Brace for more tumbling records on Eugene's latest 'fastest track'

EUGENE, Oregon : When the world's fastest runners marvel about "Tracktown magic" at the World Athletics Championships over the next two weeks it won't be something in the Oregon air that is propelling them to new levels of performance but what is beneath their feet

Eugene's Hayward Field has always been the centre of U.S. athletics and now, completely rebuilt, it boasts a track that has seen records tumbling since it was installed in 2021.

Jamaican Elaine Thompson-Herah ran her 10.54 seconds 100 metres there - second only to Florence Griffith-Joyner's dubious 10.49 world record - while on the same August day Jakob Ingebrigtsen set a Diamond League mile record and Norah Jeruto ran the third-fastest ever women's 3,000m steeplechase, showing that it was not just fast for sprinters.

American Sydney McLaughlin has a particular fondness for the site, breaking the women's 400m hurdles world record there in June 2021 then doing it again at last month's U.S. trials.

The track boasts a similar "energy return" design to that of the Tokyo Olympic stadium that also saw some staggering world records but the Eugene one was designed and installed by Beynon Sports, who have supplied the Hayward Field track since 1995.

Iannick Di Sanza, Beynon's director of marketing, told Reuters the company had mastered a "twin component polyurethane" system that hits the sweet spot to satisfy short and long distances.

"The BSS 2000 showcases a high performance dual rubber force reduction layer, which really helps it be fast, but also forgiving and it really maximises the energy return," he said in an interview on Thursday, adding he was not at all surprised to see the records falling from day one of the installation.

"It's poured in different layers and we