline from last Saturday’s overnight rating (5.1), and a 63% drop from the debut broadcast (10.3).

Former San Francisco 49er quarterback Jeff Brohm scrambled 33 yards for the winning touchdown with 2:33 remaining as the Orlando Rage (3-0) rallied to beat the New York-New Jersey Hitmen (0-3), 18-12, at East Rutherford, N.J. . . . Duane Butler scored on a 98-yard interception return with less than two minutes to play as the Birmingham Bolts (2-1) beat the Chicago Enforcers (0-3), 14-3, at Birmingham, Ala.

John Force raced to his 93rd career funny car victory, defeating Bruce Sarver in the final of the NHRA Kragen Nationals at Chandler, Ariz. Force, of Yorba Linda, had a quarter-mile run of 4.929 seconds at a top speed of 285.77 mph. Doug Kalitta won the top-fuel final and Warren Johnson won in pro stock.

Jerry Manuel, last season’s American League manager of the year after leading the Chicago White Sox to the Central Division title, was rewarded with a contract extension through 2004 with a club option for 2005. His current deal ran through this season with a club option for 2002.