When In Doubt, Blame The Foreigners:Kenyan Government-Appointed Commission Blames Foreign Agents For Recent Upsurge In Doping Positives Head of task force Professor Moni Wekesa: “We have left our athletes in the hands of foreigners. … Any drugs which we found to have been used by the athletes was only through the influence of the foreign agents.”

Some Good Distance Reads

• Good Read:Article On Renato Canova Coaching Chinese Women Distance Runners In Kenya Canova: “It’s never a problem of pure talent. When you speak about a country with almost one and a half billion people, there is talent for everything.”
• A Look At The Athletics And Administrative Career Of 1972 Olympic Bronze Medalist Ian Stewart, Who Apparently Helped “Convince” Alberto Salazar To Work With Mo Farah Stewart isn’t popular with everyone in the running world and says, “Does my attitude piss people off? I guess it must do. … No matter how you sugar-coat it, if I tell you I can’t put you in the London Grand Prix, I am saying you’re not good enough.”
  *MB Archive: Lolo Jones and Nick Symmonds blackballed by Aviva Diamond League
• 28:51 10K Man Jon Sutherland Breaks Record For Most Consecutive Days Running At 45 Years And 2 Days During his streak, he’s logged more than 190,000 miles (average of about 11 miles a day) and done “dumb” things like running the day after knee surgery and running on a boat in a hurricane to “keep the streak alive.”
• Interesting Story:Wisconsin-Oshkosh Runner Christy Cazzola Finishes Career At 28 Years Old With A Record 17 NCAA DIII Titles Cazzola was a high school phenom and had offers from DI schools, but decided it wasn’t for her and spent 5 years away from the sport until she returned as a wife and mother. She actually ran XC nationals one year while pregnant.

• Pre-NCAA Champs Rankings: Going Into Regionals, Florida Men And Texas Women Stay On Top Texas A&M and Oregon are ranked 2-3 for the men, Florida and Oregon are 2-3 for the women.
• For Oregon, NCAAs Falls Right In The Middle Of Finals Week Finals week at Oregon is June 9-13. The NCAA Championships at Hayward Field are June 11-14.

• Greg Rutherford’s Controversial 8.51m NR Long Jump Officially Ratified By British Athletics The group said the video evidence was “inconclusive” so upheld the decision of the referee at the event.
• Bahamas 400 Runner Chris Brown Got Hero’s Welcome After World Relays
• Aries Merritt Will Highlight 110H At Glasgow DL July 11th

More News From The World Relays

• Recommended Read:Seb Coe Talks About The Unique Excitement That Surrounds Relay Races, Making Comedic References To His Children And His Own Relay Running Past “This is a year of innovation in our sport … After this weekend, I am convinced that it will become a permanent fixture.”
• IAAF: Should Yohan Blake Be The MVP Of The World Relays?  Brenda Martinez gets mention for anchoring both the USA 4 x 1,500 and 4 x 800.
• Track And Field News: A Star Meet Is Born In The Bahamas The US got to the Bahamas early to practice handoffs while Yohan Blake said their team barely even practiced, but relied on “street smarts.”
• IAAF Work, Rest And Play Interview With Christian Taylor Oly TJ champ’s favorite workout is 3 x 350m. Interesting fact: Taylor longboards a mile and back to practice.
• Yohan Blake Says Michael Jackson Was One Of His Heroes And He’s “Learned A Lot” From Him Blake says he cried when he heard about Jackson’s death in 2009 and didn’t train for a week.
• Video Clip Of Crash Between Katie Mackey And Australia’s Zoe Buckman In World Relays 4 x 1,500

DII And DIII NCAA Champs Were Over The Weekend *D2 Results*D3 Results

• DII: Men’s Recap: Saint Augustine’s Cruises To Second Consecutive National Championship
  *Women’s Recap: Ten All-American Performances Lead Lincoln (Mo.) To Seventh Championship
  *Results
• Steepler Neal Anderson, Who Missed A Year After Having Brain Surgery, Finishes 6th At DII Nationals In PR Of 8:57 Inspirational story on Anderson here.
• DIII:Men’s Recap: Mount Union Wins First National Championship In School History
  *Women’s Recap: Wartburg Claims Third Consecutive National Championship
  *Results

• USATF Day 2 Recap: Team USA Claims Golden Baton At IAAF World Relays US take gold in the men’s 4 x 400 and women’s 4 x 400, 4 x 200 and 4 x 800 on day 2.
  *Day Two Team USA Quotes
• USA Wins The “Golden Baton” (First Place In World Relays Points Total) Team captains Will Leer and Chanelle Price accepted the award. Jamaica was 2nd in the team standings, Kenya 3rd.
• Jamaica Gleaner: “Carl Lewis? He Talks A Lot … Jamaica Stars Fire Back At American After Breaking His 4 X 200m WR” Blake had some strong words for Lewis after breaking the record: “He (Lewis) has been talking a lot of smack. Even the other day in India, he said some things about Bolt … We feel like we always have something to prove. We are taking all his records. There is no more for him.”
• IAAF: “World Records At The World Relays Are Worlds Apart” An analysis of how different Jamaica men’s 4 x 200 WR was to Kenya’s women’s 4 x 1,500.
• Seb Coe Praises World Relays And Says Atmosphere Was Just As Good As London Olympics Coe: “I think we recognise now that for the sport to prosper we’ve got to take it to places where there is a real tradition for something … If you’ve got bedrock interest in a discipline then just go with the grain.”
• IAAF On Men 4 X 100: Jamaica Dominates USA doesn’t make final after DQ.
• IAAF On Women 4 X 200: USA Wins; Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce Anchored Jamaican Team Only 3rd UK was 2nd.
• IAAF On Men 4 X 400: US Denies Bahamas A Home Victory
• IAAF On Women 4 X 400: USA Gets Comfortable Win As Jamaica Just Beats Nigeria For 2nd
• Jamaica Gleaner: Kings Of Sprint Again – Jamaica’s Men Complete 4 X 200m, 4 X 100m Double Jamaica dominated the 4 x 100 in 37.77.
• IAAF Work, Rest And Play With Bahamas’ 400 Runner Chris Brown The sprinter is also a big swimmer.

LRC Updated World Relays Start With A Bang As Kenya Holds On For Gold And USA Settles For Bronze In 4 X 800

LRC UpdatedW 1,500: Kenya Crushes World Record, USA Beats Old World Record, Australia Celebrates Bronze

• Jamaica Wins World Relays 4 X 200 In World Record Time Of 1:18.63 The team of Nickel Ashmeade, Warren Weir, Jermaine Brown and Yohan Blake won the $50,000 plus the WR bonus of $50,000. The US team was DQed for a handoff outside the exchange zone between Curtis Mitchel and Ameer Webb. So much for what Wallace Spearmon predicted about “almost flawless” baton passes.
  *Jamaica Gleaner 4 X 200 Article: Yohan Blake Says He Thinks They Could Have Gone Faster
• USATF Recap: U.S. Women’s 4 X 100m Relay Runs World-Leading Time To Win Gold At IAAF World Relays The team of Tianna Bartoletta, Alexandra Anderson, Jeneba Tarmoh and Lekeisha Lawson ran 41.88 to beat Jamaica’s 42.28.
  *Day One Team USA Quotes
  *IAAF report
• IAAF Report Of Women’s 4 X 400m Relay Heats
• IAAF Report Of Men’s 4 X 400m Relays Heats

USADA Says The Lawsuit Filed By Jon Drummond Is “Baseless” A USADA spokesperson said, “Mr. Drummond’s baseless lawsuit against the US Anti-Doping Agency is an effort to circumvent the mandatory arbitration process established to protect the rights of all clean athletes, coaches and the integrity of competition.”