OREGON22 POST MORTEM: Goodbye to room 112, and thoughts while driving home...
The Toyota Prius, inspired by the value of Brad Walker's 2013 Nike contract, is finally unloaded with the stuff I took to Eugene for 12 days covering the World Athletics Championships.
The Monday morning after the final events of the world championships are usually hectic as you're frantically scrambling to write your last post, edit the last photos for the post, cleaning out the locker at the stadium where the stuff you didn't want to take to the hotel every night was stored, as was the case in London in 2017.
In London, I dealt with a 4 am checkout and transport to one of the official media hotels to catch the shuttle to Heathrow Airport, which meant I didn't go to sleep Sunday night, as I was at the stadium until midnight.
Monday morning, I woke up shortly after 7 am, had a leisurely breakfast at the hotel, then moved my stuff to the car, folding the back seat to fit the bags with camera gear, clean and dirty clothes from almost two weeks, and laptops.
I use the word laptops because on the fourth day of competition, my laptop screen died, and I was forced to purchase a brand new laptop at the local BestBuy, then transfer all the data to the new laptop before being able to return to action. I returned to Seattle with two laptops, with the old (2019) model now sent out for repair.
After a final walkthrough of the room, including opening drawers to make sure I didn't leave anything behind, I said goodbye to room 112 of the official media hotel in Springfield, and pointed the Prius north to Seattle and the drive home.
No security lines to have your stuff searched. No stress about whether you are going to make it to your gate on time, or whether your overseas flight will make it on time to connect to your flight home.
Just me, my Spotify playlist, and several hundred cars and trucks occupying Interstate 5 along the way between Springfield and Seattle.
On the drive home, here were some thoughts:
MY TWO INSPIRATIONAL PERFORMANCES OF THE MEET...
It's easy to talk about the three world records set at the meet, including American Sydney McLaughlin's win in the 400 hurdles, where she became the first to go under 51.0, running 50.86.
We can also talk about the two world records to end the meet on Sunday, including the unlooked-for world record by Nigeria's Tobi Amusan, who opened the night with a world record in the 100 hurdles in 12.12, and less than two hours later ran a wind-aided (+2.5) 12.06 to win gold.
In that Sunday rush, it was also appropriate that Mondo Duplantis of Sweden via Louisiana ended the meet with a world record in the pole vault, skying 20-4.5 (6.21m), ending it the same way that I witnessed my first ever world record at the 1976 US Olympic Trials, when Dave Roberts jumped 18-8.5 (5.70m) on the final day of the trials.
That said, my most inspirational performances came in non-winning efforts.
The first came from Vancouver's Kara Winger (Paul Merca photo), who, with the help of an almost full Hayward Field crowd, willed the javelin 210-1 (64.05m) to leap from fifth to second in her final world championship meet of her storied career on the 22nd.
Since she burst on the international scene in 2008 when she threw 202-0 (61.56m) at the Big 10 championships in Champaign, Illinois, I've had a near front seat to witnessing her professional career, starting with her win at the 2008 US Olympic Trials all the way to last Friday's come through performance.
While it's easy to speculate how her career may have turned out had she not had surgery on her non throwing shoulder, along with two ACL surgeries in 2012 and 2020, the former of which caused her to miss the 2013 world championships in Moscow, she seems at peace with her career accomplishments.
“And maybe that is what my legacy is, that consistency and that ability to have an American presence internationally, even if it’s not what my hopes and dreams were made of,” she said. “Even if I could have, ultimately, thrown farther without that first injury.
“I’m extremely proud I’ve gotten back up, over and over and over again.”
When asked on a Zoom call hosted by Parity, Winger said that there was a smooth transition between her former coach, Dana Pounds-Lyon to her husband Russ, a former world championships team member in the discus.
The other inspirational performance of the meet came in the men's pole vault, when Ernest Obiena (Paul Merca photo) of The Philippines soared to a national and Asian record 19-5.75 (5.94m).
Having been born in the USA, and lived in this country for all but a two-year period when I lived with my grandmother between 5 and 7 in the Leyte region of The Philippines, I've really never talked about my Filipino heritage.
Obiena became the first Filipino to win any medal at the world championships.
After competing in the Olympics last year, Obiena, who is based in Italy where he is coached by legendary pole vault mentor Vitaly Petrov, the coach of Sergey Bubka, Yelena Isinbayeva, and 2016 Olympic champ Thiago Braz of Brazil had issues with PATAFA, the Philippine track & field federation, over payments made to Petrov.
I'm not going to bore you with the details of the PATAFA/Obiena dispute other than to put up a link to posts on the matter, but the bottom line was that Obiena missed the world indoors in Belgrade because PATAFA wouldn't enter him through the World Athletics entry portal, even though he met the qualifying standards, and was the only athlete from that country qualified for the meet.
Despite all this, Obiena managed to jump 19-4.75 (5.91m) at an indoor meet in Rouen, France just before the world indoors, then win four outdoor meets before world championships, including the Southeast Asian Games in May.
After his third place finish in Eugene, Obiena said in a mixed zone interview, "This was something I really wanted but I do not know if I was expecting it. I definitely did not expect that I would jump that high. And I would not think that it would actually take that high to win a medal. I think this is the highest world championships final ever. Going to the final, I did not know, how it was going to be and what to expect. So I am definitely happy with this medal. On the 94, I felt like I can do more. When the bar went up, I just lost it. I think my concentration just went away from me. I was just mentally not there. I need to learn how to focus myself during the competition. I need to make the most out of it."
RUNNING INTO MY PAST...
One of the most amazing things about these world championships was that in addition to being 4.5 hours by car away from my home in Seattle, was that I heard from and saw so many people who were part of my journey in the sport.
Whether it was running into my Franklin High School event coach and the Canyon Park (Bothell) Junior High coach who let me run in a tri cross country meet at Seward Park despite my junior high school not having a team, fellow teammates and competitors from college, post collegiate, athletes I coached or served as an agent for, all the way to folks whose meets I announced or covered as a media member, this particular world championships was special because of the number of different people from my past that were able to enjoy the performances.
On the final night of competition, I ran into Garfield High School track & field legend Lamar Hurd at TrackTown Pizza on Franklin Avenue. Lamar, who was a member of Oregon's 1984 NCAA championship team, is still considered a big deal at TrackTown Pizza, as his photo hangs above the entrance to the dining area, next to that of 1976 Olympic discus champion Mac Wilkins, who also attended the University of Oregon.
Hurd, who was the jumps coach at Ingraham HS in north Seattle before I took his spot in the 1992 season, was kind enough to pose for a photo underneath his picture.
SO WHAT'S NEXT?
While there is just a slight bit of a letdown after a world championship meet, competition still is happening, starting this Friday with the Ed Murphey Classic meet in Memphis, involving Washington volunteer coach Sam Prakel, Waleed Suliman, Marta Pen Freitas & Drew Windle of the Brooks Beasts, along with Seattle resident Rebecca Mehra.
Internationally, the Commonwealth Games track and field competition starts next week in Birmingham, United Kingdom, with Josh Kerr of the Brooks Beasts, and former Huskies Izzi Batt-Doyle and Sam Tanner among those scheduled to compete.
There are regional championships to be contested, most notably the European Championships in Munich August 15-21, and the NACAC (North and Central America) Championships in the Bahamas August 19-21.
The World Athletics Under-20 championships start on August 1st in Cali, Colombia, while the Wanda Diamond League resumes starting on August 6th in Silesia, Poland, and finishes with the Diamond League finals on September 7-8 in Zürich.
There is plenty of running, jumping, and throwing left in 2022 before the transition is made to the 2022 cross country season, which starts at the end of August.
NOTE: World Athletics, and the Oregon22 organizing committee contributed to this report.
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