Colorful Daegu Pre Championships Meet

It was a very long 26 plus hours worth of traveling that took me from Orlando, Florida at 6am Sunday to San Fransisco to Seoul, Korea and finally arriving at my hotel in Daegu, Korea at 9:30pm Monday evening.

I am competing tonight out here at the site that will host our World Championships in 2011. It hasn't been the most pleasant of weather out here, as it has been overcast and raining non stop since I got here.

Mr. Sandman has been on me so tough since I arrived. I think I might have been up for all of eight hours on Tuesday, I slept that entire day away. When you think about it, all of our sleep patterns are off a bit. Saturday night, didn't sleep because with flights leaving at 6am, you had to be up and moving my about 3am and Sunday, whatever sleep you caught on the plane was what you got for that night.

The hurdle race out here is going to be super hot!


Dayron Robles, Cuba- World Record holder, Olympic and World Indoor Champion will be opening his season.










Ryan Brathwaite, Barbados- 2009 World Champion from Berlin






Allen Johnson, USA- Arguably the greatest 110 hurdler of all time





David Payne, USA- 2008 Olympic silver medalist,







Dwight Thomas, Jamaica- Duel threat, 4x1 relay medalist and has run 13.16











and of course:

YA BOY!!
No one is going to have the rest overlay on anyone else in the race honestly. We all were on the same flight to Daegu, so whoever travels the best and maximized their recovery will do well.

I don't have a particular time goal in mind, I'm going out to get the win straight up. Although we aren't all as fit as we will be in the next coming months, this will still be one of the best fields assembled this season hands down. Terrence Trammel was suppose to run, if that happened, you would have had every global medalist from the last three majors ('08. '09, '10) in the field.

Hit yall with an update after the competition.

Photo's From Ponce Meet

I figured I would update a few pics from this past weekend in Puerto Rico.

Press conference action


Jeremy Wariner and I with a local fan, they really showed us a lot of love!

Last hurdle of the race action
Me and Dwight shutting down the engines

Feeling pretty good about the performance
The Central Florida Posse...100m hurdlers Damu Cherry and Kellie Wells, they look really small and I don't even have on my shoes LOL

Ponce Post Race

I set my sights on breaking the track record although I didn't know what it was. Turns out the record was 13.35, set last season by my good friend David Payne. Last night though, I obliterated that record by running 13.12 (0.0w)

It was a very humid night out there, compounded by the fact that it decided it wanted to start raining. The air was so thick, you could cut it with a knife! You would never assume I trained in Florida, but this was something very different. While warming up, I had to take several breaks and time outs, I didn't know what was going on. You could wring the sweat out of my clothing! Now that I'm back home, I am afraid to even open that plastic bag I put those clothes in. I might not pass go or collect $200 dollars and go right to the incinerator and break out a new competition wardrobe!

I had a great warm-up and I knew I was ready. The time I posted is a very good time for me seeing that this was my third meet. In past years, I've had my third meet on the board by the first weekend in April. So things are progressing about how they should. Right now, I have the top four fastest times in the World.

Brooks was happy with the performance, my training partner Dwight Thomas got second in 13.41. I was slightly disappointed because toward the end of the race I made two technical mistakes that cost me time, one over the seventh hurdle and one over nine. The hurdles were coming up very fast and at this stage, I don't have the race callousness the be in total control, but that will come with more races.

I'm happy that I came out of the meet unscathed and healthy so I can work on what I need to get done this week at practice. It was great getting a chance to chill and converse with David Payne and Ryan Wilson, a guy I hadn't seen since September 2008.

OFFICIAL RESULT

Event 122  Men 110 Meter Hurdles
=====================================================================
     WORLD: @ 12.87  6/12/2008   Dayron Robles, Ostrava          
  Ponce GP: % 13.35  5/16/2009   David Payne, UNITED STATES      
  National: * 13.61  7/5/2008    HECTOR COTTO, CALI,COLOMBIA     
  Name                     Finals  Wind
========================================================
Finals                                                             
1 David Oliver             13.12% +0.0
2 Dwight Thomas            13.41  +0.0
3 David Payne              13.42  +0.0
4 Ryan Wilson              13.57  +0.0
5 Hector Cotto             13.88  +0.0
6 Andres Amador            14.23  +0.0
7 Favio Vaz Dos Santos     14.64  +0.0
8 Adalberto Amador         15.27  +0.0

Keeping With The Theme...

Keeping with the theme of changing up the color way on the blog to match the current year's Nike competition uniforms, I have made the update for this year.

This year we've got purple, an electric yellow and black. Interesting I must say, but it's cool, whatever floats their boat up there in Beaverton, Oregon.

Ponce Grand Prix Preview

Tonight, I am making my first appearance in a competition here in Ponce, Puerto Rico. I have never been down here before, whether it was for business or pleasure, and I have been thoroughly enjoying my time down here. Most of the training group has come down to the competition, Brooks, Xavier, Dwight Thomas, Moushami Robinson and myself all made the trip. It's fun when you have a lot of your training partners and coach at the competition.

I've been here since early Thursday, haven't done very much actually. Had a great training session Thursday, I've been enjoying the local cuisine also. I had a press conference yesterday with local hero, 400 hurdler Javier Culson and 400 meter runner Jeremy Wariner along with the local meet organizers.

You know I have ADHD, so I have a hard time paying constant attention in these press conferences especially when they aren't speaking English! Thank god for the blackberry lol...

After the presser, a group of us hit the mall, it didn't have very much to offer, but you know I was able to find something to swipe my card for. Then we hit the beach, it is very lovely out here, I definitely will find my way back down here for some leisure time for sure.

I don't run until around 10pm tonight. Pretty late I must say, so I will find a way to take a little nap this afternoon for sure. It should be a good race, David Payne is running as well as Dwight and Dexter Faulk. Training has been going great lately, I don't have a time goal in mind, but whatever the meet record is, I have set my goal to destroy it. I guess I better find out what it is because if it's something like 13 flat, I don't know about destroying that LOL.

Happy Golden Birthday!

Today, my adorable nephew Khamari turned 5 years old! His birthday is 05/05/05, so it's his golden birthday. Man how time is flying. I miss him and my family a lot, being around maybe seven days out of the year is tough, especially times like birthdays and Mothers Day. They will have a big party for him this weekend probably over at Gramma Joyce's house, them kids will be tearing something up for sure!

Happy Birthday Mari!!

Justice Served

After a long and arduous process, the two individuals who murdered my friend Bilal Russel last year in Arizona were found guilty on all charges. Those charges included burglary, attempted robbery and first degree murder.

About the time when the trial was beginning, I had finally gathered the courage to contact his mother and pledged my support as well as send my regrets and condolences. I have a hard time wrapping my head around why people put themselves in positions to find themselves behind bars.

People need to wake up. I'm glad the justice system did their job and although nothing will bring him back to his family, the perpetrators got what they deserve.

April is a joyous month for me, outdoor season's popping off, my birthday etc, but it's also filled with a lot a heartache.

Gone But Never Forgotten....

My first personal experience with a close friend/relative passing away happened nine years ago today. Although many things in life have changed and I've matured, I will never forget what I was doing or where I was at when my mom delivered me the news. I was in a very celebratory mood, just finished running my first time under 14 seconds as a freshman at Howard.

I always say that life is a roller coaster, you've got to just hold on and ride the ups and downs, well this day went from the pinnacle and spiraled into the pits faster than it took me to start and finish the race that day.

I do not know the exact day he passed, but I remember this date because it was Saturday, Easter Sunday eve in 2001 and I was in the basement at my mothers house really trying to understand what the real meaning of life was and trying to understand why God would want a family such as the Cobb's, who are great, god-fearing individuals to have to grieve the loss of a child. I came to the conclusion that those are answers no one will ever know and it's best to just live your life to the fullest because you never really know.

I have an 8x10 photo of him along with a Christmas card his mom and dad gave to me in a picture frame prominently displayed in my room, so never a day goes by that he doesn't cross my mind. Rest in peace Andrew Charles Cobb II...god's angel


Photo of Mr and Mrs Cobb and myself

Opener @ Florida Relays

This year, just like every other year I've been living in Florida, I went up to Gainesville for the Florida Relays.

This is one of my favorite meets, mainly because I'm so popular there lol. From the judges and referees to the high school and collegiate athletes. Even in this day and age of the internet and almost every race being on youtube, it's still funny to me the conversations I have with some of these high school kids about hurdling. They know all the results and they watch every race, they even give me grief about how I need to work on my start more. It's hilarious to me.

I ran the open 110 hurdle race on Friday. I produced a time of 13.32 (0.4 wind), which is actually the slowest time I had every run at this meet. I won the race though for the fifth year in a row. Generally coming into this race, I've had a couple of runs at Disney or last year I had opened up in Austrailia.

As far as opening times, 13.32 is about on par with what I normal drop. In '07 I ran a 13.26, '08 13.48, '09 13.29.

The last three hurdles seemed like they were set at 45'' I tell you, it feels like this every year. I don't know what it is about that first time competitively over ten hurdles that's so difficult.

RACE VIDEO



Saturday, I popped off the opening leg of the shuttle hurdle relay. None of my other training partners ran, so I was picked up by a team that trains across town with Dennis Mitchell. Of course we ended up winning the race in fashion! It felt great to go out and get another run over ten in. It doesn't take me too long to get into my race rhythm, so by the time I get ready to run the finals out at North Carolina A&T in a couple of weeks, I will be ready for sure.

I'll post up some pics as soon as Eric Mitchum forwards the ones he took to me.