Track And Field

EUGENE, Ore. - USA Track and Field officials were meeting late Saturday to determine how to break a dead heat between Jeneba Tarmoh and Allyson Felix for third place in the women's 100 meters at the Olympic track and field trials, with a berth on the London Olympic team at stake. Tarmoh was initially awarded third ahead of Felix, though the two Los Angeles-based training partners were timed in 11.068 seconds. Timers notified referees of a possible dead heat, leading to a review of the photo finish.

- To hear publicist Hal Lifson speak is to be transported to an era when the Rat Pack ruled Hollywood, TV moms wore crisp shirtwaist dresses and pearls around the house and kids attached colorful streamers to the handlebars of their Schwinn Hornets. Lifson, who grew up in Encino and lives in Beverly Hills, combined his promotional skills and fascination with the 1960s to revive the careers of celebrities such as Nancy Sinatra, Stefanie Powers and Raquel Welch. His other passion, for running, inspired him to devise strategies to help track athletes attract mainstream media attention.

The world's greatest athlete insists he's like the rest of us. "I'm just a regular guy," Bryan Clay said. "I still have to take out the trash, I'm still changing air-conditioning filters and light bulbs and changing the oil in the cars and doing all that kind of stuff. " Just like any of his neighbors in Glendora -- except Clay won a silver medal in the decathlon at the 2004 Athens Olympics and a gold medal at Beijing four years later and, with that, the honorary title of best all-around athlete on the planet.

EUGENE, Ore. — Every time Lolo Jones was tossed a softball question, every time she was given a chance to downplay her struggles in the preliminary round of the women's 100-meter hurdles at the U.S. Olympic track and field trials on Friday, she chose to bury herself in criticism instead of covering herself in glory. She could have tried to shrug off her obviously slow start and labored effort during the middle of the race, which left her third in her heat with a time of 13.01 seconds, 15th-fastest among the 21 women who advanced to Saturday's semifinals.

EUGENE, Ore. - Former UCLA standout Jessica Cosby of Mission Hills earned a return trip to the Olympics by finishing third in the women's hammer throw Thursday in Beaverton, Ore. Amber Campbell of Indianapolis won the first final of the U.S. Olympic trials with a best toss of 71.80 meters (235 feet 6 inches). Amanda Bingson of Las Vegas was second, also at 235-6. Cosby's top throw of 70.77 meters (232-2) was short of the Olympic standard, but she had previously reached that distance.

EUGENE, Ore. - USA Track and Field recently resolved its lengthy administrative turmoil by hiring Max Siegel, a former NASCAR and music industry executive, as its chief executive. Now the organization's focus can shift to supporting athletes and raising the sport's Olympic medal count from 23 at the 2008 Beijing Games to its stated goal of 30 in London. Making the U.S. team will be half the battle. The trials, which began Thursday, figure to be toughest in the sprints and hurdles, traditionally Team USA's strongest events.

His new legs arrived on a Saturday in late summer. They were made of carbon fiber, glossy and sleek and shaped like boomerangs. Standing on them for the first time, Blake Leeper tested their flex. Just like the real thing, he thought, so alive. "I was scared," he says. All his life, Leeper had worn what amputees call "walking legs," which are built sturdy for getting around but are not so great for running or jumping. Those legs had carried him through countless basketball and baseball games, from youth leagues to high school.

EUGENE, Ore. -- After Joanna Hayes tore her patellar tendon at the 2008 U.S. Olympic trials and couldn't defend the 100-meter hurdles gold medal she had won at the Athens Games, she figured her athletic career was over. She rehabbed slowly, well enough to run alongside the kids she coaches at Studio City Harvard-Westlake but with no goal other than to live a “normal” life. Giving birth to her daughter, Zoe, in December 2010 seemed to cement her retirement. But then her knee stopped hurting during her cross-country runs with the Harvard-Westlake kids, and her boyfriend, Eric Thomas, triggered her competitive instincts by suggesting she could probably still compete on an elite level.

The Southern Section track and field championships will be held Saturday at Mount San Antonio College, with field events beginning at 10:30 a.m. and running events at 1 p.m. Sprinter Khalfani Muhammad of Sherman Oaks Notre Dame, the second-place finisher in the state 100 and 200 last year, will be trying to win his first section title in the Division 3 100 and 200. There are lots of standouts in the boys' and girls' ranks, including Gardena...

LeRoy Walker, the first African American to lead the U.S. Olympic Committee and the first black man to coach an American Olympic team, died Monday in Durham, N.C. He was 93. Walker's death was confirmed by Scarborough & Hargett Funeral home, but no cause was given. The grandson of slaves, Walker led the U.S. Olympic Committee from 1992 to 1996, shepherding the Summer Games staged in his native Atlanta and leading the group when the 2002 Winter Olympics were awarded to Salt Lake City.