US relay team sets indoor world mark, Shelly-Ann retains 60 title
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Perhaps people know Calvin Smith Jr, and even then likely because his father was a famous runner a generation back. And David Verburg ran on the 4x400 world outdoor gold medal team last year.
But Kyle Clemons? Kind Butler III?
Like so many on this US team at the world indoor championships in Spot, Poland, which was low on glamor yet deep in talent, they produced beyond expectations on Sunday and now have a 4x400 indoor world record to show for it.
When everyone expected the three-day event to peter out without a world record, suddenly this quartet made a name for each and every one on the team.
“These are moments you really have to cherish,” Butler said. “We are never going to be here again.”
The four sprinters got the baton around in a time of 3 minutes, 2.13 seconds, slashing .70 off the 15-year-old indoor mark set by another US relay team at the 1999 world indoors.
The US beat Britain into silver and Jamaica took bronze.
“The combination of these guys is amazing. They brought it out of me,” said Clemons, who already took bronze in the individual 400.
The record gave the US team eight gold and 12 medals overall, more than double the total of runner-up Russia, which had three gold and five overall.
The US team won 10 gold and 18 overall two years ago, but that was such an outsize record performance that no one thought it would be possible again.
Yet, when it came to gold, the Americans came pretty close with a slew of little-known names.
“We never lose runners, lose people. We just keep reloading,” said Clemons of the US athletics program.
The first US gold on Sunday came in the women’s 800, where Chanelle Price did all the frontrunning and refused to fade over the final two laps, as she disregarded the massive cheers of the home crowd that was pushing for Angelika Cichocka.
Then the 4x400 women’s team led from start to finish to easily win the relay ahead of Jamaica and Britain.
And in the wide-open 60 hurdles, Omo Osaghae dipped at the line to beat two Frenchmen in a world leading 7.45. Pascal Martinot-Lagarde was .01 back and Garfield Darien a further .01 second in a tight finish.
In Sunday’s top individual race, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce kept the 60-meter title in Jamaica with the fastest run by anyone in four years.
The double Olympic 100 champion finished in 6.98 seconds, beating Murielle Ahoure of Ivory Coast by .03 seconds. Tianna Bartoletta of the US took bronze.
Ethiopia’s brilliant Genzebe Dibaba breezed to a gold medal in the 3,000 meters, failing to add a third world record in a season but clinching a long-distance title after the 1,500 two years ago.
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