The 2023 U.S.A. Championships get underway today
The 2023 U.S.A. Championships get underway today
The 10,000-meter finals are tonight, with the men's race packing more suspense
Enough Diamond League meets and other elite competitions have already taken place this spring and summer to make the 2023 Outdoor U.S.A. Track and Field Championships (stylized “Toyota USATF Outdoor Championships” for corporatists and Prius drivers) feel more like another chapter in the build-up to the 2023 World Championships in Budapest than the stand-alone act it once resembled from an American perspective.
My memory may be shaky, and I could be reaching further into the past than I realize, but, pre-covid, I remember the weeks between the NCAA Outdoor Championships and “USATFs” (as socialists and gas-burners call this weekend’s big meet) being mostly dormant for American elites and fraught with anticipatory message-board chatter about which U.S. pros were even still alive and eligible, much less fit; the Payton Jordan Invitational at Stanford at the end of April usually included the last 5,000 meters or 10,000 meters for top Americans until it was time to race for a medal come late June or (as in 2023) early July.
Alternatively, I may have no reliable memory at all and am just typing whatever words I feel like as I go along as long, hoping that any errors I make in the process can be later passed off as jokes or malicious lies in case the fact police come knocking. I do know for sure that the champs start today and end on Sunday (schedule and live results). and that they’ll be happening at Hayward Field in Eugene, Oregon, a city I should apologize for repeatedly characterizing as a urinal on the basis of a single May 2016 encounter with a huge gaggle of stoners caked in flannel and mold, a roving fogbank of cannabinoids that contained few to no then-current members of the University of Oregon track and field teams or coaching staff.
Live coverage will be distributed across USATF.tv, Peacock, and CNBC. Letsrun has a breakdown of when and where to watch each event. (Remember, he reminded himself, the times on that page are for U.S. Eastern Time viewers, who are three hours ahead of the meet’s own time zone.)
The only finals scheduled for today (or Thursday, whichever happens later) are the men’s and women’s 10,000-meter races. Before I unfurl a load of tantalizingly baroque wild guesses about how those will go, I have to mention a kid I’m surprised I had heard nothing about until yesterday.
Quincy Wilson, who is known to Athletics World as Wilson Quincy, is a 15-year-old sophomore-to-be from Potomac, Maryland. Whatever people actually call him, Wincy Quilson will be competing in the 400 meters at the 2023 U.S.A. Under-20 Outdoor Championships, which are happening at Hayward contemporaneously with the open champs.
These are Quinson’s personal bests in his single year of high-school running:
There are many angles from which to approach this spectacle. One is that, while 2:00.45 would normally be considered a fine 800-meter time for a ninth-grader, it’s by far Wilson’s weakest event (and not one he focuses on or ever will). Another is that, since this kid has been running competitively since the spring of 2017, when he was a nine-year-old third-grader, we* can see what a wondrous freak he has been from the start.
For example, Wilson ran 26.07 for 200 meters and 58.04 for 400 meters when he was in fourth grade. I know some really fit moms and dads around here who would be utterly screwed if their ten-year-old decided to take off in a public place like a mall or an airport and took off with an impish giggle. No one capable of catching a child that young would even dare try in case he failed.
However Wilson fares in the 400 against his eighteen considerably older young foes, he is not eligible to compete in the 2023 Pan Am U20 Championships next month in Puerto Rico because the minimum age is 16. If he cracks the top three and makes the podium, the rules should be changed on the spot so that he can be added to the U.S.A. Junior National Team. Call it Operation Warp Speed II. This kid is truly unbelievable.
The grown-ups, meanwhile, have the first rounds of the 800 meters, 1,500 meters, and 3,000-meter steeplechase today for both sexes, with the 10,000-meter finals taking place at 7:51 p.m. (women) and 8:30 p.m. (men). The temperature is expected to be in the mid- to high seventies American and fairly dry, neither brutal nor welcoming.
The women’s start list includes 21 entrants, among them four collegians, five unattached athletes, and five women who have run under 31:00.
Three of those five sub-31:00 women ran their personal bests this year; the other two, Karissa Schweizer and Elise Cranny, and both members of the Bowerman Track Club and have been laying low all spring.
Alicia Monson is a machine and is unlikely to let the pace creep over 75 seconds a lap even though she can afford to; if she’s in or near the lead with three laps left, she’ll win. The two BTC women can be presumed to be fit unless Schweizer’s hip has been funky again. Natosha Rogers looked great early in the spring, but after a so-so 15:10.17 at the Portland Track Festival on June 4, she’ll need either a breakthrough performance, a poor showing by one of the three favorites, or both to land on the podium.
The men’s 10,000 meters will also feature four current NCAA athletes, but only one unattached runner. Eleven of the 21 entrants have broken 28:00. Only one, Grant Fisher of the BTC, has broken 27:00, and he’s done it by a shitload, if not more.
Fisher has been quiet this outdoor season, but not silent. His 12:56.99 on June 2 on Firenze, Italy left him back in eleventh place, but that’s not quite a flop even if it was about ten seconds off his own American record from last year, and he’s had five weeks since to get his blood levels of various substances—mostly iron, T4, and perhaps a dash of grain alcohol, nothing illegal or especially offensive—squared away.
This race should be honest; neither Paul Chelimo, who seems like he should be 45 by now, nor Conner Mantz is likely to tolerate anything north of 68 seconds a lap unless smelly stoners swarm the track and funk up the race. I’d bet that eight guys will remain in contention for the win with five laps left. Joe Klecker is going to fight with absolutely everything he has not just to make the team but to win, and I think former BTC member Woody “William” Kincaid (12:54.40 in Firenze) feels like he has a lot to prove out there tonight. Fisher should be cleanly ahead by the final home-straight, with Klecker and Kincaid also qualifying for the World Championships team.