• Va. athletes in the Olympics

EUGENE, Ore. — The U.S. Olympic trials are an unforgiving and often unpredictable process. But Team Virginia is shaping up nicely with the opening ceremony in Beijing exactly a month away.

Some competitors with ties to Virginia -- like Portsmouth's LaShawn Merritt, who stunned the track world in Eugene by winning the 400-meter trials final over world and Olympic champ Jeremy Wariner -- seem certain to be prime-time performers. Same for Charlottesville's Adam Nelson, a three-time Olympic shot putter. Richmond's Queen Harrison, a surprise runner-up in the 400-meter hurdles, seems capable of delivering a regal effort on sport's most hallowed stage.

Harrison, a Hermitage High School graduate, will be nursing a left hamstring pull suffered last month. Gymnast Justin Burke, who is a monument to modern orthopedic medicine, is fighting off an ankle injury.

Reid Priddy, who grew up in Richmond and whose family lives in Hanover, is hoping to lead the strong U.S. men's volleyball team to a medal.

And then there will be bit players such as a gaggle of field hockey players on the first U.S. women's team to qualify for the Olympics since 1996. Four members of the 16-woman field hockey roster played as collegians at Old Dominion.

And David Walters.

Walters, a little-known freestyle swimmer from Yorktown, is today beginning to live his Beijing dream. The University of Texas sophomore made the U.S. Olympic swim team last week by finishing sixth in the 200-meter freestyle and, in the process, earning a spot on the 800-meter relay team.

He beat the seventh-place finisher by about three-tenths of a second.

"That's cutting it close,'' Walters said by phone. "I'm a superstud," he said, laughing.

He is preparing to head to California with the touted U.S. swim team and then to Singapore before China.

"I'm so happy, but the trials can be really sad," he said. "I saw a girl break a world record in the morning and not make the team at night."

Alan Webb knows the feeling.

Webb, from Reston, was considered a 2008 Olympic middle-distance track star-to-be. But the man who placed eighth in the 1,500 at last year's world championships failed to earn a spot on the Olympic team. He finished fifth in Sunday's 1,500 Olympic trials final in Eugene. He missed his target by a mere .62 second.

A few U.S. teams are still filling their rosters, such as baseball, women's basketball and equestrian. So, it's possible that one or more Virginian could appear on those squads when they're completed.

On Thursday in Eugene, there occurred what now seems an ironic exchange. Merritt was preparing for his big 400-meter race against Wariner. Wariner, the Athens Olympic champ, was favored.

Another Virginian approached Merritt and offered advice.

It was Alan Webb.

"Before the race, while I was warming up, Alan said, 'Shawn, make sure you run all the way through the line,'" Merritt explained. "I said, 'I'm running 402 meters.' He said, 'That's what you gotta do.' Alan's from Virginia. I'm from Virginia. We're just trying to represent Virginia well."