Benjamin and McLaughlin-Levrone impress in Los Angeles

After bursting off the turn and widening the gap between herself and the field around her, Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone once again demonstrated her range by cruising to 200m victory at the USATF Los Angeles Grand Prix, a World Athletics Continental Tour Gold meeting, on Saturday (18).

Her plan for the season, however, revolves around focusing on just one event, one she calls “what I’m most comfortable with” – the 400m hurdles.

While McLaughlin-Levrone dropped down in distance to test her speed in Los Angeles, her US compatriot Rai Benjamin raced his specialism and was rewarded with a world-leading 46.64 – the ninth-fastest performance of all time – on his 400m hurdles season opener.

McLaughlin-Levrone makes a statement

One year after producing the second-fastest 400m in US history (48.74), only to later withdraw from the World Championships because of a knee injury, McLaughlin-Levrone said she had not given much thought to attempting a 400m and 400m hurdles double at the Paris Olympics before ultimately deciding to focus solely on the hurdles, the event in which she most recently smashed the world record two years ago en route to the 2022 world title.

Doubling is "definitely a possibility in the future, but just wanting to come back after last season, stick to one event and try to do it the best I can,” said McLaughlin-Levrone, the Tokyo Olympic gold medallist. “Be healthy, which we are, and I’m very happy about that and just keep it that way.”

After testing her speed over 200m in California, she may run some 400m races in the coming weeks to continue to do the same. McLaughlin-Levrone, who added that her knees “feel great”, had hoped to run sub-22 at UCLA's Drake Stadium. Despite registering the slowest reaction time in the nine-runner field, she achieved the Olympic standard while convincingly beating runner-up Abby Steiner (22.32), Brittany Brown (22.35), Rhasidat Adeleke (22.45), Jenna Prandini (22.61) and Olympic and world silver medallist Gabby Thomas (22.68).

Thomas also ran a 100m race earlier the same day.

“Today was really tough because I just didn’t feel like myself,” Thomas said. “I would have loved to have gotten more out of today and that’s what’s really frustrating because it doesn’t reflect what I did in practice or did in training.”

Change pays off for Benjamin

Rai Benjamin and his coach Joanna Hayes had “changed a lot,” he said, in his own training this year before running a world-leading 46.64 to win the 400m hurdles. The motivation behind the changes was keeping him healthier entering a major championship, which has not been the case the past two years, as he chases his first global gold medal at 400m hurdles. Benjamin owns the second-fastest all-time performance in the event and has claimed silver at the Tokyo Olympics and silver and bronze at the last two world championships while competing against Karsten Warholm and Alison Dos Santos, the trio that has pushed the event faster than ever in the past three years.

Those training changes heavily include technique, with Benjamin and Hayes honing his final 100m, as well as “figuring out that we could get away with 13 (steps between hurdles) now at this time of year,” he said. “But championship season, I have to go 12s down the backstretch.”

He left Saturday’s race describing “still a lot of things to fine-tune” despite taking the world-leading time away from Dos Santos. What did running a time like that in May tell him about what could be possible in the Olympics?

“Who knows, maybe 45, maybe 44, who knows? Sky’s the limit.” Benjamin said. “Once I keep coming out and just running well, staying healthy, I think I’m the fastest guy in the field, honestly.” 

Michael Norman, a longtime training partner of Benjamin, won the 400m in 44.53, beating Kirani James (44.85) and Vernon Norwood (44.86). Norman has rarely sprinted since the winter because of what he termed a “quite a difficult January to May” while dealing with injuries. 

One day after saying he hoped his shot put attempts would “hit the wall” in UCLA’s intimate shot facility, Joe Kovacs won with 22.93m, the joint 16th farthest ever winning mark and just two centimetres off Leonardo Fabbri’s world lead set in Savona. 

Nakaayi runs world lead

Melissa Jefferson overcame a slower start to edge Morolake Akinosun, 11.27 to 11.28, to win the 100m, but the day’s smallest margin of victory belonged to Halimah Nakaayi, who won the 800m in 1:57.56, only six-thousands of a second ahead of Tsige Duguma. 

“Of course I would like to be an Olympic champion,” Nakaayi said. “It’s my dream.”

In a 400m featuring world champion Marileidy Paulino and 800m specialist Mary Moraa, Paulino won in 50.27, ahead of Moraa’s 50.56. Their showdown was initially expected to include Olympic and 2022 world 800m champion Athing Mu, but Mu did not ultimately compete.

Tonea Marshall won the 100m hurdles in 12.55, edging Alaysha Johnson by 0.02. Olympic champion Jasmine Camacho-Quinn finished fourth after initially false-starting and running under protest. 

In winning the 1500m in 3:34.73, Olli Hoare did not reach the Olympic standard of 3:33.50, which he called his top goal for the race, but said he was happy with his season’s best performance nonetheless, as he prepares for next week’s Bowerman Mile at the Prefontaine Classic.

“I didn’t get on the pace, I expected more people to push forward for it and then the last lap felt very slow for me, which is a good sign, so I came through on the outside and just so I could win the race,” Hoare said. 

Hoare outkicked Reynold Kipkorir Cheruiyot by 0.1, with Matthew Centrowitz finishing third in 3:35.16. The 34-year-old 2016 Olympic gold medallist has called this season his last competing as a professional, and said announcing that decision had been helpful in his approach toward his final Olympic trials in June.

“I love pressure, I’ve been dealing with it my whole life having a two-time Olympian as a father,” Centrowitz said. “It doesn’t add pressure. If anything I’m running a little more free, nothing to lose.” He added that “I’m taking this season as seriously as any other year.” 

Using a 52.09 final lap, the fastest of any competitors, Bryce Hoppel won the 800m in 1:43.68, a season’s best. Hoppel had already achieved the Olympic standard of 1:44.70, but the race pulled five men under it, including Isaiah Jewett (1:44.02), 2022 world 1500m champion Jake Wightman (1:44.10), who is also tuning up for next week’s Prefontaine Classic, and Brandon Miller and Isaiah Harris.

If many events were claimed by favourites, it was not the case in the men’s pole vault or 100m. Ernest John Obiena vaulted 5.80m to upset Simen Guttormsen (5.70m) and US athletes KC Lightfoot (5.70m), Chris Nilsen (5.70m), Jacob Wooten (5.60m) and Sam Kendricks (5.60m). In the sprint, Kyree King ran 10.11 to top Letsile Tebogo’s 10.13, with Aaron Brown third in 10.23.

Thea LaFond won the women’s triple jump at 14.37m, Anna Cockrell ran 53.75 to win the 400m hurdles and Diribe Welteji won the 1500m in a season’s best of 3:55.23, leading four women under four minutes. 

Barega top in 5000m

The two-day meeting began on Friday evening, when 12 men ran under the Olympic 5000m standard of 13:05 in a race won by Selemon Barega in 12:51.60. Barega closed the final 400m in 54.15, the fastest lap of anyone in the field, to edge his Ethiopian compatriot Berihu Aregawi, in 12:52.09. Barega and Aregawi had already achieved the standard before Friday, however. World record-holder Joshua Cheptegei had yet to, until he finished third in 12:52.38. He was among six who achieved the standard in the race, including Biniam Mehary, Cooper Teare, Stewart McSweyn, Cole Hocker and Morgan McDonald.

Only two months after winning the world indoor 3000m title, Elle St. Pierre ran a 63.2 bell lap to capture her own Olympic standard and win the 5000m in 14:34.12. The time is a personal best by 24 seconds.

Also on Friday, Sandi Morris needed only four jumps at three heights to win the women’s pole vault at 4.70m, her highest clearance since February’s US Indoor Championships. Valarie Allman easily claimed the women’s discus title at 67.93m, nearly three metres farther than her competition, and Roje Stona comfortably won the men’s discus at 66.93m. 

In a hammer competition featuring five women already with the Olympic standard, Brooke Andersen won on her second throw of 77.32m, edging Denna Price. Mykhaylo Kokhan won the men’s hammer at 80.33m. Ceili McCabe ran a Canadian record 9:20.58 to win the women’s steeplechase, leading four women who reached the Olympic standard in the race.

Andrew Greif for World Athletics

Results

Watch World Athletics Continental Tour Gold highlights on Inside Track