Welcome to Championship season! With no World championship or Olympics on the calendar, this is the big championship for most American athletes this year. This is separate from the Diamond League meets that we have been talking about so far as this championship falls under the umbrella of USA Track and Field. A lot of the same rules apply, but there aren't the same setups that we've seen so far. There are no pacers or wavelights. The main goals are about placing, scoring, getting on podiums, or securing titles.
Let's look at some different scenarios. I'll make references to splits a number of times in this writeup. You can view them in the results page here. Note on the left that you can select by the day and by event. Thank you, USATF!
Men's 1500m:
Big Names in the Race:
Nathan Green - PB: 3:32.20
Vincent Ciattei - PB: 3:30.90
Rheinhardt Harrison - PB: 3:36.28
Gary Martin - PB: 3:32.03
What's Happening: After a very tactical first half (with the leaders coming through 700 in ~1:58/1:59), Nathan Green outleans Vincent Ciattei after a dramatic sprint finish to win his first professional national title
Callout: This is a good example of a "tactical" race. When you see a race that is referred to as "tactical," it usually just means that there is a slow start and a dramatic finish. You'll also notice there isn't a pacer like we've seen before. Put all of these details together and the incentives dramatically change. Taking the lead can be a massive risk and athletes all have the same incentive to sit back, save their energy, and let someone else take the lead. This is especially the case with middle distance runners whose big weapons are often their finishing kicks.
We see here that all of the guys are playing a game of chicken. No one wants to take the lead, it bunches up, and they come through 700 in about 1:58-1:59. You can also look at the splits here. Notice how the second lap is a 69 for the leaders and then it suddenly drops at 60 and then the low 50's. So, it's not as simple as being able to hold 60 second laps, they also need to be able to run a 70 and then a 51.
Definitions:
"Tactical" refers to a race where athletes will slow down to save energy and rely on a fast finishing sprint to win.
"Kick" refers to a finishing sprint.
"Splits" refers to intervals in a distance event that are used to track the progress and speed of a race. It could be miles or kilometers or laps or fractions of a lap.
Pacer is an athlete paid to take the field out fast with the goal being the field can draft and run faster than they would otherwise.
Women's 5000m:
Big Names in the Race:
Parker Valby - PB: 14:39.88
Shelby Houlihan - PB: 14:23.92
Emily Mackay - PB: 14:45.81
What's Happening: Valby takes the field through 4600m before Shelby Houlihan and Emily Mackay make a hard move. Mackay makes a second hard move with 200 to go to win with a time of 14:55.82.
Callout: This race was a clash of Valby's pace pushing and the kicks of Houlihan and Mackay. Again, unlike the 5000 meter races we've seen in the diamond league, we don't have designated pacers. So, we have a similar dynamic to the 1500m. However, in the 5000m, there are usually more athletes in the field who would prefer a more steady grind of a pace and not have it left to a dramatic kick. In this case, that's Parker Valby.
Unfortunately, this clip doesn't show the exact full race. That does happen from time to time, to the frustration of many distance fans. However, we do have the splits here. If you are overwhelmed by the 400m splits, I recommend flipping to the 1k splits. You'll see Valby's splits are steady and slightly faster than everyone else for most of the race, showing that she was trying to keep it steady.
Also worth calling out that Mackay's last 200m was under 30 seconds. In order to win the race, Mackay needed to both be able to handle 72 second laps and also switch to a dramatically faster speed.
Definitions:
"Kick" refers to a finishing sprint.
"Splits" refers to intervals in a distance event that are used to track the progress and speed of a race. It could be miles or kilometers or laps or fractions of a lap.
Pacer is an athlete paid to take the field out fast with the goal being the field can draft and run faster than they would otherwise.
Men's 400m:
Big Names in the Race:
Justin Robinson - PB: 44.47
Chris Bailey - PB: 44.06
Khaleb McRae - PB: 43.91
What's Happening: Justin Robinson initially pulls off a come-from-behind victory to win the men's 400m in a time of 44.31. However, he was disqualified after a review found that he stepped on the inside line multiple lines.
Callout: At first glance, this looked like an exciting finish along the lines of Quincy Hall's 2024 Olympic Gold performance in Tokyo. You can see the splits here and notice how everyone, including Justin Robinson, was slowing down (albeit by not much).
However, this US title came down to lane infringement, specifically World Athletics Technical Rule 17. This rule essentially says that an athlete will get DQ'ed if they step on the inside line multiple times or if they cross the lane even once. We see at 3:25 in this video that he steps on the line 3 times.
Here's the main takeaway from this race: it's important for athletes to stay in their lane!
Definitions:
"World Athletics Technical Rule 17" a rule where an athlete will be DQ'ed for lane infringement, when they are found to be stepping completely over the line or multiple infringements on the line in the same race
"DQ" is an abbreviation for an official disqualification.
"Splits" refers to intervals in a distance event that are used to track the progress and speed of a race. It could be miles or kilometers or laps or fractions of a lap.
Women's 400m Hurdles:
Big Names in the Race:
Anna Cockrell - PB: 52.77
Deonca Bookman PB: 53.95
Shamier Little - PB: 52.39
Dalilah Muhammad - PB: 51.58
What's Happening: Anna Cockrell gets out very fast and wins her first US national title in a dominant fashion with a time of 52.94.
Callout: Worth noting that while this is her first national title, she has been right in the mix with the contenders for many years. She hasn't just been on the podium at the national level before, she also was a silver medalist in the Paris Olympics where she defeated Femke Broeders-Bol.
She also gets out very aggressively, not just compared to the athletes in the field but also compared to historical performances. You'll see visually that she makes up the stagger from lane 6 very early on. If we look at her splits, it only adds to the story. She reaches the second hurdle in 10.05, which is significantly faster than everyone. That's faster than Femke's start when she won the 2025 world championship and any 400m hurdles race that Sydney McLaughlin ran in 2022, just for some reference points.
Definitions:
"Stagger" refers to a staggered start line. Since the outside lanes cover more distance due a larger radius, they shift the starting lines for each lane accordingly.
"Splits" refers to intervals in a distance event that are used to track the progress and speed of a race. It could be miles or kilometers or laps or fractions of a lap.
Men's 110m Hurdles:
Big Names in the Race:
Bradley Franklin - PB: 13.00
Cordell Tinch - PB: 12.87
Kendrick Smallwood - PB: 12.95
What's Happening: Bradley Franklin leads for most of the race and then Cordell Tinch makes a late-race surge after the last hurdle and outleans Franklin in a photo finish.
Callout: It ain't over 'til it's over! This was an intense and messy battle. 13.00 is blazing fast and it's even more significant when you factor in all of the hurdles that got hit over the course of this race. If you go to 2:08, it looks like 5 athletes hit the 9th hurdle! Here we have another photo finish situation, where every thousandth of a second counts. If you feel like you couldn't quite tell who won from watching, you're not alone. Even the professionals had to go to the cameras to find out.
Definitions:
"Photo finish" refers to a result that was so close that officials had to use high-speed cameras and go frame-by-frame to figure out who won. They use something called a slit-video system, which essentially takes 1,000's of scans a second at the finish line and stitches together a snapshot of the finish line to determine who won down to the 1/1,000th of a second. It can get THAT close.
What's Next
If you want to catch the next meet, it will be the Lausanne Diamond League Meet on August 21st. You can stream it on FloTrack.
If you want to follow along with more track and field observations or bad puns between now and then, you can follow me at @predamame on Twitter. See you then!
Welcome to Championship season! With no World championship or Olympics on the calendar, this is the big championship for most American athletes this year. This is separate from the Diamond League meets that we have been talking about so far as this championship falls under the umbrella of USA Track and Field. A lot of the same rules apply, but there aren't the same setups that we've seen so far. There are no pacers or wavelights. The main goals are about placing, scoring, getting on podiums, or securing titles.
Let's look at some different scenarios. I'll make references to splits a number of times in this writeup. You can view them in the results page here. Note on the left that you can select by the day and by event. Thank you, USATF!
Men's 1500m:
Big Names in the Race: