For Trayvon Bromell, July 4 was an independence day. His first race as a rebuilt sprinter, more than four years after he first felt discomfort in his left heel.
It was also much more than that. Bromell, whose training base is Jacksonville, Fla., arrived in Montverde, off Lake Apopka just west of Orlando, for a meet called the Showdown in O-Town.
Exactly four years earlier, Bromell celebrated qualifying for his first Olympics at age 20.
Three years after that, 364 days before the Showdown, Bromell left that Montverde track and had his coach believing he might quit sprinting.