THE BIG CHAMPIONSHIP MEETS generally turned out to be the ultimate proving grounds for sorting out this year’s 4 men’s AOY choices.
Our 2024 awards:
World Men: Grant Holloway (US)
No matter what the category, hurdle star Grant Holloway — who’s still just 26, has now been its T&FN Indoor AOY.
Prior to this year’s World honor, the Virginia native was the No. 1 American (’22), Collegian (’19) & High Schooler (’15).
Holloway continued to be unbeatable in the 60H, and cranked out the year’s 6 fastest times, topped by a World Record 7.27(A) and twice matching the all-time low-altitude best of 7.29.
His margin of victory at the World Indoor was a stunning 0.14 seconds.
A trio of Honorable Mentions: American Ryan Crouser scared the WR in the shot and put up all-time performances 2, 3 & 5; Scot Josh Kerr claimed the 2M WR at Millrose and thrilled the Glaswegian crowd with his WC 3000 win; Canada’s Christopher Morales Williams took down the 400 WR and followed up with the No. 6 performance ever.
The 5 most recent previous winners: ’23 — Mondo Duplantis (Sweden) ’22 — Duplantis; ’21 — Ryan Crouser (US); ’20 — Duplantis; ’19 — Yomif Kejelcha (Ethiopia).
U.S. Men: Holloway (adidas)
As the World AOY Holloway was the obvious choice here, moving back to the top after a year away.
World Honorable Mention Crouser is joined in the HM category here by 60 gold medalist Christian Coleman (the ’17 & ’18 winner) and weight WR-setter Daniel Haugh.
The 5 most recent previous winners: ’23 — Ryan Crouser (Nike); ’22 — Grant Holloway (adidas); ’21 — Crouser; ’20 — Crouser; ’19 — Donavan Brazier (Nike).
Collegiate Men: Christopher Morales Williams (Georgia)
Still just 19, Morales Williams embarked on his soph year with a PR 46.05 in January. Promising, but no sign of what was to come as 2 weeks later he jammed the Canadian Record all the way down to 45.39.But he wasn’t done: another 2 weeks after that he claimed the WR at 44.49. He finished off with history’s No. 6 time, 44.67.
HM to a pair of double NCAA champs. Texas Tech’s Terrence Jones, a Bahamian junior, won the 60 and 200. He also led both yearly lists, at 6.47 and 20.31. Northern Arizona junior Nico Young won national titles in both the 3000 and 5000. Additionally, he claimed the CR in the longer race at 12:57.14.
The 5 most recent previous winners: ’Kyle Garland (Florida); ’22 — Trey Cunningham (Florida State); ’21 — KC Lightfoot (Baylor); ’20 — Chris Nilsen (South Dakota); ’19 — Grant Holloway (Florida).
High School Boys: Quincy Wilson (Bullis, Potomac, Maryland)
Soph phenom Wilson was just too good in too many places not to be No.1. His national record 45.76 in the 400 may well have been good enough on its own, but Wilson was also the yearly leader in the 500 & 600 (and No. 2 ever in each) plus No. 3 in the 300 and No. 5 in the 200. And while it had no bearing on his AOY choice it should be noted that he ran on a pair of HSR-setting relays.
HM to a pair of HSR-shattering distance runners from the New Balance meet: Drew Griffith (Butler, Pennsylvania) took almost 5 seconds off the 2M best with his 8:34.91; Daniel Simmons axed a huge 18 ticks from the 5000 standard with his 13:38.86.
The 5 most recent previous winners: ’23 — Connor Burns (Southern Boone, Ashland, Missouri); ’22 — Will Sumner (Woodstock, Georgia); ’21 — Jaylen Slade (IMG, Bradenton, Florida); ’20 — Nico Young (Newbury Park, California); ’19 — Sam Affolder (Loudoun Valley, Purcellville, Virginia).