EUGENIO, Oregon. Athing Mu got caught in the middle of the track and started to fall. One hand hit the floor, then the other. As she rolled onto her back, her bright pink shoes began to point towards the sky.
With that, one of America’s most promising runners saw her hopes of back-to-back Olympic titles in the 800 meters go down the drain, while sports fans were reminded just how unforgiving these US track races really are.
The 22-year-old from New Jersey became the first big-name casualty of Monday’s testing, felled by a huddled group on the final straight of the first lap, to say nothing of the long-standing rule in the US that only the three The first placed in the selections reach the Olympics, regardless of their curriculum.
“I coached, I preached, I watched,” Mu coach Bobby Kersee told the Associated Press. “And here is another indication that, regardless of how good we are, we can leave some better athletes home than other countries have. It’s part of our American way.”
Kersee said Mu was hit from behind and a protest was lodged. USA Track and Field did not immediately respond to questions about the status of the protest. The trainer said Mu was stung, burned and injured his ankle.
“She’ll be licking her wounds for a few days,” Kersee said.
Mu got up and finished, but was more than 22 seconds behind the winner, Nia Akins, who ran 1 minute, 57.36 seconds. Mu was choking back tears as he quickly exited the track and walked through the tunnel after the race. She did not give interviews.
She was running outside in a tightly clustered group and appeared to be turning left toward eventual third-place finisher Juliette Whitaker when she tripped and fell, leaving three runners behind her struggling as they jumped over and around her. .
Mu is hardly the first athlete to see this happen. One of the more memorable and moving moments on this track happened eight years ago, at the same event, when Alysia Montano, who was looking to return to the Olympics, tripped on the final straight and ended up on the track crying.
“I have a mama bear feeling,” said Montano, who is at the track this week doing internal interviews over the PA system. “But the race is sometimes brutal. There are two laps, a close race and everyone is feeling confused trying to figure out where they want to get.”
The Olympic Trials marked Mu’s first meet of the year after dealing with injuries all season. She appeared to be in good form in the first two rounds, and Kersee said her season was progressing well.
But in the 800m final, she barely turned around.
Despite the crash, Mu could still go to Paris as part of the US relay group; she was a key part of America’s gold medal win in the 4×400 three years ago in Tokyo.
After winning NCAA national, world and Olympic championships before turning 21, Mu won a bronze medal at Worlds last year and later admitted that she needed a break from all the pressure, social media and other demands that came her way. by being marked as one of the great new stars of athletics.
In interviews leading up to this week’s meet in Eugene, she said she rediscovered her love for the sport and was looking forward to the quest to become back-to-back champion.
She dominated that distance thanks in part to a long, quick stride, and that may be what cost her a race in which she was the favorite.
“I heard it and thought ‘OK, keep running, it wasn’t you,’” second-place finisher Allie Wilson said of the commotion that resulted in Mu’s fall. “That, unfortunately, is part of racing. Things like this can happen.”
Mu’s 800 meters contrasted sharply with that of heptathlete Anna Hall less than half an hour earlier.
Hall won his 800 meters – the seventh and final event of the two-day heptathlon – to win the title and reach the Olympics. It came three years after a hurdle stumble cost her a place at the Tokyo Games, and just six months after knee surgery left her questioning whether she would make it back to Paris in time.
She also cried after the race as she headed to the stands to hug the event’s greatest American, two-time Olympic champion Jackie Joyner-Kersee.
“I’m almost in shock,” Hall said. “This year has been so difficult. And falling into 2021. The journey to get here was much more difficult than I imagined.”
There was drama elsewhere on a busy night that included six finals.
The women’s 5,000 meter race had a difference of 0.02 seconds, with Elle St. Pierre finishing in 14:40.34, narrowly beating Elise Cranny. Both are going to the Olympics.
Additionally, Vashti Cunningham, who added 13 consecutive U.S. indoor and outdoor titles this week, needed to win the third-place tiebreaker to make her third Olympic team.
Quincy Wilson, 16, finished sixth in the 400-meter final with a time of 44.94, his third sub-45 run in three tries at trials.
Now, he will wait to see if the USA track and field team will call him up to be part of the relay group.
“All I know is I gave everything I had,” he said. “I can’t be too disappointed. I’m 16 years old and I’m living in adult times.”
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AP Sports Writer Pat Graham contributed to this report.
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This story originally appeared on ABCNews.go.com read the full story
