Kynard Soars to Second US Title, Nelvis Flies to 12.34

Published by IAAF on June 27, 2015

London 2012 Olympic Games silver medallist Erik Kynard provided the one of the principal highlights of the second day of the US Championships as he equalled his personal best of 2.37m to win the high jump and he then took three attempts at improving the long-standing US record in Eugene on Friday night (26).

Kynard was clean over the bar until 2.34m, which he cleared on his second attempt, and then claimed him second national outdoor title with second jump at 2.37m, which also equalled Jesse Williams’ meeting record from 2011.

The competition was not completely over, as JaCorian Duffield had added three centimetres to his personal best when he went clear at 2.34m on his second attempt. 

After two failures at 2.37m, and secure in second place having booked his place on the plane to Beijing as part of the US team going to the IAAF World Championships in August, Duffield decided to take his third attempt at a US record-equalling 2.40m.

He brought the bar down, his third consecutive failures, allowing Kynard to pass and call for the bar to be raised one centimetre in the hope that he could consign Charles Austin’s mark from 1991 to history.