GAINESVILLE, Fla. — A buzzing cell phone served as
Grant Holloway's wake-up call the morning of March 24. Still half asleep, Holloway rolled over and reached toward the night stand. As he read the ESPN mobile alert, Holloway barely reacted. The news, he had assumed, was inevitable.
This was how Holloway found out the 2020 Olympic Games had been postponed.
"I just stayed in bed," Holloway said. "Nothing really to do afterwards."
Holloway began his preparations for the upcoming Tokyo Games as the man to beat in the 110-meter hurdles, having put together one of the greatest high hurdles seasons of all time last year.
As a junior for the Gators in 2019, Holloway
broke a 32-year-old American record in the 60-meter hurdles to win a third consecutive NCAA title, then
broke a 40-year-old collegiate record and completed another NCAA Championships three-peat with the fastest 110 hurdles time in the world last year (12.98 seconds). Holloway turned professional shortly thereafter, eventually capping his monstrous year by defeating the reigning Olympic champion and
winning the gold medal at the IAAF World Championships. Holloway, who turned 22 last November, became the first American 110 hurdler in six years to win gold at a global championship, and one of the youngest gold medalists in the event's history.
This year was Holloway's first training cycle without long jump and relay workouts – duties he handled as a collegian to help his teammates contend for (and win) team national titles each of his three seasons with the Gators. Once he turned pro, hurdling became Holloway's sole focus. And given the fact he took the high hurdles throne while his attention was split between other events, all indications pointed to 2020 being another historic year for Holloway.
In his only meet this year, a mid-February 60 hurdles race in Clemson, S.C., Holloway clocked a world-leading time of 7.38 seconds. That's just three hundredths of a second off the American record he set last year, and nearly a full tenth faster than anyone in the world this season.
Holloway's indoor opener last year: 7.49 seconds.
The comparison means nothing to Holloway now. It will forever be an impressive start to a lost season. What kind of shape he worked himself into, even if it was the best of his life, became irrelevant in one buzz of a cell phone last week.
"We're preparing for 2021 at this point," Holloway said. "The goal is still there. It's just a delay. I'm not being denied something. The worst feeling would be not making the team. That's something I don't want to have happen. I'm just going to take the extra time, work on my craft, and figure out things to do.
"You just have to move forward, figure out what you want to do next, and take it from there."
If it sounds like Holloway took everything in stride, it's because he did.
The day after the announcement, Holloway woke up and headed to Florida's Lemerand Athletic Center. Wednesdays were recovery days in his training model, and even without an Olympics to prepare for, a 10-minute jog with friends was better than doing nothing at all.
Holloway was all smiles as he crossed Stadium Road, greeted his professional training partners, and rattled off joke after joke. There was no doom and gloom among the group of Olympic hopefuls. They're young, with plenty of opportunities to make Olympic teams still ahead.
By next year's Olympics, Holloway will only be 23 years old, still likely in the early years of, or just entering his prime.
As the reality of the postponement set in, Holloway felt for athletes for whom time is more pressing. He knew they were the ones hurt the most by this delay. Like Kerron Clement, a Gators Great, three-time Olympic medalist, and reigning Olympic champion in the 400-meter hurdles. Clement, who turns 35 in October, trained with the group until last fall, when he left for California in preparation for a final run at the Olympics.
Andrew Riley was another. Riley joined the group of professionals in Gainesville in fall of 2018, around the time of his 30th birthday. The Jamaican 110 hurdler made the 2016 Olympic semifinals, missed the 2017 World Championships altogether, and reached the semifinals at last year's World Championships under
Mike Holloway's guidance.
Riley will be a month away from his 33rd birthday at next year's Olympics, a fact his training partners jokingly remind him of.
"I was 12 years old when Riley won his first nationals," Holloway announced to the group, referencing Riley's 2010 NCAA title in the 110 hurdles as a sophomore at Illinois.
After they shared a laugh, Holloway jogged the O'Dome Loop. This workout did about as much for Holloway as playing catch would for a professional baseball player. The run began alongside the scoreboard at McKethan Stadium, took him between Exactech Arena and Ben Hill Griffin Stadium as he headed up Lemerand Drive, turned down University Avenue, veered onto SW 2nd Avenue, passed the football practice fields, continued onto SW 23rd Street, behind the grandstands of Pressly Stadium, and back to the starting point.
Under normal circumstances, it would be exactly what Holloway's body needed to both recover from and prepare for three days of arduous workouts. This time, there was no training to recuperate from or look forward to.
Once Percy Beard Track shut down by the University Athletic Association amidst the global coronavirus pandemic, Holloway and his training group, coached by Florida head coach
Mike Holloway, found refuge at nearby Fred Cone Park's track. For a couple days. That closed, too, leaving them with nowhere to train.
Running will help Holloway and his training partners maintain their fitness, but without the ability to go through technical workouts on a track, rust can accumulate quickly.
Without any hurdling on the docket, Holloway has some time to live stream his video game sessions, broaden his red wine tastes, and enjoy the occasional cigar. Until August. That's when, as of now, his fall training for the 2021 Olympics should begin.
As Holloway finished his final sets of dynamic exercises on the sidewalk, the group squabbled over what time to tackle "Gator Mountain" in Ben Hill Griffin Stadium Friday morning. Much to Riley's dismay, they settled on 8 a.m.
Holloway didn't mind. Any time with friends and family these days is a treasure. Plus, he remembered he didn't exactly have a schedule to keep anymore.
"Sleep, wake up, sleep a little bit more, eat, sleep again, play video games until I don't want to play, then go back to bed and start all over," Holloway said. "It's been very slow and very boring. Hanging out with family and friends is really the only thing that's getting me through the days."
The 110 hurdles final of the Tokyo Olympics was originally scheduled for August. Instead of running for a medal, Holloway expects that's when his training cycle will begin anew. He has plenty of time to rest between now and then.
And no ESPN mobile alerts worth losing sleep over.
