Dutch athlete beats all-time indoor and outdoor marks with 65.63 seconds at New Balance Indoor Grand Prix
Amazingly Boston has four indoor athletics tracks. The facility at Boston University has gained much attention lately due to its spate of super-fast performances. But on Saturday (Feb 4) the TRACK at New Balance staged the latest event in the World Indoor Tour Gold series in impressive style.
With a spectator capacity of 5000 and good infrastructure and warm-up facilities for athletes, the venue believes it is capable of hosting the World Indoor Championships in future. It is clearly not a slow track either judging from the results on Saturday.
These included a world indoor best at 500m by Femke Bol as the Dutch athlete sped around the circuit to clock 65.63.
Not only was her time a world indoor best but also the fastest in history outright. The former outdoor mark was 65.9 by Taťána Kocembová from 1984 and indoor best of 66.31 by Olesya Krasnomovets from 2006.
Runner-up Leah Anderson clocked a Jamaican best 68.34.
“I’m just super happy to have it worked out like this,” said Bol, who scorched through 400m in 51.4 before hanging on in the final 100m.
When asked about her potential over longer distances such as 800m, she said: “No, I’m not planning to go further than 500m. Now I’m moving to some 400s before I do the European Indoor Championships.”
Laura Muir (Kevin Morris/NB Indoor GP)
Laura Muir enjoyed a winning start in her first-ever US indoor race as she cruised to 3000m victory in 8:40.34. Fellow Brits followed in her slipstream too as Melissa Courtney-Bryant finished runner-up in 8:41.09, Katie Snowden third in a PB of 8:47.41 and Hannah Nuttall fourth in a 8:47.72 PB.
There was a British win in the men’s mile, too, a Neil Gourley clocked a PB of 3:52.84 as he finished strongly to pip New Zealand’s Sam Tanner by one hundredth of a second. The performance also places Gourley No.3 on the UK all-time rankings.
Neil Gourley (Kevin Morris/NB Indoor GP)
Grant Holloway was a class apart in the sprint hurdles as he ran world leads of 7.39 in his heat and 7.38 in the final to win comfortably.
Aleia Hobbs won the women’s 60m in 7.02 ahead of Miciah Brisco 7.10 as the big names of Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone and Shericka Jackson went out in the heats.
Noah Lyles also impressed with a narrow win over Trayvon Bromell in a PB of 6.51.
Noah Lyles (Kevin Morris/NB Indoor GP)
Elsewhere Heather MacLean ran a world lead of 4:23.42 in the mile as she pipped Lucia Stafford to the line, while Mariano Garcia was impressive in the 800m as he clocked 1:45.26.
Ajee’ Wilson won the women’s 800m in 2:00.45 as Brits Issey Boffey (2:01.42), Ellie Baker (2:03.19) and Lynsey Sharp (2:05.60) battled behind.
In-form distance runner Woody Kincaid employed his trademark fast finish again to win the men’s 3000m in 7:40.71, while home town favourite Gabby Thomas won the final event of the night, the 300m, in 36.31 with Anna Kielbasinska second 36.41.
Results here
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