Athletics: Lagat regains indoor record

Bernard Lagat regained the American indoor 5,000-meter record on Saturday with a victory at the 104th Millrose Games, the first in 98 years to be staged outside of Madison Square Garden. Three-time Olympian Lagat won in 13mins 7.15secs, showing his fitness six months before the London Olympics at age 37 by breaking the US mark of 13:11.44 set by Galen Rupp last year in the British city of Birmingham. "I had a few problems in training this past week and rested a bit more than I usually do, so to run 13:07 at this time of the year, in a week like this, that s a good indication I can do a lot better," he said. Lagat, a two-time 1,500 Olympic medalist, performed just as coach James Li had expected right down to the second. "Bernard did exactly what we expected," Li said. "We knew from his training that he was ready for something like this." Kenya s Lawi Lawang, Lagat s training partner, was second in 13:08.28 to smash the US college record that was also owned by Rupp. Rupp answered by breaking Lagat s two-mile American record, winning in 8:09.72 at the USA Track and Field Classic in Fayetteville, Arkansas. "That s the way it goes," Lagat said. "You win some, you lose some." In a showdown of US Olympic contenders, David Oliver won the 60m hurdles in 7.51 with Terrence Trammell second in7.52 and Aries Merritt third in 7.53. Two-time US Olympic relay medalist Sanya Richards-Ross won the 400 in 50.89, surpassing Bulgarian Vania Stambolova for the fastest time in the world this year. Matthew Centrowitz, the son of a two-time US Olympian, won the men s mile in 3:53.92. Women s world 1,500m champion Jenny Simpson won the 1,500 title in 4:07.27 while LaShawn Merritt, the 2008 Olympic 400-meter champion and 2011 world 400 runner-up, won the rarely contested 500m in 1:01.39. World high jump champion Jesse Williams of the United States cleared 2.32 to win while Russian Olga Kucherenko of Russia won the long jump in 6.75 and world leader Jenn Suhr took the pole vault by clearing 4.58m.