Long after the buzz died down, Oregon assistant athletic director Vin Lananna was on the phone, standing on the javelin runway, taking an important call. Four Oregon men had just broken the collegiate record in the four-by-mile relay in thrilling fashion Saturday night, finishing in 16:03.24 to best Michigan’s 2005 mark of 16:04.54. One of them, junior Andrew Wheating, was by Lananna’s side, attempting to take in every word.
On the other end of the connection was Hicham El Guerrouj, the world-record holder in the 1,500m (3:26.00), the mile (3:43.13), two-time Olympic gold medalist, and current Oregon business student. El Guerrouj was congratulating Lananna and his athletes, redshirt freshman Matthew Centrowitz, Wheating, redshirt senior Shadrack Biwott and senior Galen Rupp, for leaving their unofficial mark on history in a unique and seldom-run race – a race that had many chances to go wrong.
Lananna invited several colleges and professional teams to join the Ducks, but many backed out at the last minute until Oregon and Oregon Track Club Elite were all that remained. The race, Lananna decided, would go on.
“When everybody kept asking us what we were going to do, we just said, the heck with it,” he said. “No matter who shows up, we were gonna run.”
Then senior Scott Wall, who was supposed to be the fourth member of the relay team, showed up to the Twilight with a knot in his calf. Deciding against running Wall at less-than-full strength, Lananna told Biwott, who was fresh off an afternoon workout, that he would be the fourth man in the relay. With Biwott, a non-U.S. citizen running, the American record of 16:08.54 would not be attained, adding pressure to the collegiate record.
“I just said, ‘OK,’” Biwott said afterward with a laugh.
Four more obstacles surrounded the record attempt: Four mile-long runs near personal bests, to get an average as close to 4:01 per leg of the mile as possible. Rupp, Wheating and Centrowitz had each run sub-four-minute miles, but only Wheating’s came in an outdoor setting, at last year’s Oregon Relays.
Lananna, looking for something to engage his athletes, opted for the unprecedented move of letting crowd members onto the track to watch the four-by-mile relay.
Most of the 5,726 denizens of Hayward Field made their way to the track, where they stood in the outer four lanes. Cheers picked up before the athletes were brought to the track, and the wave was even attempted, but somehow everyone held ground and resisted the urge to move a step closer.
“The athletes kind of threw it out there as a joke (before the race),” Lananna said, “and we said, ‘Yes. That’s what we’ll do.’”
The crowd roared as the Ducks and OTC Elite runners made their way to starting line, with the Oregon fight song serving as background music on the night. Centrowitz, OTC Elite’s Tom Brooks and Oregon’s James Withers, acting as a one-man “B” relay, lined up for the first leg as the gun fired. Withers acted as the pace-setter for three laps before stepping off the track, leaving Centrowitz with a slight lead.
“I’ve been running for like, six, seven years now and I’ve never been in a race where you can’t hear yourself breathing out here,” Centrowitz said of the race atmosphere.
At the first exchange, Centrowtiz handed the baton cleanly off to Wheating after recording a split of 3:59.53, his first ever outdoor mile under four minutes. Wheating and OTC Elite’s Stephen Pifer made it a race, as Pifer temporarily swiped the lead, but Wheating used his trademark finish to pass Pifer over the remaining 200 meters, handing off to Biwott with a split of 3:59.60.
The Ducks were well off world record pace by the third leg, and there would be no breaking Ireland’s 1985 record of 15:49.08, as Biwott handed off to Galen Rupp after running a 4:05.21 mile split. But the collegiate record was well within Rupp’s sights, and he raced toward the record with the support of a consistently raucous crowd.
“With 100 meters to go, I took a look at the clock,” Rupp said, “and I knew I had it then.”
At the race’s conclusion, Rupp was mobbed by his teammates as the letters “CR” showed up on the clock. The senior, who will end his career at Oregon as the most decorated athlete in school history, had run his segment of the relay fastest of all, in 3:58.93.
Other notable performances
Beijing Olympian and former Stanford athlete Jesse Williams electrified the crowd with a high-jump duel against former Kentucky jumper Grant Lindsey, competing unattached. Williams, who won the high jump at the 2008 U.S. Track & Field Trials at Hayward, beat Lindsey with a cleared height of 7-6 and then landed 7-8 on his next attempt, a personal best outdoors and the second-highest jump in the world this season.
Williams did not make his next three attempts at 7-9
Record breakers
Daily Emerald
May 10, 2009
0
More to Discover