6/29/09

EUGENE, Ore. -- A leg cramp at the worst possible time. Or the doubly unspeakable bad luck of both calves cramping at once.

Going out fast in the early rounds and having nothing left at the end.

An incomprehensible, unthinkable miscalculation.

After two days of the U.S. Olympic track and field trials, the margin between making the team and watching the Beijing Games from the couch has been established as agonizingly tiny -- yet big enough to haunt the non-qualifiers for the next four years.