A Happy Homecoming

Jon Drummond’s legs ached Saturday. His legs always ache after he runs on the pitted track at the Sports Arena, yet he competes in the Los Angeles Invitational indoor track meet every year in front of crowds smaller than those he sat among when he was growing up.

“I run here because it’s home,” said Drummond, who won a gold medal as the leadoff runner on the U.S. 400-meter relay team at the Sydney Olympics. “It’s not really a quote, unquote money meet. We wish we could get more sponsors. I wish somebody big-time would come in and say, ‘I’m going to support the meet.’ L.A. deserves a high-quality meet.

“Track and field is a living organism, but what will happen if no one supports it?”

Drummond and Mickey Grimes did their part to provide good drama and good humor, although an announced crowd of merely 5,890 got to see it. Grimes, who ran the second leg of the triumphant U.S. men’s 400-meter relay at the 2001 world championships, burst past a fast-starting Drummond to win the 55-meter dash in 6.10 seconds, a blink ahead of Drummond’s 6.11.

“I’m glad to be home,” said Grimes, who grew up in Southern California and is training in Riverside. “It’s great to be in a field with him. I remember thinking ‘I want to be like him,’ when I was little.”

Drummond, 34, couldn’t be angry with Grimes, who is eight years his junior. Both were happy to have done something they considered positive for the sport. “But we can’t win if we don’t get support in our country,” Drummond said.

Kenya’s Bernard Lagat was given a standing ovation for winning the mile for an unprecedented fifth consecutive year. He hoped to go under 4 minutes and squeaked in at 3 minutes 59.72 seconds, thanks to a 1:59 over the final half-mile.

It was the best he could expect in a field he described as the weakest he has seen in years, which he attributed to scheduling conflicts. The U.S. cross-country championships and a Golden Spike tour event were also held Saturday.

“There are places I could get more money,” said Lagat, who recently left Pullman, Wash., to train in Tucson. “If we all go places to get more money, who’s going to run in meets like this? Meets like this are not going to survive without big athletes.”

USC alumna Angela Williams won the women’s 55 meters without her coach, John Smith, who was with other HSI group athletes in Fayetteville, Ark.

“My coach called me and said, ‘You’ve been thinking too much because you’re trying to change so many things. Just go out and have fun,’ ” said Williams, who was timed in 6.73 seconds. “I feel really good. I’m so proud of myself, and I don’t say that a lot.”

Williams, the four-time NCAA 100-meter champion, said her goals for this season are to run some 10s “legally and consistently,” and to be in the top five in the U.S. “I want to be known not just as the fastest starter, but the one that finishes fastest,” she said.

In other noteworthy performances, Yuliana Perez won the women’s triple jump at 44 feet 9 3/4 inches, and Mel Mueller of Simi Valley won the women’s pole vault by clearing 14 feet 3 1/4 inches. Kenta Bell, who had the longest leap among U.S. triple jumpers last year, won that event with a leap of 56 feet 4 3/4 inches.

The men’s pole vault was won by Russ Buller at 18 feet 5 1/4 inches.