6/15-21 Notables

• 24: The clock is ticking  As expected, there was a big NON upswing - up to 24 - in US#1 performances. It wasn't as big as the NIN/NSIC weekend, or last spring's NON weekend when USATF Juniors were also held - but lots of memorable chart-toppers nonetheless.  The toughest thing to deal with was the heat and wind, with latter sometimes helping and sometimes hindering sprinters and jumpers.  Wayne Davis II and Chalonda Goodman GA were probably robbed of #1s in their respective 110H and 100 finals, but when the wind was calmer, in the prelims, they set and matched new standards.
• Not a jumpers and throwers paradise  A big trend in this week's new national leaders was the fact that there was nothing on the field event side at all, despite 8 of the US field event leaders being present in Greensboro.  The winds were not particularly favorable for the jav or discus, and the vaulters definitely struggled with it.  The heat, of course, was tough on almost everyone, except maybe the dashers.
• From 9:01 in the snow...  Remember Trevor Dunbar's 9:01 3200 time trial in the snow last fall?  The heat factor makes what he was able to do last weekend pretty darn impressive.  Sure, he came a few days early to acclimatize himself some, but it still was brutal for the Kodiak, Alaska senior.  But who was it who made the killer move with 800 to go and winds up with the only sub-8:50 this season?  Dunbar.  He also picked up an en route US#1 at 3k, leaving Greensboro with two #1s after losing the 5k leader to Solomon Haile
• Tough act to follow  Amazingly, The Woodlands picked up two US#1s and relay championships at NON - but couldn't get a school record.  Known in the 80s as McCullough, the school scored the #2 all-time 4x1 Mile mark in 1986 and the #3 all-time in the DMR in 1987 (it was a USR at the time).  But The Woodlands' 17:17.21 was the fastest since 86 in the 4x1 and their 9:55.17 was the best in the nation since Auburn WA's 9:50.98 in 2002
• Still more to come  The season is hardly over, with the USATF Juniors this weekend and World Youth Trials the next week.  Don't be surprised if more than half of the current marks (save for the relays) are revised at least once more