Stockholm And Bolt Vs. Gay Vs. Powell Is Friday *Updated Provisional Start Lists

LRC Stockholm Preview After a two-week hiatus, the Diamond League returns with a fantastic meet on Friday and LetsRun.com, with a little help from Ato Boldon, breaks the meet down for you. Tyson Gay and Usain Bolt will finally square off at 100m (Asafa Powell is out but he wasn't going to win, so who cares?). Plus a stacked 800 with Nick Symmonds and Andrew Wheating, a stacked men's 5,000 with Galen Rupp and Chris Solinsky and a stacked women's 1,500 with all of the top, healthy American 1,500-meter runners plus Anna Alminova and Nancy Langat.
*Asafa Powell Is Out With Injury Big-time sprinting is tough on the body when guys are clean as now all 3 of the Big 3 have missed time in 2010.
*Bolt Unveils His New Singlet And Announces He's Ready: "I'm feeling good, I'm in good shape." You can see his new singlet on the left.
*Shot Put To Be Held Downtown On Thursday
*US Champ Lauren Fleshman Is Rabbiting Women's 5k We don't get this quote at all: "I'd sooner sell my body on the street than help another American break the American record." She'll help a foreigner but not an American?
*Kenyans Turn Focus To Stockholm Diamond League Meet

The Only Must-Read In The Industry

LRC Week In Review: German Fernandez vs. Alan Webb vs. Leo Manzano Sure, it's the dog days of summer, but we devote much of our weekly recap a guy who hasn't raced in months - German Fernandez - and compare him to Webb and Manzano. Plus, we've got the African and European champs and a LetsRun.com mention in Sports Illustrated.

Good News

• Paul Doyle, Asafa Powell's Agent, Survives Plane Crash In Virginia His wife, former Irish sprinter Karen Shinkins, survived as well.
• More On Crash Landing With Photo Of Plane www.ajc.com

Injury News

• Kara Goucher Back Running After Foot Surgery During Pregnancy She has surgery on her big toe. More on the surgery here.
• Terrence Trammell's 2010 Season Ends Due To Knee Ailment

From Over The Weekend

Deriba Merga Dominates Bogota Half Marathon As WR Holder Tadese Drops Out The race belonged to the 2009 Boston champ from the get-go.

Kenya Thrilled By Turnout At African Champs And Hopes To Host Other Meets In Future

African Champs *Results

Kenya Elated: Kenya Exceeds All Expectations With 25 Medals At African Champs Ten golds, including five in a 2-hour period on the final day, helped the host nation dominate the medal count. Nigeria was second with 18 medals.

Sunday: New Tactics, Same Result: Kiprop = The Best In The World The Olympic champ Asbel Kiprop showed that he is still the best in the world as he used yo-yo tactics to dispatch a slew of talented challengers on Sunday. Instead of putting himself too far back as he did at last year's World Champs, Kiprop hammered to the front and towed the field through 53.65 before backing off and hammering things home in 54.38 as Silas Kiplagat failed to medal. Former USA Today writer Dick Patrick reports from Kenya.
*IAAF Recap Of Final Day Of African Champs In addition to the 1,500m, there was the 5k final, which Kenya swept. Vincent Yato appeared to have the gold but slipped on the infield grass in the final 10 meters, letting Edwin Soi get the win. Another sold-out crowd at the Champs surprised Kenyan officials.

Saturday: Ethiopia Finally Wins Gold As Tirunesh Dibaba Remains Undefeated At 10k Thanks to a final lap of 61, the Olympic champ had no problems with world champ and hometown favorite Linet Masai, who finished 3rd.
Interesting Read Kenyan Officials Are Stunned By Large Crowds Just like in America, the Kenyans are great at track but the public normally doesn't support it, but more than 30,000 were in the stands on Saturday.

Random/Somewhat Interesting News

• Dathan Ritzenhein And Haile G To Battle In Great Run (Half Marathon) In Sept Prior To Doing It Again In NYC
• Doping Way Up In India As Country Gets Ready For Commonwealth Games It's more than doubled since 2007.
• Joan Benoit Happy As Beach To Beacon Turns 13 Khalid Khannouchi is running.
• Interesting Read: NY Times: Half Of ACL Surgeries May Be Unnecessary If you are poor and don't have health insurance, we agree. Otherwise, have the surgery.
• Caster Semenya's Coach Urges Patience
• Glowing Profiles Of Tyrant Van Commenee Keep Coming In
• Walter Dix Wins 100m In Nova Scotia
• IAAF To Develop High Altitude Training Center In Uganda

Justin Gatlin's Comeback

Gatlin Runs 10.24 To Win First Comeback Race It's supposedly equilvalent to 10.21 without a headwind. Gatlin wanted to believe he could run 10.00 but he's probably a 10.10 guy right now at best.
*Discussion Of Gatlin's Comeback

Recommended Read: Sports Illustrated: From Heaven To Hell And Back Amazingly, Gatlin seems to be fine financially as he's still driving a Maserati.

Random News

• LeMaitre Has A Long Way To Go To Catch Bolt Or Gay The white dude is only 20.
• South Africa Disappointed With Showing At African Champs  They had topped the recent medal tables until this year.
• 50-Year-Old Merlene Ottey Wants To Qualify For 2012 Olympics
• Commonwealth Games Could Be Stellar On The Track If Athletes Show Up  Even without Usain Bolt, a ton of world champions are scheduled to compete, but athletes are worried about security.
• TD Banknorth Beach To Beacon This Weekend Two all time greats, Khalid Khannouchi and Catherine Ndereba, will be there. They may not want to admit it, but their best days are behind them. Martin Lel is running this year.

2010 Europeans *Results

More Euro Recaps: Christian Reif Breaks 24-Year-Old CR To Win Long Jump The German won a tight battle in which 6 men went over 8 meters and it took 27 feet (8.23m) to win a medal.
*French Steeplers Make It Look Easy With 1-2 Finish Mahiedine Mekhissi-Benabbad outsprinted Bob Tahri for gold with a CR of 8:07.87.
*1972 Munich Sprint King Valeriy Borzov Says Lemaitre Still Isn't In The League Of Bolt And Gay Times are much tougher than in Borzov's era, when the Soviet ran 10.07 and 20.00 to win both Olympic sprints. It takes a 9.6 to be a gold medal threat these days.
Brits Enjoy Success And Look Ahead To London: Hard-Liner Van Commenee Doesn't Tolerate Excuses He's been called "The Volcano" and "the hardest coach in Britain," but the tough stance and refusal to accept failure has been putting British athletics back on the map, including 6 golds, 7 silvers and 6 bronzes at Euros, the best UK medal haul in history.
*Despite Success At Euros, UK Coaches Warn Athletes And Fans Not To Start Counting The London Olympic Medals Just Yet Hardware at global championships is tougher to come by. At the 1998 Euros, the Brits won 16 medals, including 9 golds, but only Colin Jackson (110 hurdles) won a gold at the following year's Worlds.
*Van Commenee Gives His Own Take On Euros, His Demanding Stance As Boss And The Goals For The Future

Sunday PM: Final Day Of Europeans: Nuria Fernández Gets 1,500m Gold Before Home Crowd, Abeylegesse Gets Silver In 5k Fernández, 4th at Worlds last year, got gold before the Spanish crowd and Abeylegesse, winner of the 10k, was beaten by countrywoman Bekele in the 5k.
*Lemaitre Leads France To 4 x 100 Gold And Gets 3rd Gold Of Euros
*Blanka Vlašić Finally Gets European Gold In High Jump
Sunday AM: Switzerland's Viktor Röthlin Wins Marathon Gold The runner-up four years ago get the coveted gold in oppressive conditions.

Saturday: IAAF: Brits Have Great Night As Mo Farah Completes 5k/10k Double Hard to beat someone who runs his final 1,200 in an impressive 2:55.77. Watch last lap of race on video in right-hand column.