A 110 hurdle time without a hurdle height attached is close to useless. High school boys race 39 inch barriers under NFHS rules. Junior high boys usually race 33 inch, college and international men race 42 inch, and the national high school record book keeps separate lines for 39 and 42 because the gap between them is roughly two thirds of a second. Below: the height ladder first, then the times by grade.
USATF starts 11 and 12 year old boys over 30 inch barriers in an 80 meter race. Thirteen and 14 year olds move to 100 meters over 33 inch. At 15 the race becomes 110 meters over 39 inch, which is the NFHS high school height and stays there through senior year. College and international men race 42 inch. The full height table, including the 400 and the youth events, is in hurdle height by event and age.
Three inches sounds trivial. It is not. The US high school record over 39 inch barriers is 13.08 by Wayne Davis in 2009. Over 42 inch it is 13.74 by Kevin Craddock in 2004. That is roughly two thirds of a second for three inches, which is also why a boy who trains on lowered hurdles gets a shock in his first varsity race. Times across all three hurdle events by level are collected in average hurdle times by age.
NFHS sets 39 inches for high school boys, but junior high hurdling is not standardized the same way. Several state and local junior high associations run a shorter low-hurdle version of the 110, reportedly as low as 30 inches in some Illinois conferences, though that figure comes from secondary reporting rather than a primary rulebook we could confirm directly. Confirm what your own meet is actually setting before you measure yourself against somebody else's time. Flat sprint context for the same athletes is in the high school boys' 100m ranges.
Takeoff distance and clearance height both change with the barrier. Film one rep at the height you actually race and the AI grades lead leg, trail leg, and takeoff distance against the 39 inch standard rather than a generic one.
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Every row names its barrier height, because a time only means something next to the bar it was run over.
| Level | Height | Typical range (s) |
|---|---|---|
| Junior high, 100mH | 33 in | 16.5 - 20.0 |
| First-year hurdler, JV | 39 in | 18.0 - 21.0 |
| HS freshman, varsity | 39 in | 16.5 - 18.5 |
| HS sophomore | 39 in | 16.0 - 17.5 |
| HS junior | 39 in | 15.3 - 16.5 |
| HS senior | 39 in | 14.9 - 16.2 |
| State entry standard, Oregon 2025 | 39 in | 15.10 - 16.61 |
| State entry standard, Utah 2025 | 39 in | 15.73 - 18.50 |
| State final / podium | 39 in | 14.2 - 15.2 |
| National class | 39 in | 13.6 - 14.3 |
| NCAA D1 | 42 in | 13.6 - 14.3 |
| HS national record | 39 in | 13.08 (Wayne Davis, 2009) |
Common questions athletes and coaches ask about this topic.
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