Hurdlers Come Through Quickly At Penn Relays!

In perfect weather conditions Friday at the Penn Relays, a Team USA quartet of hurdlers stamped their mark on the track record books in the men's 4x120 yard shuttle hurdle relay.

Competing in the Olympic Development division and wearing Team USA jerseys, 2008 American indoor champion David Oliver, 2005 USA indoor champion Joel Brown, 2001 NCAA indoor champion Aubrey Herring, and 2006 NCAA champion Aries Merritt teamed up to run 53.31. The time was announced as a world best - the fastest time ever recorded by a national team in the event. Team USA Blue was second in 55.55, with DC Capitol third in 59.67.

The race was part of the National Relay program that will be featured in Saturday's USA vs. The World events at Penn.

"Since we're having such great luck with the sprinters and 400m people in our national relay program, the idea was to broaden it with the hurdles," said USATF high performance chair Brooks Johnson. "Our women's hurdlers had to run a 4x100 relay, but hopefully in the future we will be able to duplicate for our hurdlers what we do for our sprinters."

By Jay Hicks, a.k.a. Track Evangelist.

Courtesy USA Track & Field.