AFTER AN ABSURDLY EASY 47.97 to win his semi, Rai Benjamin admitted that he was not at the Trials chasing a fast time. “It’s all about making the team,” he said. The drama would, yes, be about making the team — for everyone else.
Though he is now a global star, the 26-year-old Benjamin, a New Yorker who ran for UCLA, USC and once on a relay team as a 17-year-old for his parents’ native Antigua, has never won the World Championships or the Olympics, even though he owns the second-fastest time in history, the famous 46.17 AR in losing to Karsten Warholm in the ‘21 Olympics.
That rematch between the intense Norwegian and the calm, tall American has been in the oxygen for years, and now it is just weeks away in Paris. Global television awaits.
The 9-man final was one of the best fields in history — the slowest PR in the field belonged to Arizonan James Smith (48.97). Five in the 47s, plus Benjamin.
He drew lane 7, bracketed by contenders CJ Allen, the Washington State grad, and Trevor Bassitt, from Div.II Ashland. Those three had comprised the U.S. team at last year’s Worlds.
Many eyes were also on Caleb Dean, the 23-year-old Marylander who had won the NCAA for Texas Tech in a stunning 47.23, giving him the second-best PR in the field. Dean was in 5, between Bassitt and the NCAA runner-up, Alabama’s Chris Robinson.
Dean went for it. Because touch-down times are available for each hurdle, we know that by hurdle 4, Benjamin (16.94) was trailing both Dean and Robinson by two full tenths (16.74). By hurdle 5 they had widened that advantage to nearly 0.3.
Then Benjamin’s steady drive took over from the fast starters. Between hurdles 6 and 7 he required just 3.84 seconds compared with 4.26 for Dean. Between 7 and 8 it was 4.06 versus 4.53 as Rai took nearly a full-second lead and was in command heading for the final straight, at which point Dean crashed while Robinson battled to hold on against the onrushing pair of Allen and Bassitt.
At the final hurdle Robinson was still in the hunt, but he lost out on the run-in as Allen outleaned Bassitt for 2nd while Robinson also broke 48 but settled for 4th. Dean failed to finish.
Benjamin’s 46.46 winning time broke his own OT Record of 46.83 from ‘21 and is the fifth-fastest time ever run — if a bit slower than he ran (46.39) in…
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