Members of the U.S. Navy parachute demonstration team, the Leap Frogs, perform above Drake Stadium during the opening ceremony of the 102nd Drake Relays. (Photo by Wikimedia Commons)

One of the great success stories on the domestic front for track and field in the last few years has been the Drake Relays. Hy-Vee, the upper Midwest grocery store chain, is pumping more than half a millions dollars per year into the meet.

The end result is that Drake is bringing in basically every available pro not snapped up by the Penn Relays’ “USA vs The World” program. In general, that means hurdlers plus the all-too-often-ignored field events.

Last month, Relays director Brian Brown announced some early fields in those events, plus a new shuttle hurdle relay for pro men and women. Some of the hurdlers will do double duty (relay and individual) and the world records of 53.36 (men) and 50.78 (women) are targets.

On Thursday, more announcements were made. First and strangest is the location of special high jump competitions: inside a new Hy-Vee store in Waukee, Iowa. Specifically the produce section. I am not making this up. They will be great events, too: Derek Drouin (Word & Olympic bronze) vs Erik Kynard (Olympic silver) for the men, Brigetta Barrett (World & Olympic silver) vs Ruth Beitia (Worlds bronze) vs Chaunte Howard-Lowe (American record holder) for the women.

The Drake Relays also managed to score the world’s four best men’s quarter-milers. All three medalists from last year’s Worlds will be there–LaShawn Merritt, Tony McQuay, Luguelin Santos–plus Olympic champion Kirani James. Only ten men have ever run the 400 in under 44 seconds and two of them will be in this race.

Probably better yet is the shuttle hurdle relay announcements. These are awesome teams and probably equally matched.

MEN		WOMEN
Team 1	Team 2	Team 1	Team 2
David Oliver	Aries Merritt	Dawn Harper-Nelson	Brianna Rollins
Ryan Wilson	Jason Richardson	Kellie Wells	Queen Harrison
Antwon Hicks	Jeff Porter	Nia Ali	Lolo Jones
Joel Brown	Ty Akin	Kristi Castlin	Vashti Thomas

The men’s teams have six of the top seven on the 2013 US list (and three of the world’ top five) and all of the top eight on the ’13 US women’s list (all in the world’s top eleven). Add up their 2013 best times and you get 52.84 to 53.14 for the men, 50.11 to 49.80 for the women. Add up their best times from the last two years and it’s 52.45 to 52.16 for the men, 49.89 to 49.80 for the women. Most Diamond League meets would have a hard time putting together those kinds of fields.

Your video of the day is right up top here, the press conference making this announcement. Notice the high jump setup, right in front of cabbages and carrots and whatnot.

Links

This morning I recapped the weekend’s college action.

News

Runner’s World’s Morning Report recaps all of yesterdays news: Rupp does a workout after dropping out of a race with an injury scare, WADA wants Kenya to speed up its doping probe, and more.

Ken Goe’s daily Oregon track and field rundown looks at the Ducks’ position in the USTFCCCA rankings.

Those USTFCCCA computer rankings keep Arkansas #1 for the men and move Texas to #1 for the women.
More from the USTFCCCA

Pheobe Wright compares clubs, training groups, and other track organizations to Harry Potter characters. If you’re like me and like this, you’re two different kinds of nerds in one.
More from Fast Food & Cheap Thrills

Athletics Weekly previews this weekend’s Birmingham Grand Prix. Genzebe Dibaba is, of course, going for yet another world record.
More from Athletics Weekly

Speaking of World Records, Renaud Lavillenie and Ashton Eaton both think they could break the indoor world records.

The Boston Marathon and its long history will be the subject of a documentary.

Want to know what is happening when? Track and Field News has every calendar and schedule you could need.
More from T&FN

Stat corner

On Saturday, Cam Levins narrowly missed the Canadian indoor 3000 metre record despite running much of the race with only one shoe. Still, his time eclipsed the Canadian outdoor record. Here is the all-time Canadian list down to 8:00.00 (so far as I know it), mixing indoor and outdoor times and converting 2-mile times.
Key: id=indoor, ov=oversize indoor, cv=converted from 2 mile, ic=indoor, converted

1	7:38.05	ic	Cam Levins	2/16/13	New York (ATC)
2	7:40.17	id	Kevin Sullivan	2/9/07	Fayetteville
	7:41.59	id	— Levins	2/2/14	Boston (RLC)
	7:41.61		— Sullivan	7/22/08	Stockholm
	7:42.17	id	— Sullivan	2/10/06	Fayetteville
3	7:43.42		Jeff Schiebler	8/25/98	Lausanne
	7:43.89		— Sullivan	7/1/06	Cork
	7:44.46	id	— Sullivan	1/31/04	Boston (RLC)
4	7:45.58	id	Jason Bunston	2/2/96	New York (MSG)
	7:45.75	id	— Levins	2/4/12	Boston (RLC)
5	7:46.22		Paul Williams	6/8/88	Victoria
6	7:47.90	id	Nathan Brannen	2/10/06	Fayetteville
7	7:47.95		Graeme Fell	8/16/85	Bern
8	7:48.04		Carey Nelson	7/22/86	Paris
9	7:48.33		Stephen Agar	8/26/98	Rovereto
10	7:49.17		Rob Lonergan	6/27/86	Hengelo
11	7:49.20		Simon Bairu	7/15/07	Gent
12	7:49.32		Paul Craig	8/15/80	Lausanne
13	7:50.21	ov	Sean Kaley	2/6/99	Ames
14	7:50.40		Grant McLaren	7/3/75	Oslo
15	7:50.90	id	Brendan Matthias	3/12/93	Toronto
16	7:51.95		Paul McCloy	8/16/85	Berne
17	7:52.02	id	Ben Hubers	2/11/12	Bloomington
18	7:52.16		Dave Reid	7/10/85	Lausanne
19	7:52.24		Paul Morrison	6/5/04	Gresham
20	7:52.27	ov	Michael Woods	2/4/06	South Bend
21	7:52.28	ov	Kurt Benniger	2/4/06	South Bend
22	7:52.35		Greg Duhaime	8/10/80	Cologne
23	7:53.51	id	Reid Coolsaet	1/25/08	Boston
24	7:53.89	id	Mathew Kerr	3/14/98	Indianapolis
25	7:54.26		Taylor  Milne	7/23/08	Vlaanderen
26	7:54.57	ov	Luc Bruchet	1/18/14	Seattle
27	7:54.61		Ryan McKenzie	6/15/08	Richmond
28	7:55.11		Matt Johnston	6/5/04	Gresham
29	7:55.13	ov	Mo Ahmed	2/23/13	Geneva OH
30	7:55.37	ic	Robert Finlay	1/11/69	Boston
31	7:55.47	ov	Ryan Hayden	1/30/04	Seattle
32	7:56.14	id	Marc Olesen	3/12/93	Toronto
33	7:56.48		Christian Weber	1995
34	7:56.78		Eric Gillis	7/1/09	Halifax
35	7:56.80		Bob Finlay	8/23/72	Munich
36	7:57.01	id	Ross Proudfoot	2/8/14	Boston (BU)
37	7:57.03	id	Ian Carswell	3/8/97	Indianapolis
38	7:57.13		Philippe Laheurte	6/29/85	Tillsonburg
39	7:57.39	ov	Jay Cantin	2/14/04	Seattle
40	7:57.41	cv	Joe Sax	7/27/74	Toronto
41	7:57.46	ov	Alex Genest	2/11/12	Geneva OH
42	7:57.80		Art Boileau	4/13/85	Eugene
43	7:57.92	id	Andrew Nixon	2/8/14	Boston (BU)
44	7:58.14		Vern Iwancin	6/18/85	Burnaby
45	7:58.23		John Castellano	6/8/88	Victoria
46	7:58.40		Peter Butler	6/30/78	Vasteras
47	7:58.70	id	Dylan Wykes	1/31/04	Boston
48	7:59.03	id	Graham Hood	2/11/05	Fayetteville
49	7:59.16	ov	Chris Winter	2/9/13	Seattle
50	7:59.70		Dan Shaughnessy	7/21/73	Toronto
51	7:59.72		Kyle Boorsma	7/26/08	Oordegem
52	7:59.81	cv	Bruce Kidd	5/23/64	Modesto