Chaunte Lowe won the high jump with a world-leading leap of 2.05m, as she and local favorite Lolo Jones wowed the crowd on Saturday at the US outdoor athletics championships.
After her US record performance in the high jump, Lowe did a celebratory back flip in the Drake Stadium landing pit.
Then Lowe, the former Chaunte Howard and mother of a three-year-old daughter, headed toward the long jump area where she spanned 6.90m for second place in an event she had virtually abandoned for five years.
PHOTO: AFP
Only Brittney Reese, last year’s World champion, with a wind-aided leap of 7.08m, got the better of Lowe in the long jump.
“I love jumping here. Man, this was like a dream come true,” Lowe said after her high jump triumph. “The surface is awesome, the crowd is awesome, and the weather [low 30s C] was awesome.”
“To break the American record at home, that’s what anybody can dream of. It just meant so much and I am truly blessed,” Lowe said.
Des Moines native Jones was also celebrating after a victory in the 100m hurdles in 12.69 seconds.
However, vaunted 400m runners Jeremy Wariner and Sanya Richards-Ross had nothing to celebrate on the penultimate day of the championships.
Wariner, the 2004 Olympic and 2005 to 2007 world champion at 400m, stumbled to the track and bowed out with a hip flexor injury in a race won by Greg Nixon in a world-leading 44.61 seconds. Lejerald Betters was second in 44.71 seconds — a time that also improved on the prior world-leading 44.73 seconds set by Wariner in Rome on June 10.
Richards-Ross, the women’s 400m world champion, sat out the 400m final with a quadriceps injury.
In her absence Debbie Dunn claimed the women’s 400m title in a world-leading 49.64 seconds.
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