U.S. sweeps up 400 hurdles

BEIJING — The big debate was whether it would be the best U.S. Olympic track team in 40 years. Maybe ever. Once the torch was lit, though, it started shaping up as one of the biggest disappointments.

A couple of underdogs got things back on track for the Americans on Monday.

Angelo Taylor led a medals sweep in the 400-meter hurdles and Stephanie Brown Trafton won a surprising gold in the discus. A team that came into the day with no gold medals walked out with two. A team that came in trailing Belarus in the medals count walked out in the lead.

"We wanted to uplift the track team," Taylor said, "and bring home the sweep."

Who better to lead than a comeback kid?

The Olympic champion in Sydney in 2000, Taylor was laying electrical wire 14 months ago, virtually out of the sport in the aftermath of an ugly legal imbroglio. He failed to make the final in Athens four years ago — he said he had stress fractures in both shins. In Beijing, he became the first 400-meter hurdler since Edwin Moses to win gold medals eight years apart.

He ran a personal-best time of 47.25 seconds, ahead of teammates Kerron Clement and Bershawn Jackson, who combined to produce the first sweep of the event since the U.S. did it in 1960.

"To go through what I went through and be back on top again — I'm just so blessed right now," Taylor said.

It will take more performances like these to advance the conversation about this team being as good as the 1968 Mexico City squad, which won 28 medals — fewer events were contested then — and included Bob Beamon, Dick Fosbury, John Carlos and Tommie Smith.

"No way," Carlos said at the Olympic trials. "They had guys in '68 that didn't make the team that could whip this team. I'm not taking anything away from these young athletes, but I don't think they have anywhere near the depth we had."

Slowly, though, the Americans are showing some depth.

There was the sweep.

There was Jenn Stuczynski's pole vault silver, trailing only Russia's Yelena Isinbayeva, who set a world record. That Cold War-style rivalry got heated after the American said she hoped to "kick some Russian butt."

There was Brown Trafton, who was considered a field filler more than a medal contender. She threw the discus 212 feet, 5 inches (64.74 meters) on her very first attempt — and that held up to give the U.S. team its first gold.

She didn't make it out of Olympic qualifying four years ago, had only two throws over 200 feet before this year, and finished only third at the U.S. Olympic trials.

Not great credentials, but none of that matters now.

She won the first gold for a U.S. woman in the discus since Lillian Copeland in 1932 and only the second medal of any color since then.

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