USA Outdoor Track & Field Championships - Saturday Recap, Sunday Preview

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The USA Outdoor Track & Field Championships started Thursday and run through Sunday, June 27th, at Drake Stadium in Des Moines, Iowa. Below is Saturday's recap, Sunday's preview and information on how to follow and watch the Championships.

In case you missed this: Hilarious Post-Race Blog by 5K Champ Lauren Fleshman

SATURDAY RECAP:

Women's Heptathlon:

Hyleas Fountain continued her domination of the multi-events in the US, scoring a total of 735 points to win by 729 points over runner-up Sharon Day. This was an all-time high score for the Olympic Silver medalist, bettering the 6667 points she scored in winning the 2008 Olympic Trials. Fountain credited her strong start (12.93 in the 100m hurdles) with giving her the momentum she needed to blast through all seven events.

"If you have a really good first event, it usually just flows from there and your confidence just builds," she said. "I think with the heptathlon, that's really important. A lot of girls, if they don't do well [in the first event], it gets them down and it can affect them for the rest of the heptathlon."

Men's Decathlon:

Tom Pappas seemed poised to claim his record 6th US title going into Day 2 but Jake Arnold, a two-time NCAA and Pac-10 champion while at the University of Arizona, crashed the party, winning his first U.S. decathlon championship with a stadium-record 8,215 points. Pappas says the heat was a little much for "someone of his age" and that he hadn't been able to train for the 1500m much due to a foot injuries. Pappas isn't done yet however, as he plans to continue to train for 2012.

Women's 100m Hurdles - FINAL:

Lolo Jones put on a great show for her hometown crowd, dominating the 100m hurdles final from start to finish in 12.69 seconds.

"I felt pressure to perform well here," Jones said. "Anytime you get a medal, anytime you win, it's great. But the fact that it was on my hometown (track), in my backyard, and I was able to handle the stress of all that, I'm really proud of what I accomplished here."

Kellie Wells was a surprise 2nd in 12.84 seconds, upsetting Damu Cherry-Mitchell, who was 3rd in 12.86. Wells tweeted a thank-you to her coach Dennis Mitchell for "believing in me when no one else did," and showed us all a photo of her hardware! (@KellieWellz)

Women's Shot Put:

2008 Olympian Jillian Camarena threw an outdoor personal-best throw of 62 feet, 9.25 inches (19.13m) to win the shot put, moving her into a tie (with runner-up Michelle Carter) for fifth place on the all-time U.S. Camarena said she was inspired by Chaunte Howard-Lowe jumping so well in the high jump (more on that next).

2008 and 2009 US Champion Michelle Carter finished 2nd in 18.46m/60-6.75.

2008 NCAA discus champion for Arizona State and the fifth-place finisher in the shot put at last year's USA Championships, Sarah Stevens finished third with a toss of 18.23m/59-9.75.

Women's High Jump:

Chaunte Lowe put on an amazing show for the crowd at Drake Stadium, just as she has been doing all over the world this year. Lowe, who set the American Record earlier this year and beat reigning high jump queen Blanka Vlasic of Croatia, jumped yet another personal best to push her American Record half an inch higher to 6-8.75/2.05m. This mark is the 2010 world leader.

"I was going too fast," Lowe said. "The little Similacs as I call them - because they're babies, you know the young ones - they were jumping. I was so proud of them. I never get a chance to see them jumping at the NCAA level. And to come out and see that they were having personal bests and out there ready to compete with me, I love that. And actually, it got in my head a little bit in a good way."

Once she cleared the record height, Lowe was overcome with emotion. She lay on the mat for some time, fighting back tears. It was part of the reason she decided not to take any more jumps.

More quotes from Lowe at UniversalSports.com

Lowe's energy is so contagious. She is always exciting to watch and sometimes will even dance for the crowd (see Vlasic and Lowe pictured below). Jill Geer of the USATF wrote a great blog about "Chaunte the Entertainer."

Women's Long Jump:

The Chaunte Lowe Show continues! While it was too tall of an order to take down 2009 Outdoor and 2010 Indoor World Champ Brittney Reese (7.08/23-2.75m), Chaunte Lowe did place 2nd in 6.90m/22-7.75 in what many considered to be the best combo performance of the vertical and horizontal jumps ever. Women Talk Sports member Brianna Glenn placed 3rd with a big personal best 6.81m/23-4.25. Congrats Bri!

Men's 400m Hurdles:

Bershawn "Batman" Jackson ran the fastest time in the world this year, winning in 47.32. NCAA Champion Johnny Dutch proved he is on another level than his collegiate competition, finishing 2nd in 47.63, which puts him on the Top 10 US All-Time list.

Women's 1500m:

I was so bummed that I didn't get to watch this race, as the local NBC station chose to air a tribute to the late and legendary UCLA basketball coach John Wooden instead. I also can't find a video anywhere (yet). But Twitter is beautiful, and I was able to follow updates there and gathered a few things:

1. Gabe Anderson is the story of the year and a tough [expletives omitted] (You don't know why? Here you go.)
2. Erin Donohue is just good, despite everyone that wants to say she's "done" or "at her limit" as soon as she shows a sign of weakness or has an off race. She has been at a high level for awhile and is here to stay.
3. Anna Pierce, who spent much of 2009 just winning stuff placed a disappointing 8th at the Adidas Grand Prix in New York. Today she apparently was back to her old self, nipping Donahue in the last 30m. Lesson learned - "Sometimes it's good to get your ass kicked."

Solid race recap at Letsrun.com

Women's 400m:

Sanya Richards-Ross ended up pulling out of the final, and no one can blame her, as she struggled in the semi-finals and just might not quite be ready after dealing with a quad injury that occurred in late April. In her absence, World Indoor Champion Debbie Dunn won in a 2010 world-leading 49.64. NCAA Champ and Indoor American Record Holder Francena McCorory (Hampton University) was 2nd in 50.52, just one one-hundredth ahead of 4x400m gold medalist Natasha Hastings.

Men's 400m:

Gold medalist Jeremy Wariner pulled up with more than 200m left in the one-lapper and dropped to the track. Wariner did not talk to media after the race, but his coach Clyde Hart said, "Jeremy said the pain was very sudden and intense. We're calling it a hip flexor issue, but we're going to get Jeremy back to Texas and get him some evaluation and see what's going on. He could be out a week, he could be out three weeks. We just don't know right now. We know his knees are good.''

Greg Nixon stormed to victory in a world-leading 44.61, and a track and field writer reported that the athlete's dad could be heard yelling, "That's my boy!" afterwards.

Women's Hammer Throw:

After a breakthrough indoor season in which she won the Indoor VISA Championships Series (and $25,000), Amber Campbell finally won her first US hammer title, throwing 71.52m/234-8 to beat runner-up Jessica Cosby by 11 inches.

SUNDAY'S SCHEDULE:

I hope to come back to this post tomorrow and add more event previews, but for now I will leave you with - of course - the Women's Steeplechase Preview:

Women's Steeplechase FINAL - 1:15pm CDT:

Bridget Franek and Lisa Aguilera are the top dogs in the race. Franek, somewhat of a rookie, burst onto the scene last year to PR in 9:36 at the USA Championships to qualify for the World Championships. This year, she is undefeated, as she is still competing as a collegian for Penn State. Franek won the NCAA Championships a couple of weeks ago in 9:38 unpressed. Aguilera is the veteran with a much faster PR (and former American Record) of 9:28. The question is, who is faster on Sunday?

Also don't count out Lindsey Allen, who has a PR of 9:40 and looked great in the prelims, and Nicole Bush who pushed Franek in the prelims and looks to be recovered from her injury that occurred at last year's Championships.

Also watch out for dark horses Kara June, who has a PR of 9:49 and ran 10:08 in a torrential downpour at 1 in the morning in Indianapolis a couple weeks ago to qualify for this meet, and Shayla Houlihan, who has won every steeple she's entered this year except for Thursday's prelim, and who is looking to make that step to the next level of sub-10 minutes and beyond.

How to Follow the Meet:

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