First-round effort of 74-10.50 (22.82m) surpasses Barnes’ 1989 standard of 74-4.25 (22.66m); Crouser adds 74-5.75 (22.70m) in third round in Fayetteville, giving him top two all-time marks and four of five best in history; Cunningham wins high jump and Clark outlasts Nageotte in thrilling pole vault tiebreaker 

By Erik Boal, DyeStat Editor

One world record thrown by Ryan Crouser, now just one more Randy Barnes all-time mark left to take down.

Crouser opened his shot put series Sunday at the first American Track League indoor event at Randal Tyson Track Center in Fayetteville, Ark., with a mark of 74-10.50 (22.82m) to eclipse Barnes’ 1989 indoor world record of 74-4.25 (22.66m).

Crouser added a third-round effort of 74-5.75 (22.70m), giving him the top two indoor marks in history and four of the top five, including a 74-1 (22.58m) performance Dec. 5 in his season opener at Kansas State. He concluded his series Sunday with a 73-9 (22.48m) in the sixth round.

Crouser has now surpassed the 22-meter mark in 45 career competitions, including six indoors.

He boasts 108 career 22-meter efforts, including 10 indoors, four coming in the past 50 days.

It was the second time in his career that Crouser had three 22-meter marks in the same indoor series, including last February at the USATF Indoor Championships in Albuquerque, N.M., a competition highlighted by his 74-1.75 (22.60m) that now ranks as the No. 4 all-time indoor performance.

Crouser’s career-best outdoor performance remains 75-2 (22.91m) from July 18 at the American Track League event at Life University in Marietta, Ga., which equals No. 4 all-time. Barnes’ world outdoor record of 75-10.25 (23.12m) has stood since 1990.

Nigerian athlete Chukwuebuka Enekwechi took second at 67-9 (20.65m) and American competitor Payton Otterdahl was third at 67-7 (20.60m).

In the two women’s field events showcased at the meet, Vashti Cunningham won the high jump with a third-attempt clearance at 6-2.75 (1.90m), the top mark by an American female competitor this indoor season.

Katie Nageotte and Megan Clark both cleared 14-9 (4.50m) on their first attempt in the women’s pole vault, before each athlete missed three tries at 15-1 (4.60m), forcing a sudden-death tiebreaker to determine the winner.

Both competitors cleared 14-9 again in the third round, but each missed at 14-11 (4.55m) in the fourth. Clark then cleared 14-9 in the fifth round of the tiebreaker to prevail after Nageotte was unsuccessful.