Bane Voice: The performances that emerged from the darkness didn’t disappoint. And it was a particularly exciting affair if you’re a fan of Mexican track and field – Jesus Tonatiu Lopez (1:44.71) and Eduardo Herrera (3:36.31) picked up wins in the 800m and 1500m, respectively. World Indoor 1500m medalists Nikki Hiltz and Emily MacKay dropped down in distance to battle it out over 800m, with Hiltz picking up the “fast” section win in 2:00.46. But it was actually Canadian Jazz Shukla who got the fastest mark of the day out of section 2 with a 1:59.94 victory, the first sub-two of her career.

The 10,000m races didn’t yield any Olympic qualifying marks (more on that below), but we did see Olympic Marathon Trials fourth-placer Jess McClain pick up a 31:35.28 win in her first race back in a Brooks uniform and BYU alum Casey Clinger (back racing in his high school singlet for now) picking up the first sub-28 of his career with a 27:57.90 victory off his own.

The 5000ms were won by international talent getting back in the groove of things. Sifan Hassan did a lot of lonely solo work to clock a 14:58.83 in her first race after finishing fourth at the 2024 Tokyo Marathon and Luis Grijalva showed he’s back fully healthy after an injury abbreviated his indoor season. Grijalva was clearly there to work, as he picked up wins in both section 2 of the 1500m (in 3:38.20) and the 5000m (in 13:16.53), the latter of which truly looked like 4800 meters of jogging for the 12:52 man. After finishing fourth in the 5000m at the last two global championships, Grijalva looks to be racing himself into medal contention at any opportunity.

But perhaps the race of the evening was the men’s steeplechase, where Kenneth Rooks showed himself to be the clear class of the field when rabbit Dan Michalski stepped off the track after 2000m of pacing. Rooks – who looked up to that point like he’d been trotting along leisurely – ripped off the proverbial tear-away warm up pants and took off like a bullet. He put eight seconds on the field over the last two laps and got a new PB in the process, just missing the Olympic standard by 0.08 with a 8:15.08 victory.

Both steeplechase teams for Team USA are shaping up to be fascinating battles next month. Rooks, the defending U.S. champ, might be the safest Trials bet after his performance in LA, but Anthony Rotich is the only athlete with the standard currently, thanks to his 8:13.74 in Monaco last summer. Outside of those two, with American record holder Evan Jager still rediscovering his footing (he only ran 8:33.19 in his return to the event and doesn’t yet have a Trials qualifier) and Hillary Bor focusing on the roads – so far – in 2024, the seven men who’ve all run between 8:16 and 8:20 over the last two seasons all have to be eyeing that theoretical third spot. 

On the women’s side, Emma Coburn’s ankle injury opens up a slot previously assumed to be off-limits for the last decade, and with Krissy Gear winning the 1500m at TrackFest in 4:03.65 (a five-plus second PB) she has to be the favorite to defend her national title. But she’s not unbeatable by any means – Courtneys Wayment and Frerichs both have faster PBs and NCAA champ Olivia Markezich is right on the heels of the pros. 2021 Olympian Val Constien clocked a 9:27.22 win here in her first steeplechase since tearing her ACL last spring, showing she should be back in the mix as well, and Team Boss may end up represented in this event even without Coburn if Gabbi Jennings can keep knocking six-second chunks off her PB. When it comes to the steeplechase, TrackFest was just a preview of even more fun drama to come.

Full results of the meet can be found here.