Haddonfield’s Seth Clevenger advanced to the finals of the 1,500-meter run Friday at the USATF Under-20 Championships in Eugene.
Clevenger, who recently completed his freshman year at Iowa State, ran 3:52.74 at Hayward Field and placed 3rd in the first of two heats. The top four finishers in each race and the next four-fastest advanced to the 12-runner final. Clevenger earned a “large-Q” qualifier with his 3rd-place finish. His time was 8th-fastest overall among the 21 entrants.
Clevenger started out in 7th place after a strategic 66.78 first lap and came through 800 in 2:11.23 in 6th place in his section. But he used a 58.61 third lap to move into 5th and ran the final 300 in 42.92 – that’s 57.23 pace for 400 – to secure an auto qualifier.
Talk about negative splits. Clevenger ran about 1:57.6 for his final 800 meters.
Despite the very slow first 800, Clevenger still ran within 4 ½ seconds of his 1,500 PR of 3:48.23 from a meet in May in Ames, Iowa. He ran 4:08.67 full mile as a high school senior at West Philly Nationals.
The top two finishers in Saturday’s final will represent the U.S. in the World Athletics Pan Am Under-20 Championships Aug. 4-6 in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico.
The final is scheduled for 10:08 p.m. EST Saturday.
From the Backstretch by Reuben Frank 