CJ Allen cruises easy like Sunday morning in qualifying on a Hungarian holiday...

BUDAPEST, Hungary--In the only action Sunday morning involving Washington athletes, Washington State University and North Mason HS alum CJ Allen (Paul Merca photo) cruised to an easy second place finish in his first round heat of the men's 400 hurdles to start day 2 of the World Athletics Track & Field Championships at the National Athletics Centre.

On State Foundation Day of Hungary, which is a national holiday, Allen went hard over the first few hurdles, then ran a controlled race through the finish to take second in 48.36 and advance to the semifinals on Monday at 7:35 pm local time (10:35 am Pacific).

In the mixed zone, Allen said, "It was smooth. I wanted to execute the race, and that's what I did. I started shutting it down towards the end, and the field came up on me. The plan was to go hard through the first two hurdles. There's no point burning through everything I have (in the rounds). I felt controlled the whole race."

Later on today, Josh Kerr of the Brooks Beasts and Great Britain, along with former Husky Sam Tanner of New Zealand run in the second of two semifinals of the men's 1500 at 5:40 pm local time (8:40 am Pacific). 

They'll be in a heat that features reigning Olympic champ Jakob Ingebrigtsen of Norway and former world champ Timothy Cheruiyot of Kenya, with only the top six advancing to Wednesday night's final.

Complete results from the second day of competition is available here.

NOTE: World Athletics, the WABudapest 23 Organizing Committee, and USA Track & Field contributed to this report.

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