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August 24, 2004 8:50 pm

U.S. women hurdle to gold, bronze

By MIKE PRATER

Gannett News Service

ATHENS, Greece - American Joanna Hayes stood on one end of the track with an Olympic-record smile after winning the 100-meter hurdles Tuesday night.

On the other side, Canadian Perdita Felicien, the 2003 world champion, a former NCAA champion at the University of Illinois and a pre-race favorite, was lying on the track, crying.

In one of the most eventful moments of this meet, Hayes set an Olympic record by winning the 100 hurdles in 12.37 seconds. Teammate Melissa Morrison picked up the bronze with a 12.56, while Olena Krasovska of the Ukraine won silver with a personal-best 12.45.

``I'm just so happy and so excited that I was able to pull this out. I just planned on winning and I went out there and did it. I had two goals, one to win and one to get the record, and I did them both in one shot,'' Hayes said.

Morrison won a bronze to match the one she picked up at the 2000 Olympics is Sydney.

``I would have taken a gold, but I'll settle for a bronze. Good start, came out really well. I crashed at about two hurdles, but I stayed in the game and that shows me that mentally I'm where I need to be,'' she said. ``I maintained and I got through the race with a bronze medal and I'm happy about that.''

Only six runners finished after Felicien crashed into the first hurdle with her lead right leg. Running in lane five, she clipped the hurdle and toppled awkwardly to her right, taking out Irina Shevchenko of Russia.

Felicien sat on the track in disbelief as Hayes cross the line, then went on a victory lap with Morrison.

``I don't know, I have no clue what happened,'' Felicien said. ``It's my worst nightmare come true.

``It is going to take me four years for this to sink in. I need to recover from it. I made contact with the hurdle on the eighth step, and boom it was over.''

Russian officials protested the race, claiming their athlete was impeded and not allowed to finish the race. The protest was denied, but the medals ceremony was postponed until Wednesday.

Hayes has no problem waiting for her medal, especially after the close call with Felicien's fall. Hayes was running in lane four, just to Felicien's left. If Felicien had fallen in a different direction, she could have taken Hayes out, and not Shevchenko.

Hayes said she thought about that ``a million times. ... Yeah, I'm pretty pleased about that.''

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