Ja'Kobe Tharp breaks 110m hurdles world record at NCAA Track and Field Championships

· Yahoo Sports

Ja'Kobe Tharp, an Auburn junior, broke the 110m hurdles world record in the NCAA Track and Field Championships semifinals.

Tharp clocked 12.75 seconds (+1.0 meter/second tailwind) at Hayward Field at the University of Oregon to lower fellow American Aries Merritt's world record of 12.80 from 2012.

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"Coaches said, 'Execute.' My last three hurdles were kind of trash. ... I have more in my legs," Tharp said on ESPN. "That was not a picture-perfect race."

Tharp takes over from Merritt as the only American male runner to hold an active world record in an individual Olympic event.

He's also the first man to break a world record at NCAAs since Dwight Stones in the high jump in 1976, according to the NCAA.

Tharp's previous personal best of 13.01 seconds from winning the 2025 USA Track and Field Outdoor Championships put him outside the 30 fastest men in history.

He placed sixth in his World Championships debut last September, two weeks before turning 20 years old.

Since Merritt broke the world record to cap his incredible 2012 season that included an Olympic gold medal, Americans Grant Holloway (12.81 in 2021) and Devon Allen (12.84 in 2022) came close to breaking the record.

In the end it was Tharp, a 6-foot-4-inch native of Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

The professional track and field season continues Sunday with the LA Grand Prix, expected to include Sha’Carri Richardson in the 100m, live on NBC and Peacock from 4-6 p.m. ET.

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