Riley Masters of Veazie and Bangor High School is one of six Mainers who have declared to compete at the U.S. Olympic Trials for track and field, which run from July 1 through July 10 at Hayward Field on the campus of the University of Oregon in Eugene, Oregon.
Matthew Forgues of Boothbay will know his fate before the event’s July 1 official opening ceremonies as he competes in the 20-kilometer race walk final at 1:30 p.m. Thursday in Salem, Oregon. Forgues, 24, competed at the World Race Walk Team Championships in Rome, Italy, on May 7 and posted a time for the 20K distance of 1 hour, 35 minutes and 42 seconds.
Carsyn Koch of Wade, Isaiah Harris of Lewiston, North Yarmouth native Ben True and Kate Hall of Casco all will compete for the first time at the trials Friday. Becky O’Brien of Cumberland will be competing in her second Trials after finishing 16th in the shot put in 2012.
Koch, who just completed her sophomore year at Cedarville (Ohio) University, will compete in a first-round heat of the women’s 800-meter run at 7:45 p.m. Friday.
The former multiple-sport star at Washburn District High School is the reigning NCAA Division II champion at that distance during both the indoor and outdoors seasons. She won the indoor title with a time of 2:05.12 in March at Birmingham, Alabama, then won the outdoor crown with a 2:03.48 clocking on May 28 at Bradenton, Florida.
Koch met the Olympic Trials qualifying standard with a 2:02.39 effort during the Payton Jordan Invitational on May 1 at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. That effort is the fastest outdoor women’s 800 time in NCAA Division II history.
Harris, an eight-time individual state champion in track and field while at Lewiston High School and a two-time New England champion at 800 meters, rose quickly through the NCAA Division I middle-distance world this winter and spring as a freshman at Penn State University.
Harris was the Big Ten Conference champion in the 800 both indoors and outdoors for the Nittany Lions. He set a conference record of 1:46.24 while winning the indoor crown, then clocked 1:46.21 to win the outdoor title.
Harris went on to finish fourth at the NCAA Division I championships in 1:45.76.
He is scheduled to compete in the Olympic Trials’ first round of the 800 at 7:15 p.m. Friday.
True, a former Dartmouth College running and Nordic skiing All-American who now lives and trains in Hanover, New Hampshire, is the veteran of the Maine contingent at age 30.
His bid to make the 2012 U.S. Olympic Team in the 5,000- and 10,000-meter runs were derailed by Lyme disease, as he finished sixth in the 5,000 final and 12th in the 10,000 final.
More recently, True is a three-time winner of the Boston Athletic Association 5K road race who placed second at both 5,000 and 10,000 meters at the 2015 U.S. championships and sixth in the 5K at the most recent world championships last August.
He is expected to try and qualify for the 2016 Olympics in both the 10,000 — the final is scheduled for 9:15 p.m. Friday — and the 5,000 beginning 8:02 p.m. Monday.
Should True qualify in either event, he would join his wife, Sarah, on the 2016 U.S. Olympic Team. Sarah (Groff) True already has qualified in the triathlon after finishing fourth in that event at the 2012 Summer Games in London.
Hall will compete in the qualifying round of the Olympic Trials’ women’s long jump at 8:10 p.m. Friday, with the finals set for 2:45 p.m. Saturday.
She won 26 individual state titles in indoor and outdoor track while attending Lake Region High School in Naples, then set a national record in the long jump by soaring 22 feet, 5 inches at the 2015 New Balance Nationals Outdoors in Greensboro, North Carolina.
Hall spent last year as a freshman at Iowa State University where she was the leading point scorer for the Cyclones at the Big 12 Indoor Track and Field Championships by placing second in the long jump (21-1 1/2) and fourth in the 60-meter dash (7.39 seconds).
She then placed 12th in the long jump at the NCAA Division I Indoor Track Championships for Iowa State before deciding last spring to transfer to the University of Georgia.
Hall’s record-setting long jump at the New Balance Nationals ranks her sixth among qualifying distances for the Olympic Trials.
UPDATE: Adds Becky O’Brien as also competing in the Trials.
