Gay runs away with U.S. title

She was trying to stay focused on her 200-meter final, beginning only 10 minutes later, but Torri Edwards did not want to miss watching Tyson Gay run the same distance Sunday afternoon at the U.S. championships.

What she and 7,407 spectators saw means everyone will be watching Gay closely between now and the 2008 Olympics.

“That was phenomenal,” Edwards said.

Despite a slight headwind, Gay won in 19.62 seconds, the second-fastest 200 in history. Only Michael Johnson’s world record of 19.32 from the 1996 Olympics remains ahead.

“A lot of people think it’s reachable, but it’s extremely far to 19.32,” Gay said.

Stardom now is a lot closer to Gay, 24, who describes himself as “just a country boy from Lexington, Kentucky.” By the stopwatch, his performance at the national meet was the best 100-200 double in history.

“I’ve never received this much attention,” Gay said. “I’m not a flashy guy.”

Having won the 100 meters Friday in a meet-record-tying 9.84 seconds, Gay became the second person in the last 22 years to sweep the U.S. sprints. The other was Justin Gatlin, who won 2005 U.S. and world titles in both, only to run afoul of drug testing last year.

Gay’s races were the highlights of the four-day meet, which ended Sunday with several compelling performances:

* Sanya Richards came into the championships as the poster athlete for U.S. track and field, her picture alone on the front and back covers of the meet program. When she failed to make the world team in the 400 meters, finishing fourth as an overwhelming favorite with an 18-meet winning streak, Richards was ready to concede to the nagging illness that has compromised her training.

“I wanted to give up,” Richards said. “I knew I executed a great [400] race, and I lost. That’s really discouraging.

“Coach [Clyde] Hart and I wanted to shut it down. My dad [Archie] said, ‘You have an opportunity to make the team. Give yourself an option.’ ”

Father knew best. Richards (22.43) ran second to reigning world champion Allyson Felix (22.34) in the 200. Edwards (22.55) was third.

* Alan Webb won the fastest 1,500 meters in meet history, beating two-time Olympic medalist and Kenyan emigre Bernard Lagat, a victory that sent Webb into fist-pumping joy before and after he hit the finish line.

“Bernard has made us all step up our game,” Webb said.

Webb’s time, 3 minutes 34.82 seconds, broke Steve Scott’s 25-year-old meet record by one-tenth of a second. Leonel Manzano sneaked past Lagat to take second. Lagat’s third-place time, 3:35.55, would have won every other U.S. title since 1982.

The emotional reaction at the finish, Webb said, was a release of pressure he had felt for the two weeks since a dismal performance in his last race.

“I was beating myself up about it,” Webb said. “I just wanted to prove to myself I could do it again.”

* Tiffany Williams (53.28) and Sheena Johnson (53.29) became the first female 400 meter-hurdlers to break 54 seconds this year.

The men’s 200 lived up to its billing as the race to watch, despite two of its big players not making the final.

Xavier Carter, who had run the second-fastest 200 prior to Sunday (19.63), collapsed to the track because of a dislocated kneecap in the semifinals. Walter Dix, who had run 19.69 this season, withdrew after taking third in the 100.

That left the drama to Gay, yet to win a world or Olympic medal, and 2005 world silver medalist Wallace Spearmon, who took second in 19.89. Both are coached by Lance Brauman, who watched the meet from the Federal Correctional Institution in Texarkana, Texas.

Brauman was sentenced to a year and a day in prison after being convicted in July on embezzlement, theft and mail fraud charges related to using student-assistance funds at Barton Community College in Kansas to pay athletes, including Gay, for work they didn’t do. Gay was not charged.

“His situation is what it is,” Gay said. “He has a couple more months, and he’s out.... I’ve started to mature more and train diligently in his absence.”

Gay said he speaks frequently with Brauman, most recently after winning the 100, and insists he will resume working with Brauman full time after the coach’s scheduled release in September.

In the interim, Gay has been splitting time between Fayetteville, Ark., and Arlington, Texas, where he has been working with Olympic relay gold medalist Jon Drummond.

“I haven’t talked with Lance personally, but I would safely say he is comfortable with what is happening,” said Drummond, whom Gay asked for help on his notoriously poor starts.

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Philip Hersh covers Olympic sports for The Times and the Chicago Tribune.

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

Fast company

Tyson Gay owns four of the best 15 times in the men’s 200 meters (through Sunday):

*--* TIME NAME, COUNTRY YEAR 19.32 Michael Johnson, U.S. 1996 19.62 Tyson Gay, U.S. 2007 19.63 Xavier Carter, U.S. 2006 19.65 Wallace Spearmon, U.S. 2006 19.66 Michael Johnson, U.S. 1996 19.68 Frank Fredericks, Namibia 1996 19.68 Tyson Gay, U.S. 2006 19.69 Walter Dix, U.S. 2007 19.70 Tyson Gay, U.S. 2006 19.71 Michael Johnson, U.S. 2000 19.72 Pietro Mennea, Italy 1979 19.73 Michael Marsh, U.S. 1992 19.75 Carl Lewis, U.S. 1983 19.75 Joe DeLoach, U.S. 1988 19.77 Michael Johnson, U.S. 1996 19.77 Ato Boldon, Trinidad & Tobago 1997 19.79 Carl Lewis, U.S. 1988 19.79 Michael Johnson, U.S. 1992 19.79 Michael Johnson, U.S. 1995 19.79 Shawn Crawford, U.S. 2004 19.79 Tyson Gay, U.S. 2006 19.80 Carl Lewis, U.S. 1984 19.80 Ato Boldon, Trinidad & Tobago 1996

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Source: IAAF.org

Los Angeles Times