Sunday’s Key Events
All Times Mountain
2 p.m. Women’s long jump heptathlon
3:30 p.m. Women’s pole vault final
3 p.m. Women’s javelin throw heptathlon
4 p.m. Men’s high jump final
5:03 p.m. Women’s 400-meter hurdles final
5:11 p.m. Women’s 800 heptathlon
5:28 p.m. Women’s 5,000 final
5:51 p.m. Men’s 400 hurdles final
6 p.m. Women’s 1,500 final
6:11 p.m. Women’s 200 meter final
6:20 p.m. Men’s 1,500 final
How to Watch
2:45-4 p.m. Streaming at
5-6:30 p.m. KUSA-9
What to Watch
Sunday is the final day of competition at the U.S. Olympic Trials and features eight different finals to determine the last spots for Team USA in Rio.
In the women’s 1,500-meter final will be three former University of Colorado runners: Jenny Simpson, Sara Vaughn and Sara Sutherland. Simpson, who trains with CU coaches Mark Wetmore and Heather Burroughs, is favored as the two-time defending U.S. champion in the event, but she will face competition from Portland’s Shannon Rowbury, who set the American record at the distance last year, and Brenda Martinez, who won bronze at the 2013 world championships in the 800 and who stumbled out of the 800 earlier at this meet after a mishap in the final 150 meters. Sara Vaughn‘s main goal this trials was to make that final.
Katie Follett Mackey, who ran the second-fastest qualifying time in the women’s 5,000 Thursday, is expected to contend for a top three spot. She and ran at the University of Washington on its NCAA championship cross country team. Also competing in the event will be Jessica Tebo, an Englewood-born runner and former CU Buff who recently returned to Wetmore and Burroughs to train. The top three in the women’s 10K — Molly Huddle, Emily Infeld and Marielle Hall — also are expected to contest for spots.
Former Wheat Ridge multiathlete Annie Kunz will continue in the second day of the heptathlon. Kunz only has been seriously training for the event for 18 months, having split time between soccer and track previously at Texas A&M, where she graduated this spring. Her coach, Kris Grimes, says her goal is to finish top 10.
The men’s 1,500 final will be the last event of the night, with Ben Blankenship and Matthew Centrowitz holding the two top times from the semis. Only five runners in the 13-person field (one more than usual was added under protest) have the Olympic standard needed to make it Rio. The remaining runners are unlikely to get it in this race, unless someone volunteers to push the pace early.
