Second Fastest 400-Meter Hurdles Performance Earns This Week's Performance of the Week Awards

Track and field fans voiced their choices in this week's DyeStat's Performance of the Week poll, while DyeStat's editors made their own selection.

Readers’ Choice: Rai Benjamin

With 40.82 percent of the vote, Rai Benjamin won our Readers’ Choice vote, beating Michael Norman with his second-place tally of 18.75 percent.

Benjamin, a USC junior, set a collegiate record in the 400-meter hurdles in the final at the NCAA Division 1 Outdoor Championships, running 47.02. That equaled the best mark by Edwin Moses and has him tied for second all-time behind Kevin Young, who owns the world record at 46.78.

For historical perspective, Moses ran his best time, then a world record, in 1983. Young set his world record in 1992. The fastest 400-meter hurdles in the last 10 years was run by Angelo Taylor in his gold medal winning performance at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. He ran 47.25, 0.23 seconds slower than Benjamin.

In many ways, the most impressive part of Benjamin's race was it was only his second time running under 48 seconds. His previous best was 47.98 at the NCAA Division 1 West Preliminary, which qualified him for the NCAA Championships.

Watch Benjamin's post-race interview on RunnerSpace.com.

Benjamin also ran second leg on USC's collegiate record breaking 4x400 relay that ran 2:59.00. His split was 43.7 seconds.

Editors’ Choice: Rai Benjamin

There were several fantastic performances this past week. Benjamin's USC teammate, Michael Norman ran a collegiate record 43.61, good for sixth all-time. He also anchored the USC 4x400 relay.

At the professional level, Gwen Berry took back the American record in the hammer, winning in Poland with a mark of 255-2 (77.78m). Also with a big performance was Juan Miguel Echevarria of Cuba with his big long jump of 28-11.50 (8.83m). His jump was slightly wind-aided, just over the allowable limit for record purposes, but it was one of the longest all-condition jumps in world history.

And then at the high school level, Katelyn Tuohy ran an impressive double at the New York State Meet, setting all-time marks in both the 1,500 and 3,000 meters.

But this week's Editors' Choice award goes to Benjamin. He did something Friday that no one has been able to match since 1992, five years before Benjamin was born.

From the moment the gun went off, Benjamin took charge of the race. Moses was known for running 13 steps between the hurdles, something many of today's elite athletes struggle to do. Benjamin kept his steps, 13 between each hurdle, the entire way.

Coming off the final turn, it looked like North Carolina's Kenny Selmon might be able to pull even with Benjamin, but the opposite happened. Benjamin ran away from the field over the final 100 meters. No one was going to catch him. Selmon set a personal best, but he finished more than a second adrift of the USC hurdler.

LADIES & GENTLEMEN RAI BENJAMIN IS THE 🐐

COLLEGIATE RECORD ✅
MEET RECORD ✅
FACILITY RECORD ✅
FASTED TIME IN THE 🌎 ✅
2ND FASTEST TIME EVER ✅ pic.twitter.com/B7EsAXzSyK

— NCAA Track & Field (@NCAATrackField) June 9, 2018