THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, June 14, 1996 TAG: 9606140736
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C7 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TOM ROBINSON, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ATLANTA LENGTH: 80 lines
Olympic Games track and field competition gets the glory. Every four years, though, there first comes a show that by many accounts demands greater guts than the Olympics for less national acclaim - the U.S. Olympic Track and Field Trials.
They begin today in the stadium in which the world's Olympians will gather next month. And at least as much as their compatriots in other sports, the Americans who make the Olympic track and field team will know they have done something very special.
``No question about it. The U.S. Trials are more intense (than the Olympics),'' said Steve Riddick, Norfolk State's track coach and a 1976 Olympic sprinter. ``It's not even close.''
A few athletes with close ties to South Hampton Roads, and a few more loosely connected, will see for themselves starting at noon today. The heptathlon 100-meter hurdles, featuring two-time Olympic gold medalist Jackie Joyner-Kersee, opens the meet.
The men's 200-meter final, highlighted by international star Michael Johnson, ends the Trials a week from Sunday at 5:40 p.m. There will be eight days of competition in all, with off days next Tuesday and Thursday. The top three finishers in each event make the Olympic team.
Pole vaulter Lawrence Johnson of Chesapeake and the University of Tennessee is considered South Hampton Roads' closest thing to an Olympic lock. Johnson, 22, became the U.S. record holder last month with a vault of 19 feet, 7 1/2 inches. He is expected to battle former national record-holder Scott Huffman, two-time Olympian Kory Tarpenning, Dean Starkey and Mike Holloway for a top-three berth.
Pole vault qualifying is tonight. The final is Sunday night. If Johnson makes it, he also would be the first black U.S. vaulter in the Olympics.
``I'm not taking anything for granted,'' Johnson said recently, mindful that world-record holder Sergei Bubka failed to clear a height in the '92 Olympics. ``I'll definitely go to the Trials with my battle gear on.''
Other local athletes such as 100-meter man Andre Cason (Virginia Beach), 100-meter and 400-meter hurdler Tonya Williams (Norfolk) and 1,500-meter runner Terrance Herrington, a '92 Olympian who trains part of the year in Chesapeake, are not favorites in their events but are considered contenders.
Two rounds of the 100 are today and the final two rounds are Saturday night. Riddick said such events as the 100, which has a loaded field, is where the intensity of the Trials is especially evident.
``There's more focus on the Trials,'' Riddick said. ``Guys like Carl Lewis (34) and Dennis Mitchell (30), they can't focus on the Games because their legs are older now. People have them on the team already, but I'm not sure they can make the team in the 100. It takes four rounds, and I'm not sure their legs can handle back-to-back-to-back-to-back rounds.''
Riddick has three sprinters - non-Hampton Roads residents Ramon Clay, Tim Montgomery and Brian Lewis - entered and also trains Cason. He said he constantly preaches the importance of seeing the race through, using himself as proof of what happens when concentration slips even for an instant.
Having survived the pressure of the '76 Trials by finishing third in the 100, Riddick pulled up early and coasted to the wire in an Olympic semifinal and failed to reach the final.
``I was a little more carefree in my thinking (at the Olympics),'' Riddick said. ``I was taking stuff for granted. I relive that 100 meters all the time. slowing down.''
Speaking of going hard, Williams will be the busiest local performer. A former Norview High School star, Williams, 21, recently won her second consecutive NCAA 400-meter hurdles title for the University of Illinois. She was second in the 100-meter hurdles this year.
She will compete in both at the Trials and is good enough to make the final field of eight in each, said her coach, Gary Winkler. However, the 400 field is particularly tough, Winkler said.
``There are three people in it who have all broken the world record in the last two years,'' Winkler said, citing world-record holder Kim Batten, Tonja Buford-Bailey and Sandra Farmer-Patrick. Batten, however, has been troubled all spring with foot and ankle problems.
The 400-meter hurdles will be run today through Sunday. The 100-meter hurdles are next Friday through Sunday. ILLUSTRATION: Photo
Norfolk State coach Steve Riddick, a former Olympian, has three
sprinters entered in the U.S. Trials. by CNB