PRE CLASSIC REPEATS AS WORLD NO. 1

September 11, 2017

Eugene, Oregon – With the 2017 track & field athletics season in the books, the Prefontaine Classic has defended its title as the top-ranked invitational meet in the world. For the second consecutive year, and third time in 5 years, America's most famous invitational is at the top of the rankings calculated by All-Athletics.com, the official data services partner of the IAAF’s top-tier international circuit, the IAAF Diamond League.and has to be certainly considered as one of the best Pre Classics ever. Held on May 26-27 at historic Hayward Field, this year's Prefontaine Classic outpointed all other IDL meets, as well as the more than 600 invitational meets held around the world in 2017.

The 2017 Pre, sponsored by NIKE, rates as one of the best-ever editions in terms of great marks and superb competitions. As proof, at this year's World Championships in London, athletes who had competed in the Pre Classic went on to win 23 gold medals (17 individual, 6 relay), 17 silver (14 individual, 3 relay), and 13 bronze medals (11 individual, 2 relay).

Five meet records were set at this year's Pre, none more thrilling than the titanic battle between Christian Taylor (59.5/18.11) and Will Claye (59-23/4/18.05) who both surpassed the old record held by Taylor. Celephine Chespol broke 9-minutes and set the women's steeplechase meet record (and Under-20 world mark) of 8:58.78, despite stopping to fix a wayward shoe. Ryan Crouser took down the 7-year-old shot put record with a throw of 73-71/4/ 22.43, Maria Lasitskene previewed her World Championships domination by clearing 6-8/2.03 in the high jump, and Tori Bowie surprised the greatest 200m field ever assembled in the United States with a 21.77 victory that stood up through the season's end as the year's fastest time.

The meet will also be remembered as the American track-racing farewell to the sport's biggest distance star. Great Britain's Mo Farah capped his string of successes at Hayward Field with a hard-fought 13:00.70 win in the 5000. Brittney Reese leaped over the elusive 7.00 meter mark in the long jump (23-0/7.01), Olympic Champion Omar McLeod set a world-leading mark of 13.01 in the high hurdles, Kenya's Ronald Kwemoi led 3 under 3:50 in Bowerman Mile (3:49.04) and Ashley Spencer of the U.S. ran a world-leader of 53.38 in the women's 400 hurdles.

This year's finish for the Prefontaine Classic was the 4th highest score in history for an invitational, and the Eugene IDL meet has now recorded 5 of the top 10 scores of all-time.

The final 2017 All-Athletics.com rankings:

• • In the Results Score category, which puts a value on the quality of the marks in the meet, Pre now has been No. 1 four times, more than all the other Diamond League meets combined.

  • The Pre Classic has the most consecutive top 3 finishes of any IDL meet, with 7. The next longest is Zurich with 4.

  • Pre has the highest average score of any meet during the Diamond League era (2010-present).

  • Pre has 5 of the top 10 highest scores ever achieved; only Monaco has as many as 2

The final 2017 scores: