Amazing Things Are Happening at The Armory This Year

By Elliot Denman

"Amazing Things Are Happening Here," the signage over Fort Washington Avenue, just south of 168th Street, tells you.

The signage is Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center's and it advertises the amazing medical advances and world-class treatment being delivered by the good folks at the renowned hospital.

But it's a message that a lot of other good folks, those at the New Balance Track and Field Center, Columbia-Presbyterian's neighbors, have a right to deliver, too.

Amazing indeed were some of the goings-on at the 15th edition of the Armory Track and Field Invitational meet, which concluded a two-day run Saturday evening with a string of sizzling, eye-opening, fan-firing performances.

It may have been icy out on Fort Washington Avenue but the pace was red-hot inside the renowned Armory facility.

How hot?

Just ask the fans who packed the Armory and got to see Canadian distance star Cameron "Cam" Levins, who races for the Nike-backed Oregon Distance Project, run one of the greatest one-day doubles in indoor track history and Team USA and Team Ireland wage a brilliant distance medley relay battle that wound up with both dipping under the fastest figures ever previously recorded for the distance medley relay.

Oh, and there was a lot more.

Cool, calm Ajee' Wilson built on her ever-brightening reputation by winning a brilliant, strategically-run women's 800-meter race, and Shawn Barber lived up to his burgeoning reputation with the best pole vault performance in Armory history.

Yes, all this as a backdrop to the collegiate events that have been the crux of this meet since its origin in 2001.  For sure, with the NYRR Millrose Games now two weeks away, the season's pace is spot-on.

With a couple of notable exceptions, however.  It wasn't a great day at the office for Nike Oregon Project teammates Galen Rupp and Mary Cain.

At 5:12 p.m., Levins stepped to the line for the start of the Men's Invitational Mile and proceeded to blow apart an all-star field in a 3:54.74 victory that demolished his PR of 3:57.16 and brought him home at least 15 meters ahead of Chris O'Hare, the Englishman by way of Tulsa (3:57.26).  Penn junior Thomas Awad, the Long Islander out of Chaminade High School, impressed in a 4:00.20 third place with the rest of the pack spread out around the last turn.

By 5:46 p.m., on some 30 minutes active rest, Levins was ready to go at it all over again.

And this time he was perhaps even more impressive.  The once-unknown youngster out of Campbell River, British Columbia, crushed yet another quality field with a 27.52 final lap that brought him home in an 8:15.38 two miles, another PR.

Runner-up Suguro Osako netted a Japanese indoor record of 8:16.47 and one more Oregon-based runner, Ben Blankenship, snared third in 8:16.53. But Rupp looked less than sharp with a last lap of "only" 29.61 that brought home in a totally-unaccustomed fourth in 8:17.24.

Levins, Osako and Rupp are training partners out in Oregon under the tutelage of Alberto Salazar.  So if wasn't a glory-filled day for Rupp, the expected star for the training group of Coach "Al Sal," it was a big day for the others in the Salazar enclave.

Many fans were scratching their heads to recall an indoor distance double to match this one by Levins.  And they weren't getting far in remembering any this lustrous.

At Southern Utah University, Levins ran off with NCAA titles at 5,000 and 10,000 meters in 2012. Representing Canada, he ran at the 2012 Olympic Games and the 2013 World Championships, then claimed the bronze medal in the 10,000 meters at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.

Watch out, track and field world, this Afro-coiffed 25-year-old is ready for much bigger things just ahead.  "I feel the strongest and fittest I've ever been," he declared. 

"The Afro?  You'd think aerodynamics would go against that, but then again maybe not.

"I thought maybe I'd get dropped by Galen, but I didn't.  I tucked in and was ready for whatever happened.

"But that wasn't the real Galen you saw out there.  I'm sure he'll be killing us all in a couple more weeks."

Sensational as the Levins double was, it was outdone by the best distance medley race in the history of indoor track.

Team USA of Matthew Centrowitz (2:49.47 1200 leadoff), Michael Berry (46.40 400), Erik Sowinski (1:47.60 800) and Pat Casey (3:56.48 anchor 1600) fought off a gutsy Irish team anchored by Ciaran O'Lionaird (in 3:58.43) to lower all indoor records for the event and bring it home in 9:19.93.  

The former undercover best-ever: The University of Texas's 9:25.97 in 2008.

Ireland, too, was under the old world record DMR figures with its 9:25.37 as O'Lionaird, after coming from far back to get within five meters of Casey, paid the price and fell back to a not-close second spot.

The New Jersey-New York Track Club (on Kyle Merber's 3:58.20 anchor) moved into third at 9:27.16 ahead of Team Kenya (9:27.21) as well as top collegiate foursomes Columbia (9:35.02), Duke (9:36.47), Mississippi (9:40.51) and Princeton (9:41.58).

"Centro(witz) got us out early and that set the tone," said Sowinski.

"The race was on.

"The further it went, the more exciting it got for everybody."

"The whole building got it into it," said Oklahoman Casey. "There was pandemonium, I think especially when Ciaran got back into it.

"I think the fans loved it.  It was a great race in a great environment.  That's what track and field should always be about. It was just a fun event all around, for all of us.

"Ciaran's super talented and in great shape, but I always believed in myself. I knew I had a lot left and was ready to get the job done."

He sure did.

And USA wasn't far off the all-time, all-conditions DMR best of 9:15.56 run by Team Kenya outdoors at the 2006 Penn Relays. More good news for DMR fans -- the event will be added to the card of the 2nd IAAF World Relay Championships, May 2-3 in the Bahamas (replacing the 4x1500 relay) and with that it will likely gain official WR status, rather than relegation to a "best ever" category.

Neptune, N.J. pride and joy Ajee' Wilson, the 2014 U.S. indoor and outdoor 800 champion, and world No. 2-ranked 800 runner, calmly strode to a 2:01.63   women's 800 win, despite Treniere Moser's strong bid off the final turn (good for second in 2:01.79), while Cain was never really a factor, settling for a 2:02.75 fifth place.  

"I didn't really know she (Moser) was coming up on me," said Wilson. "I heard noises, I heard stuff going on, back of me but, I wasn't sure what it was.

"I just kept my focus and brought it in."

One thing's already sure for Wilson -- she won't be able to defend her indoor national 800 crown -- since there's no 800 in the meet (a month away in Boston), now replaced by the 600 and 1000 meters.

With all the din emerging from the brilliant running on the 200-meter banked oval that is often called the world's fastest indoor track, it was easy to overlook Shawn Barber's inspired high-flying down the pole vault runway.

Up-up-up went the University of Akron standout, clearing 19 feet and three quarters of an inch on his third attempt, before bowing out at 19-4.  The Armory PV record of 18-9 1/4 (cleared by both Tim Mack and Tye Harvey in 2002) had stood for 13 years before Barber relegated it to the scrap heap.

Yet another standout Salazar pupil -- distance star Jordan Hasay -- came through with a 9:38.28 win in the women's two-miler, with NYAC's Nicole Tully a valiant second in 9:39.38.

Will Claye, the Florida-based triple jump star who took the 2012 World Indoor title and the London Olympic silver medal, again delivered a rousing show with a 55-6 1/2 win that fell just short of his own Armory TJ record of 55-11 set last year.

With Omar Craddock spanning 55-4 1/4 for second place, Claye had quite a battle on his hands.

University of Wisconsin senior Michael Lihrman had the honor of being the cover boy on the Armory Track Invitational official program and lived up to his sterling, NCAA-leading reputation by sending the 35-pound weight on a ride of 78 feet, 8 1/2 inches, erasing the meet record of 76-6 1/2 set by Long Islander Walter Henning for LSU in 2010.

The cover photo shows a clean-shaven Lihrman but now he sports a beard of three-weeks standing. In wicked Wisconsin winters, he knows it's excellent insulation from the weatherman's extremes.

The UW Badgers had another happy winner in 4:03.81 College-section miler Morgan McDonald, the freshman out of Sydney, Australia.

"It wasn't the four-minute pace I wanted but I'll certainly take it," said McDonald, whose previous PR was an outdoor 4:04.01. "There's no indoor track in Australia -- no need for it back home -- but I'm really getting to like it here.

"Indoor track, it's all an adventure for me. The whole setting, the crowd, it was all tremendous. I'm really getting to like this whole thing."