A race from all the way back in May of 2007 determined Nicole Teter’s Olympic fate Monday night in the 800m.
Teter’s Olympic ‘A’ standard time of 1:59.91 from that race, in Eugene, secured her the third spot on the U.S. Olympic Team despite finishing fourth place in the final.
Kameisha Bennett finished in 2:01.20, a tenth of a second better than Teter’s 2:01.30. However, because she hadn’t met the ‘A’ standard of 2:00 since Jan. 1, 2007 – Bennett gave birth to a son 16 months ago and couldn’t race – and Teter had, the Oregon Track Club Elite runner got the spot.
She said she knew immediately after finishing she was in.
“Pretty immediately,” Teter said. “I looked at the times and knew she didn’t run under two.”
Hazel Clark won the event in 1:59.82 and Alice Schmidt was second in 2:00.46.
Both Bennett and Teter were in the final because race officials advanced the four runners who tumbled to the track during Saturday’s semifinals even though they didn’t qualify by place.
That second chance means a second trip to the Olympics for Teter.
“From falling, not thinking that I was even in the finals, to getting fourth and making the team by default,” she said. “I cannot wait to go to China.”
It is Clark’s third Olympic team and second Olympic Trials win since 2000.
The 31-year-old led the race from wire-to-wire, running a 57-second first lap to safeguard against being involved in a fall. Her front-running strategy worked out.
“At the end I was hurting, but I had that will to gut it out and make it to the line, that’s it,” Clark said. “Going wire-to-wire is a tough way to win a race.”
Second-place finisher Alice Schmidt made her first Olympic team. She won the controversial semifinal and, like Clark, tried to stay clear of other runners Monday night.
“Knowing that there were 12 people there, at least my strategy was I need to get out hard,” Schmidt said.
Teter, 35, was the runner-up at the 2004 Olympic Trials, advancing to the semifinals in Athens. She moved to Eugene 16 months ago to train under OTC Elite coach Frank Gagliano, who coached her in 2004.
Teter was left in the back for much of the race, but moved into fourth with 300 meters left, and third at 200 meters to go. Down the final straightaway, Bennett outstrode Teter. After taking more than a year off because of her pregnancy, Bennett wasn’t disappointed afterward.
“Miracles can happen because the other day I thought my Olympic dream was completely over,” she said, referring to the fall.
Oregon junior Rachel Yurkovich can share in Bennett’s sentiment, taking third in the women’s javelin but not advancing to the Olympics because of her missing the ‘A’ standard of 197-0.
In fact, none of the top three individuals in the event met the standard, but winner Kara Patterson, second-place finisher Dana Pounds and fourth-place finisher Kim Kreiner, had previously met it.
“I’d like to get back out there to that 60-meter mark,” Patterson said. “I like that I have a 61-meter throw under my belt.”
Patterson, from Purdue University, threw 191-9 for the win. Yurkovich threw 185-1, six feet behind her Oregon school record of 191-1, set at the Oregon Relays in May.
“I came into today knowing that this would probably be my last meet of the year, unless I threw the ‘A’ standard, which I knew was probably unlikely,” Yurkovich said.
The Duck was eighth until her final throw, which launched her five spots ahead and into a bronze medal.
Yurkovich is still enrolled in summer school at Oregon and was already focusing on her schoolwork.
“I changed my thoughts around today and I have a midterm tomorrow, so we will see how the rest of the week goes,” she said.
Yurkovich’s Newberg High teammate Mallory Webb finished in 12th place. Webb had just graduated from Fresno State University.
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