Sunday, June 30, 2019

Prefontaine Classic

It's tough to choose a single highlight of the Prefontaine Classic when the choices include Rai Benjamin's 47.16 400m hurdles, Sifan Hassan's 8:18.49 3000m, Christian Coleman's 9.81 100m, and Darlan Romani's 22.61/ 74' 21/4 shot put triumph. Let's take a closer look at two of these: the women's 3,000m and men's shot put.
Darlan Romani, Brazil
Winner Men's Shot Put
Jeff Cohen photo
Congratulations to Hassan on her outdoor world record 3000m today. While her 8:18.49 places her at #4 on IAAF's all-time list, the top three times are by members of the widely discredited Chinese team of the early 1990s - even the fastest of whom has admitted doping. This easily is the legitimate outdoor world record.

In addition, that 6 women broke 8:30 was mind-boggling, and the official all-time lists were rewritten. In addition to Hassan's #4, Konstanze Klosterhalfen's 8:20.07 ranks #6, Letesenbet Gidey's 8:20.27 #7, and Genzebe Dibaba's 8:21.29 #10. Or as I prefer to put it, #1, #2, #3, and #10.

It was reasonable to expect one of the historically deepest men's shot put fields to produce some fireworks, especially between Ryan Crouser and Tom Walsh.

This is why we run the races, or in this case, throw heavy weights around. Brazil's Darlan Romani upset all expectations with one of the greatest series in history.
Jeff Cohen photo
His 3rd round 22.46/73' 8 1/4" was #14 all-time.

His 4th round 22.55/73' 11 3/4" was #11 all-time.

His 5th round 22.61/74" 2 1/4" is #10 all-time.

All 6 throws fair and the shortest was his first at 21.64/71' 0". An incredible series that no one saw coming!

When informed in the interview area that he is now #10 all-time, he was visibly moved.

Full results here:

https://eugene.diamondleague.com/program-results-eugene/







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