UK Track and Field Set for United States Olympic Team Trials

Live Results | Complete Meet Schedule (Broadcast schedule at bottom of page)

EUGENE, Ore. – Kentucky track and field will be well represented at the United States 2016 Olympic Team Trials, which will take place July 1-11 in Eugene, Oregon.

Weekend Breakdown
Three Wildcats – Beckie Famurewa, Kenyattia Hackworth and Sha’Keela Saunders – are entered to begin qualifying in field events on Friday evening. 

The women’s discus starts at 7:50 p.m. ET. The women’s long jump begins at 8:10 p.m. ET.

NBC’s family of networks will broadcast the 10-day trials. On Friday the early going from 7-9 p.m. ET will be shown on NBC Sports Live Extra (online and app), and then NBC will show the competition from 9-10 p.m.

UK Class of 2015er Kenyattia Hackworth – the No. 2-ranked American in the long jump this season and junior Sha’Keela Saunders will take three jumps in the long jump preliminary round. 

Jumpers who leap to 21’11.75”/6.70 meters advance automatically to the Saturday final. If 12 jumpers don’t leap to the automatic qualifying mark the top-12 will advance.

Saunders placed fifth and Hackworth ninth in the long jump at last season’s USATF Championships, which were also held at Hayward Field and served as the qualifying meet for the IAAF World Championships.

Beckie Famurewa is entered in the discus, and will throw in flight two of the prelims. Advancement to Saturday’s final is, like the long jump, based in USATF rule 180.5b.

The auto-qualifier mark in the discus is 200’1”/61m. If 12 don’t toss that mark, the top-12 will advance.

How to qualify for the Olympics
The top three finishers in each event, so long as they have the Olympic qualifying standard which was established by the International Association of Athletics Federations months ago, will automatically earn spots on Team USA for the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro.

UKTF at the Olympic Trials
Kentucky has four members of its 2016 women’s team and Nick Anderson from the men’s team entered in the Olympic Trials.

Additionally, Keni Harrison and Hackworth — professionals who train in Lexington under head coach Edrick Floréal – are competing. 

A few more UK alumni are entered in the meet and will be covered as they compete. 

Olympic team trials and their equivalent meetings are taking place across the world in the coming weeks. For example UK junior Ariah Graham (800m) and Class of 2015er Leah Nugent (400m hurdles) are competing at the Jamaica Championships this weekend.

Alumni Rondel Sorrillo, a UK volunteer assistant coach who trains in Lexington, and Mikel Thomas both qualified for the Olympics last weekend at the Trinidad and Tobago trials. 

Freshman Jasmine Camacho-Quinn (Puerto Rico – 100m hurdles)  and Luis Orta (Venezuela – marathon) are also already qualified for the Olympic Games.

2016
USATF OLYMPIC TRIALS MEET INFORMATION (all times Eastern)
Live Results | Complete
Meet Schedule

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