EUGENE, Ore. — Allyson Felix felt no final-day pressure at the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials. She’s just that good.
Wallace Spearmon, Jenn Stuczynski and Marshevet Hooker are good, too, but all had to endure their share of bumps, bruises and thumping hearts before their Olympic trips were sewn up Sunday.
The day after Tyson Gay’s untimely fall reminded everyone there are no sure things in track, the two sprinters and the pole vaulter worked harder than anyone might have imagined to make it to Beijing.
Spearmon, thought to be a shoo-in in the men’s 200, needed a late burst to win the third and final spot in that sprint. Walter Dix finished first and the other spot went to defending Olympic gold medalist Shawn Crawford.
Stuczynski set the American record in the pole vault at
16 feet, 1¾ inches, but only after she missed on her first two jumps at the lowest height and needed an emotion-draining third and final attempt to keep her chances alive.
And Hooker, who ran the fifth-fastest time ever in the 100 (it was wind-aided) to start the meet last weekend, crashed across the line to win the final spot in the 200 by .01 seconds. She needed that because she didn’t earn a spot in the 100 despite her fast times in qualifying.
Anwar Moore, an underdog in the 110-meter high hurdles, was in third place with about 15 meters left, but stumbled over the final hurdle and wound up sprawled on the ground.
In the 1,500 meters, the qualifiers were Bernard Lagat (Kenya), Lopez Lomong (Sudan) and Leonel Manzano (Mexico) — three men born in different lands who made it to America and will now wear red, white and blue at the Olympics.
“That means America is a melting pot,” Lagat said. “America is where they welcome everybody regardless of their place of birth.”
Lagat, also the champion in the 5,000, was the only person over the two-week meet to win two events.
Felix cruised to victory in the 200, finishing in 21.82 seconds to secure the trip she didn’t wrap up last week in the 100, when she finished out of the top three.
It made for a long wait, but she rolled with it.
“I’m a laid-back person. I was just relaxing, waiting for this, thinking about it, waiting to get started,” she said. “I’m relieved, but it’s not done yet hardly. Now it’s time to go back to work.”
Spearmon figured to coast to victory but he finished third, just ahead of Rodney Martin to get the final spot in the 200, the one freed up when Gay fell Saturday in the quarterfinals.
“I got third, and the question is now, if he was here would I have made the team?” Spearmon said. “I can’t answer that question. I’m here. That’s all I can tell you.”
Gay’s MRI showed a strain in a muscle in the back of his left leg. He’s restricted to light workouts for the next two weeks, but said he’d be ready for the Olympics.
His absence means Walter Dix and Muna Lee, on the women’s side, are the only American sprinters who will get a chance to double in individual events.
Crawford trained with coach Trevor Graham before the last Olympics, and though he wasn’t ever involved in a doping scandal, his name came up because Graham was a key player.
“Whatever he did with anybody else, I’m not worried about it,” Crawford said. “I know what I did. I can’t hold that against a person. People make mistakes. I didn’t make those mistakes. I’m not worried about it.”
While Crawford’s story could turn out to be a great comeback tale, what the Americans really want to redeem their sagging sport are some young, new faces with new stories to tell.
Stuczynski is a candidate. A basketball player who took up pole vaulting four years ago and trains in a quonset hut, she has set the American record twice in seven weeks.
She missed by a bunch on her two attempts at the world record, 16-5½, but when it was over, she was thinking more about those misses at the start. When she finally cleared the first height, she buried her hands in her face and fell back onto the mat.
“The first one didn’t scare me. The second one made me a little nervous,” she said. “When I got to the third, I didn’t feel good either, but I got over.
“I think I was more happy to make the opening height than I was the record jump.”
She wasn’t the only one who felt relieved.

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