Gay outruns wind, record

INDIANAPOLIS -- That blur speeding through Indy was Tyson Gay.

Running on a wet track, with the wind blowing in his face, Gay completed one of the most impressive sprint doubles in the sport's history Sunday.

The quiet, 24-year-old former Arkansas sprinter ran the second-fastest 200 meters ever, a 19.62-second dash that broke Michael Johnson's meet record on the final day of the U.S. track and field championships.

Add that to his 9.84-second triumph into the wind in the 100 on Friday, and no other sprinter's marks in the same meet can match him.

Despite a 0.46-mph headwind, Gay's 200 time was second only to Johnson's world record 19.32 set at the Atlanta Olympics in 1996. Johnson set the U.S. meet record of 19.66 at the Olympic Trials earlier that year, a world record at the time.

Wallace Spearmon, the defending U.S. champion and Gay's training partner in Fayetteville, Ark., was second in 19.89, with Rodney Martin, a former Western High School standout, third at 20.18.

"The time was excellent. The race was excellent, too," Gay said. "I wasn't thinking about any time. I was trying to get away from Wallace Spearmon as fast as I could."

Xavier Carter, who had the second-fastest 200 meters all time before Gay's big run, was carried off the track on a stretcher after injuring his right leg in the event's semifinals earlier Sunday.

Carter grabbed his right thigh about 120 meters into the race, staggered a few steps and tumbled to the ground. He lay there for several minutes before being carried away.

Carter's agent, Mark Block, initially thought Carter had injured his iliotibial band, a group of fibers that run on the outside of the thigh from the hip to the knee. However, further examination showed Carter's kneecap had popped out of place and then popped back in.

Carter ran a 19.63-second 200 in Lausanne, Switzerland, last July 11.

The 200 was to have included four of the six fastest runners in the event's history, but only two of them were in Sunday's final -- Spearmon and Gay. In addition to Carter's absence, Walter Dix didn't show up for Saturday's preliminary round.

Gay said he was "a little bit" surprised at how one-sided his victories were this week.

"Some people were injured," he said. "I'm sorry for Xavier, it's really been on my mind. I even heard Asafa Powell may have pulled up slightly in his trials. I want everyone to get healthy."

Powell won the 100 at the Jamaican championships Saturday but appeared laboring at the finish. His brother Nigel said Sunday the injury was not serious.

Gay and Spearmon are coached by Lance Brauman, who is nearing the end of a prison sentence for embezzlement, theft and mail fraud. Brauman, a former Arkansas assistant, will have to call them to talk about the race. They can't call him.

Defending world champion Allyson Felix won the women's 200 in 22.34. Sanya Richards, who failed to make the U.S. team with a fourth-place finish in her best event, the 400, on Saturday, made the squad in the 200 with a second-place finish at 22.43. Torri Edwards, the 100-meter winner Friday, was third in the 200 at 22.55.

The athletes wrapped up four days of competition at Carroll Stadium. The top three finishers in each event make the U.S. team for the world championships to be held Sept. 25-Aug. 2 in Osaka, Japan, providing they have met the necessary qualifying standards. In addition, defending world champions get a bye to Osaka as long as they competed in something at the U.S. meet.

Alan Webb broke Steve Scott's 25-year-old meet record in the 1,500, winning his third U.S. title in 3:34.82. Webb surged ahead of defending champion Bernard Lagat over the final 30 meters for the victory. Leonel Manzano was second and Lagat, the meet's 5,000 champion, was third.

After crossing the finish line, Webb fell to his knees, his fists raised in triumph.

"I didn't get to run this meet last year," he said. "I didn't get to defend my title. To lose the title, and get it back, it's emotional, I guess."

For the first time since 1993, Allen Johnson won't be competing at the worlds. The 36-year-old seven-time U.S. champion finished seventh in the 110-meter hurdles. Terrence Trammell won in 13.08.

Khadevis Robinson won his fourth U.S. 800 championship, third in a row, in 1:44.37, and Nick Symmonds was second in 1:45.17.

Lopez Lomong, the former "Lost Boy of Sudan" who passed his U.S. citizenship test Tuesday, took fifth and missed qualifying for the worlds. Lomong, who spent 10 years in a refugee camp in Kenya, said he is hoping to compete for the United States at the Pan American Games later this year.

THE REVIEW-JOURNAL CONTRIBUTED TO THIS REPORT.