Devon Allen

What? You didn't see the thousands of us leaving before all the distance events?

From the data at T&FN, it appears that Sacramento's attendance figures were higher than either of the previous 2 off-year championships, so I think the organizers are probably happy. There were a lot of people at the stadium on Sunday despite the heat. The stadium seats 22,000, so half full is still a lot by track and field standards.

The NCAA declared Jeremy Bloom ineligible in football because he had skiing sponsors, so I don't think they would allow Allen to receive sponsorship in Track and be a NCAA football player.

coach d wrote:

What? You didn't see the thousands of us leaving before all the distance events?

From the data at T&FN, it appears that Sacramento's attendance figures were higher than either of the previous 2 off-year championships, so I think the organizers are probably happy. There were a lot of people at the stadium on Sunday despite the heat. The stadium seats 22,000, so half full is still a lot by track and field standards.

Actually on Thursday night the announcer even chided folks for leaving before all events had been completed (two steeple heats and a 10,000m finals), but there weren't even enough in the stands to to begin with for "thousands" leave. Daily Relay even had video footage of folks leaving and has commented about low turnout.

And give me a break - anyone watching could see the stands were not even half full. I like the (glass) half full philosophy, but after all the bluster of how great Sac's fan base is and it's better than Eugene - I'll rely on what everyone plainly saw as a pretty empty stadium on the day of nearly all finals. Even Sac officials listed it at 9,600 and as the great Rojo has said related to attendance figures, you can't trust what the host site reports.

Btw, there were 7,500 folks in attendance for the Friday Night (pre) Pre Classic where only 5 events were contested and nearly ALL stayed for all events, the last starting at 9:17pm (yes, it was a 10,000m).

"He also appears to be the first white man to win the hurdles since 1962 when Jerry Tarr (another University of Oregon football player/track star) won."

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Appearances can be deceiving (LMAO). Devon is definitely of mixed race, of which he seems to have gotten the best of the best from each. He is an incredible young man, and that is what matters-not what race he is.

Original Barefoot Runner wrote:

Devon is definitely of mixed race, of which he seems to have gotten the best of the best from each.

ha ha, you're right, he is. part English, part Norwegian

Definitely a great kid and a leader. He was President of the Black Student group at his Arizona high school as a Senior.

Devon was in my class at Brophy, a top-notch Jesuit HS in Phoenix. He was a member of our BSU during high school, and finished as our President. See his bio here, http://espn.go.com/blog/high-school/player-of-the-year/post/_/id/9372/arizona-boys-track-aoy-devon-allenespecially the part on Academic Achievement. We are happy for him and proud of his achievements in just one year at Oregon.

If I recall correctly Devon Allen's 100m time from his HS senior year was a 10.4x

Arizona Track Mates wrote:

He was a member of our BSU during high school.

Whitest looking black dude I've ever seen, but I guess that explains the speed.

I've watched U.S. track for 43 years and never have seen a talent explode on the scene like this. It is seriously uncanny.

All time US U23 list

12.93 Renaldo Nehemiah

13.09 Aries Merritt

13.16 Roger Kingdom

13.16 Terrence Trammell

13.16 Devon Allen

13.19 Ronnie Ash

13.21 Jason Richardson

13.22 Greg Foster

Allen turns 20 in December.

I count myself lucky to have been at both these breakthrough races.

A star turn for sure.

Skeets won when he was 19, but I can't recall if he was a freshman of sophomore and the set the world record the next year. As good as Devon is doing, to get much better, he is going to need a dedicated hurdle coach.

trackcoach wrote:

Skeets won when he was 19, but I can't recall if he was a freshman of sophomore and the set the world record the next year. As good as Devon is doing, to get much better, he is going to need a dedicated hurdle coach.

Skeets won the USA title as a nineteen year old freshman but he did not win the NCAA title that same year. He finished second to Greg Foster, who was only a soph himself. Times for that race were 13.22 for Foster and 13.27 for Nehemiah.

I live in Eugene, OR and have been following Allen. What's really unbelievable is that he has only run the event (42" hurdles) less than a dozen times, including preliminary rounds at the PAC 12's and Regionals. The third time he ran the event, he lined up against Asthon Eaton at the Oregon Twilight, and lost by a little over a meter. At that point you knew he was going to be special, because he was still participating in Spring football. He ran 10.5 early in the season, but he can probably do 10.2 now. He ran the 400 Intermediates at the PAC 12's, with the worst form I've ever seen. The announcer even stated, "Allen has absolutely run himself out of this race with his poor form...." When he came off of the last hurdle, he was 4th. or 5th., and made a dash to the line finishing second by .05 of a second in 51.19. The time wasn't great, but if you had seen the race, you know if he gets his steps down, he'll at least run 48 seconds. He ran 20.75 in the 200 as an 11th. grader. Oregon's 4X400 relay squad was running 3:07, until they put Allen on team as the third man. He ran 46 seconds and the team lowered its time to sub 3:04. All these accomplishments as a TRUE track Freshman, and he's on scholarship for football where he caught two touchdowns in the Spring game. He's a great football prospect. Enough said.

Arizona Track Mates wrote:

Devon was in my class at Brophy, a top-notch Jesuit HS in Phoenix. He was a member of our BSU during high school, and finished as our President. See his bio here,

http://espn.go.com/blog/high-school/player-of-the-year/post/_/id/9372/arizona-boys-track-aoy-devon-allenespecially

the part on Academic Achievement. We are happy for him and proud of his achievements in just one year at Oregon.

If President Obama is the first black president (half white/half black) then whites can claim Devon Allen. We don't have any role models in the sprints:)

"whitest" "black" guy I've ever seen:

Shows how stupid the focus on race is in America.

You're either blind or just not very smart. Ash was so fast he hit the hurdle on the way up. He wasn't fading, etc. Had he not fallen he would certainly have run low 12.9.

i kinda like running wrote:

That was insane. Hurdlers usually hit their prime a little later than sprinters, because it's such a technical event. This kid could be a gold medalist in Rio.

Devon looks like a H.S. kid who is still adjustng to 42", what is getting him by right now is his start, speed between the hurdles and he finishes strong. Usually the summer between H.S. and college kids will start practicing 42", but if Devon particpated in football summer camp, he missed out on that.

You are right about hurdlers usually not hitting their prime until their late 20s. Skeets, Foster, Trammell and a few other ran very fast at an early age becasue they started running 42" as young as age 17. I would not be surprised if Devon platueas at 13.1 or even takes a step backwards for the next year or two; there is almost no way he can run much faster without better technique. You see this in the 110s a lot, guys get stuck at a certain time, usually around 13.1 or 2x and almost dissapear for awhile and then make a major breakthrough. 4 good current examples are Oliver, Merritt, Wilson and Ronnie Ash; I really don't expect to see Devon getting much better anytime soon. I have never seen a sub-13 hurdler with out good hurdle technique. Devon by all accounts is a 13.1x hurdler, winning USATFs was a little bit of an anolomy, he is going to need time to make the next jump...just keeping it real.

Realism wrote:

Arizona Track Mates wrote:

He was a member of our BSU during high school.

Whitest looking black dude I've ever seen, but I guess that explains the speed.

Seems you don't know, but there are whites, Latinos, and Asians in various BSU'S as well?