Conditions ripe for 100 showdown.

Byline: Ron Bellamy / The Register-Guard

Justin Gatlin and Asafa Powell didn't run head-to-head at the Prefontaine Classic, and their duel in Gateshead, England, has fallen through, and the reigning world record-holders at 100 meters currently have nothing scheduled against each other for 2006.

So, why does such a race have to be in Europe somewhere?

Why couldn't it happen at the newly announced high-performance meet, scheduled for the evening of Aug. 8 at Hayward Field?

It would take a major sponsor with deeeeep pockets to underwrite the match race of the world's two fastest men. Powell and Gatlin aren't running unless suitably compensated, but there would be incentives, on a number of fronts, to make that happen here.

An impossible dream? Probably. But look at the win-win situation this could become.

Gatlin and Powell get their payday. It's naive to think they're going to run against each other in the Pre Classic, where they appear because their Nike contracts require them to do so. The shelf life of an elite sprinter is short.

But if a major sponsor stepped forward to underwrite the 100, as the cornerstone of a 12- to 15-event meet, the sprinters get market value.

They also get to take a bow as doing something for the sport, and fellow athletes, because the net gate receipts will benefit the Professional Athletics Association, the newly formed union for top-level U.S. track and field athletes.

Gatlin, who considers Hayward Field his "house," who said Sunday that he cherishes the relatively few opportunities he gets to run in the United States, would be doing something for the sport in this country. Powell, a Jamaican, wouldn't be able to play that angle, but he is a Nike athlete, and that's the company that was essentially born at Hayward Field, where fans are notoriously fair and embracing of great performances, no matter the nationality of the performer.

A Gatlin-Powell race would guarantee a huge gate - maybe a sellout - with national TV coverage. It would be a marvelous inauguration of the Road to Eugene '08.

And it would cost a bundle. Tom Jordan, meet director for the Pre Classic, said he initially thought the asking price for a Gatlin-Powell race, when they came to share the world record at 9.77 seconds, was in the $200,000 to $300,000 range.

But the fact that such a race hasn't been nailed down leads Jordan to believe the price tag is much greater, perhaps $500,000. Is there any corporate sponsor that could justify, to shareholders, putting up that much money for less than 10 seconds of glory?

By the way, conditions could be wonderful. Historically, according to the National Weather Service, Aug. 8 is the driest day of the year's second-driest month in Eugene. Most it's ever rained here is two-hundredths of an inch. Average high temperature is 70 degrees, and the temperature reached 104 in 1978.

At the least, the race could produce the fastest 100 meters ever on U.S. soil; the current best is 9.84 seconds by Donovan Bailey in the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.

And the race would, for the year, and probably until the 2007 world championships, satisfy our desire to know who's the world's fastest man.

Evidently, it's not going to be an easy task to get the Aug. 8 meet established, this late in the season. The meet doesn't even have an official name yet - will it emphasize the PAA, or the pending Olympic Trials? - and it wasn't encouraging over the weekend that Gatlin hadn't even heard of it yet.

It's up to the athletes to make the meet. It will be a meet by them, and for them, and their level of participation will reflect both their regard for the PAA, and their support of their sport.

Hence, what a huge statement it would be if Gatlin and Powell returned to Hayward Field in August; what huge visibility there would be for the sponsor who made the race happen.

Because Gatlin and Powell will face each other at some point this summer, and for a lot of money. Why not Aug. 8, at Hayward Field?