Defending outdoor champion Omar Craddock of Florida got the crowd’s attention with his massive wind-aided jump of 55-1.5(16.92m) on his first attempt of the competition earning him a first place position coming into finals.

“It was amazing, when I’d seen it come up on the board, the first thing that went through my mind was ‘Ah it’s not the A standard’ and the second thing was ‘Ok this was my indoor personal record,’” Craddock said. “I jumped my indoor personal record, first jump. I just knew I had more in the tank. I had more speed in me and I could just execute a lot better, and obviously through my progression it showed.”

When Craddock starts off with a good mark, he knows he’s going to go even farther that day, and he was right. All of Craddock’s legal jumps would have not only won the competition but every mark would beat the next best jumper by at least six inches. Not letting other competitor’s marks or his commanding lead affect him, Craddock continued to improve. Craddock matched his first massive jump exactly on his fifth attempt and then went farther jumping 55-6.25(16.92m) on his last attempt.

“In my mind, ‘You’re in last place, the leader’s 55-whatever, go get it.’ And I pretty much did that,” Craddock said.

With competitors nearly a foot or more behind his mark, Craddock said the support from the infamous Historic Hayward Field spectators motivated him to improve his mark.

“Every time I started a clap, they were right there clapping, showing love,” Craddock said.”I love coming here, no matter what team you are on, Oregon fans are going to show love period.”

Ranked 23 prior to competition with a season best of 50-9.84(15.49m), sophomore Manuel Ziegler of Memphis also benefitted from the crowd, jumping a wind-aided personal best 54-1(16.48m), earning him second place and beating New Mexico University senior Floyd Ross’s wind-aided 52-11(16.13m) third place.