Pre Classic Men’s 100 Has Record Setters From Everywhere

            Eugene, Oregon – After setting an American record in the 4 x 100 earlier this month, all of team USA will compete individually at the Prefontaine Classic.  As previously announced, second-leg star Justin Gatlin will be headlining the 200 meters; the other three will be featured in the 100.
 
            Mike Rodgers led off the equal-fastest American 4x100 team in history to win the World Relays earlier this month in 37.38.  Individually, Rodgers ranked No. 2 in the world in last year’s Track & Field News world rankings, his sixth-straight year among the Top 10.  That streak is the longest by an American since Hall of Famer Maurice Greene (1997-2004).

            Tyson Gay is the American record holder at 9.69.  He ran third leg in the Bahamas.  The top-ranked American by T&FN four times, Gay was the world’s No. 1 ranked sprinter by T&FN in 2010 and in 2007.  In 2007, Gay won World Championships gold medals in the 100 and 200.

            Oregon native Ryan Bailey was anchor on the American record-setting team, crossing the line ahead of one Usain Bolt.  He was 4^th in the 2012 Olympics.  With a best of 9.88, Bailey is among America’s fastest ever, just on the heels of world record holders Carl Lewis (9.86) and Leroy Burrell (9.85) as well as American record holders Greene and Tyson Gay.

            Nesta Carter is the only man from Jamaica to rank among the T&FN  world top 10 in each year this decade in this event, topped by a No. 2 in 2013.  Carter has led off the Jamaican gold-medal 4x100 teams in the last two Olympics as well as the last two World Championships.  The 2012 Olympic team set the world record at 36.84.

            Richard Thompson is Trinidad’s fastest ever at 9.82 and has been his country’s fastest since running 9.85 in 2011  The former NCAA champion from LSU in 2008 finished that summer with an Olympic silver medal.

            Kim Collins, the 2003 World Championships gold medalist, is a four-time Olympian for St. Kitts.  He is history’s oldest sub-10 runner at 9.96, set last summer at age 38.  Collins made T&FN’s top 10 world rankings last year.  This year he was undefeated indoors in the 60 meters, clocking a national record 6.47 after a pair of 6.48s – the only man to run sub-6.50.

            James Dasaolu won the European Championships last summer.  With a best of 9.91, he is Great Britain’s fastest since Linford Christie (9.87), the 1992 Olympic gold medalist.  The Pre Classic will be Dasaolu’s first race on U.S. soil.

            China’s Bingtian Su will also be racing for the first time in the U.S.  A four-time Chinese champion, he has already equaled his PR of 10.06.  He won the Asian Championships in 2011 and 2013.  The Chinese national record is 10.00.
 

            Fans can follow the event lineups as all announced fields are posted at  <link http: www.preclassic.com _blank>PreClassic.com.  The direct link to current start/entry lists is <link http: preclassic.runnerspace.com _blank>HERE and will include updates to all announced fields.
 
            Tickets for the 41^st annual edition of the Prefontaine Classic, to be held May 29-30 at Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore., are available now from goducks.com and from 1-800-WEBFOOT.  Sponsored by NIKE continuously since 1984, the Prefontaine Classic will be shown live to an international audience and by NBC Sports from 1:30 till 3:00 p.m. PT on Saturday, May 30.

            The Prefontaine Classic is the longest-running outdoor invitational track & field meet in America and is part of the elite IAAF Diamond League of meets held worldwide annually.  The Pre Classic’s results score has rated No. 1 or No. 2 in the world in each of the last four years by All-Athletics.com, the official data partner of the IAAF Diamond League.

            Steve Prefontaine is a legend in the sport of track & field and is the most inspirational distance runner in American history.  He set a national high school 2-mile record (8:41.5) while at Marshfield High School in Coos Bay, Oregon, that is the fastest ever in a National Federation-sanctioned race.  While competing for the University of Oregon, he won national cross country championships (3) and outdoor track 3-Mile/5000-meter championships (4), and never lost a collegiate track race at any distance.  As a collegiate junior, he made the 1972 U.S. Olympic Team and nearly won an Olympic medal, finishing 4^th in the 5K at the 1972 Munich Olympics, at age 21.  After finishing college in 1973 and preparing for a return to the Olympics in 1976, he continued to improve, setting many American records.  His life ended tragically on May 30, 1975, the result of an auto accident, at age 24.  The Pre Classic began that year and has been held every year since.