US athletes set to bolster track record
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Sydney McLaughlin (right) en route to breaking the 400m hurdles world record and inflicting a defeat on world champion Dalilah Muhammad at the US Olympic trials on Sunday with a time of 51.90sec.
PHOTO: AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE
EUGENE (Oregon) • With world records broken and season's best marks posted, American athletes showed they are peaking at just the right time for the Tokyo Games as the United States Olympic trials came to a thrilling end on Sunday.
Along with Ryan Crouser's record-breaking heave in the shot put (23.37m) and Sydney McLaughlin's mark in the women's 400m hurdles (51.90 seconds), hurdlers Rai Benjamin (400m) and Grant Holloway (110m hurdles) also came close to getting their names in the record books after eight days of competition.
American sprinters played second fiddle to Jamaican speedsters at recent Olympics but there was plenty to suggest they can turn the tables in Tokyo.
Gabby Thomas delivered a 200m time not seen since Florence Griffith Joyner in the 1988 Games while Sha'Carri Richardson clocked 10.86sec in the women's 100m final. Thomas' main rival is set to be two-time 100m champion Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, who clocked a personal-best 21.79sec to win the 200m at the Jamaica trials, signalling their readiness to challenge over both sprints in Tokyo.
Trayvon Bromell will have his eyes on Olympic gold after winning the 100m final in 9.80sec - 0.01sec better than Usain Bolt's gold medal performance in 2016.
The Americans are fancied in the 200m, which they have not medalled at for the past two Games, after world champion Noah Lyles posted a world-leading 19.74sec on Sunday to book his Tokyo ticket.
The US has topped the track and field medal table at every Games since 1984 but has never won a women's hammer medal. That drought could end, with DeAnna Price extending her national record to 80.31m - a distance bettered only by two-time Olympic champion Anita Wlodarczyk.
New Zealand's 1,500m runner Nick Willis was blown away by the surplus in talent.
"Wow, this has got to be one of the best US teams heading to the Olympics ever," he tweeted.
AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS