December 05, 2016 Homepage Archive

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Archived Homepage For December 05, 2016

Quote Of The Day

“Because we have moved into the world of transparency.”

– Seb Coe responding when asked why each member’s vote on the new IAAF constitution reform resolution was displayed on screen publicly rather than have a secret ballot.

*MB: IAAF/Coe reforms pass 182-10, dissenters and abstainers outed on big screen

2016 NXN Live Webcast Results

MB: Official 2016 NXN Discussion Thread

LRC Total Domination: Brie Oakley And Fayetteville-Manlius Dominate 2016 Nike Cross Nationals (NXN)Brie Oakley may be America’s newest female distance star.
*MB: OAKLEY Got Her Gun!!

LRC Casey Clinger Repeats As Nike Cross National Champion But His American Fork Team Is Upset By Bozeman In Team Battle For the first time ever, a boy repeated as NXN champ. Clinger is the individual champ once again but his dream of a perfect day that included both individual and team titles was denied.

RRWBrie Oakley, Casey Clinger Run Away With Individual Titles At NXN Championships

2016 NXN By The Numbers What 8 states have never sent a team? What team has been the most?

NXN Talk On The Message Board

Is There A Demand For Lighted Running Shorts / Pants With A GPS Enabled Panic Alarm In Them?

LRCQ&A With Tim Polanowski – Inventor Of At Night Athletic After nearly plowing into another runner one night, Polanowski has invented a pair of running shorts that come with built-in LED lights that can be turned on / off and a GPS enabled panic alarm.
*MB: What do you think of these super high-tech, lighted shorts with alarm that are on Kickstarter? Q&A with co-founder

USATF Annual Meeting Has Started

USATF Agrees To 8-Year Deal With NBC 8 years? Why not just make it for 26?
*USATF Release The deal will reduce USATF’s production costs as NBC will take on at least 18 hours of live coverage including USA Champs and the Pre Classic.
Max Siegel Gives USATF “State Of The Sport” Address Siegel broke down how US athletes earned almost $7 million from USATF cumulatively and how many athletes there were at each income level (from many at $25,000 to only one over $100,000).
*MB:Max Siegel asked USATF delegates to cheer $7M spent on 700 athletes, when $1.8M was salary for 1 CEO.
Convention Resolution Submitted In Reaction To USATF Lawsuit Against USATF Youth Committee Activist David Greifinger has called for the USATF CEO and Board to “respect the due process rights of its members.”
*MB:USATF & Max Siegel Continue Their Powergrab – This Time Against The Youth
Results Of USATF Athletes Advistory Committee Elections Jeff Porter is the chair, Lauren Fleshman are on the USATF board and Will Leer and Phoebe Wright are the 800-1,500m representatives.
USATF Annual Meeting Kicks Of In Orlando, FloridaStephanie Hightower gave her last address as USATF president.
Register-Guard Article From Before Jackie Joyner-Kersee Conceded To Vin Lananna On Joyner-Kersee, Lananna said, “I think she’s a great person, a fantastic person. We’re friends, and I think she’s a great ambassador for the sport.” A little bit different tone than the US presidential election.

2017 London Worlds Will Be Here Before You Know It

LRC IAAF Announces 2017 World Championships Entry Standards – Which Ones Got Easier And Which Ones Got Harder? Find out what the pros will have to run, jump or throw if they want to compete in London next summer. Also why is the IAAF sexist?

Our Weekly Recap

WTW Galen Rupp Bombs, Ben True Shines, Meet America’s 13-Year-Old Phenom, The Return Of Chris Derrick And Much More Thanksgiving may be a holiday for most Americans but a ton of US pros decided to go to work and race last week. We break it down and give you the scoop on Mary Cain‘s knee injury.

Doping Updates: Chernova Finally Loses Her 2011 Gold

Video: Full English Video Of Latest ARD Russian Doping Report The story by ARD and French newspaper Le Monde show the scale of cover-ups and extortion by the IAAF extended to more athletes besides Liliya Shobukhova.
Russian Heptathlete Tatyana Chernova Stripped Of Her 2011 World Title And 2012 Olympic Bronze You’ll remember Chernova was previously caught doping, but only given a selective ban that had her keeping her championship medals. Russian mid-d runners Ekaterina Sharmina and Kristina Ugarova were also given doping bans.
*Jessica Ennis Will Now Have Three World Titles To Her Name*2nd Article
Summary Of IOC Retesting From The 2008 & 2012 Games No surprise – Russia has twenty more positives and ten more stripped medals than the next closes nation.
Rune Andersen, Head Of Task Force Dealing With Russia’s Suspension, Will Report An Update To The IAAF Tomorrow With the Rio Games long over, it’s easy to forget that all Russian track and field athletes are still banned from international competition.
InsideTheGames’ Nick Butler:“IOC And WADA Need To Stop Fighting If Genuine Improvement Is Ever Going To Be Made In War On Doping” Butler slams all the politics behind the anti-doping movement.
IAAF Launches Online Portal To Report Doping Anyone can report suspicious activity or tips anonymously through this site.
What A Joke:Russian TV Station To Air Film About “Foreign Athletes Doping” Although it sounds like it probably will bring up some valid concerns about the TUE system.
IAAF Athletes Commission Declares Full Support For Proposed IAAF Governance Structure Reforms The proposed reforms include a new Integrity Unit which will “enforce higher ethical standards.”
Usain Bolt Video Interview: “Doping Cheats Be Given Life Bans”

End Of Year Track News

SPIKES Looks At The Top Moments Of 2016 For AOY Finalists Almaz Ayana, Elaine Thompson And Anita Wlodarczyk
Wayde van Niekerk Beats Out Caster Semenya For South African Sports Star Of The Year Van Niekerk’s 74-year-old coach Ans Botha was named coach of the year.
Remaining London 2017 Worlds Tickets On Sale Today
Friday:IAAF Prepares To Host End Of Year Award Event In Monaco

Olympic News

IOC Warn Tokyo 2020 TO Keep Costs “Significantly Less” Than Their Announced $20 Billion Budget Cap The IOC doesn’t want countries to think they need to spend $20 billion to host the Games.
Rio 2016 Claim “Only” Two Workers And 700 Suppliers Remain Still To Be PaidInsideTheGames writes, “But the sums owed are still thought to amount to millions of dollars in what is an unprecedented situation in recent Olympic history.”
Rio Mayor Admits Economic And Political Problems Caused Challenges “Every Day” Before Rio 2016
Eurosport Confirmed As Exclusive German Broadcaster For Next Four Olympic Games

Election Season Isn’t Over Yet

PoleVaultPower’s Becca Peter Interviews USATF Presidential Candidates Jackie Joyner-Kersee And Vin Lananna Read how each candidates responses differed to a series of questions about their views on a variety of issues impacting the sport.

High School XC

Results:2016 Foot Locker Regional Cross-Country Results 30 of the 40 finalists are set. Find out who they are here. The Affolder brothers (one in 10th grade and one in 12th) went 1-2 in the Northeast.
Kate Murphy Raised Her Arms In The Shape Of An “O” As She Led Lake Braddock’s Girls To NXN
Race Cheats Starting Young: NJ High School Runner Caught Cheating At NXN Northeast Meet For the second time this season, Terry Varicelli was caught hopping into the race at the end, this time “finishing” in 27th place with a time about 2:30 faster than his PR.
*MB: High school runner caught cheating again
MB: Freshman Graydon Morris Qualifies for FLN
More Super Saturday Coverage Including NXN Action Is Here
NXN At-Large Teams Announced
MB:DJ Principe 15:17 Breaking Bowdoin CR
MB:Quick predictions of At-Large Bids for NXN Announced here.

D3 Runner Gets Mauled

LRC Video: Deer Collision Sends NCAA D-III Runner Flying During Cross-Country Race If you think a cramp is the worst thing to fear in a race, you’ve never had anyone yell, “Watch out for the deer!”

Weekend Distance Action

Joseph Gray Wins Xterra Trail World Championships Over Nick Arciniaga And Chad Hall (Ryan’s Brother) Former winner Patrick Smyth was in the hunt, but was DQ’d for a wrong turn. Ryan Hall ran and was 18th, finishing more than 5-minutes behind the women’s winner, Polina Carlson. *Discuss
Yemane Tsegay (2:08:48) Wins Fukuoka In A Close Race With Former WR Holder Patrick Makau (2:08:57); “Miracle Worker” Yuki Kawauchi Gets 3rd (2:09:11) Tsegay pulled away from Makau in the final mile as Kawauchi beat his calf injury to stake his claim for a spot on Japan’s 2017 World squad. Canada’s Reid Coolsaet might have outdone his own expectations, but came up short in his Canadian record attempt by 46 seconds.
*IAAF Recap*Discuss
CIM: Kenya’s Nelson Oyugi (2:11:40) And Sarah Kiptoo (2:31:19) Win California International Marathon Americans performed well as former CIM winner Daniel Tapia was 3rd (2:12:27) and Stephanie Bruce was runner-up (2:32:36). 2007 Foot Locker champion Ashley Brasovan ran a huge marathon PR to get 6th in 2:41:35.
*MB:Daniel Tapia 2:12:28! CIM! *Results
Felix Kiptoo Kirwa And Rebecca Kangogo Chesir Continue Kenyan Dominance At Singapore Marathon In hot and humid conditions Kirwa won in 2:17 as Chesir ran 2:43. *Results
Zach Miller And Ida Nilsson Win Competitive Races At North Face 50 Mile Olympian Magdalena Lewy-Boulet was second for the women. *Discuss

New IAAF Reforms / Sponsorship: Goodbye Adidas, Hello Asics

95% Vote In Favor Of New IAAF Reforms
IAAF Announce New Partnership With Asics
Adidas Ends IAAF Sponsorship Three Years Early Sources say the deal was worth $8 million a year for the IAAF.
BBC:Seb Coe’s Reforms To Tackle Corruption And Doping Changes include a new integrity unit and term three 4-year term limits for all council members.
*InsideTheGames article
MB:IAAF/Coe reforms pass 182-10, dissenters and abstainers outed on big screen Speaking on why the vote was public rather than secret, Coe said, “Because we have moved into the world of transparency.”
Usain Bolt Praises Seb Coe’s Reform Efforts “He is making some bold moves.”
Seb Coe:“These reforms are fundamentally about standing tall for the clean athletes. The clean athletes have to know we are in their corner.” Apparently 43 leads were received in the first 48 hours the new online doping portal was open.
European Athletics President Svein Arne Hansen Before The IAAF Vote: “The time for change is now … It’s now or never.”

Pre-Sunday Roads News

Former WR Holder Patrick Makau Going For His Third Consecutive Title At The Fukuoka Marathon Makau will face fellow Kenyan James Kwambai (2:04:27) and Ethiopia’s Yemane Tsegay (2:04:48).
Yuki Kawauchi Determined to Run Fukuoka Despite “Everyone Telling [Him] Not To” Kawauchi has been dealing with a calf injury and could only jog his tune-up half. He says this will be his last attempt to make a Japanese national team.
Recommended Read:37-Year-Old Reid Coolsaet Running Out Of Opportunities To Get The Canadian NR, But He’ll Take Another Shot In Fukuoka The record is 2:10:09 from 1975 and Coolsaet has run 2:10:28.
Coolsaet Has Dealt With Injuries And Hasn’t “Had Many Indications In Training That [He’s] Ready For A PB” In the past Coolsaet has “rolled the dice” or been “dead set on going out on record pace,” but says he’s not going to force it in this one.

Singapore: Former Champions Kenneth Mungara (2:09:00) And Kennedy Kiptoo Lilan (2:11:36) Will Clash In The Singapore MarathonRebecca Kangogo Chesir (2:25:22) and Peninah Arusei (2:27:17) lead the women’s field.

Vin Wins

knight-lananna-usa09 It’s Official: Vin Lananna Is New USATF President As Jackie Joyner-Kersee Withdraws Candidacy Good luck to our new president.
Discuss: JJK DNF, drops out – Vin Lanana new USATF president!

Doping News: Russia Not Going Anywhere Fast

IAAF Task Force Leader Rune Andersen Is To Report That Russia Has Made Almost No Progress With Reforms At this point Russia is running out of time to be eligible for 2017 Worlds with the IAAF reportedly “frustrated with the pace of change.”
Russia Still Refusing To Accept They Were Caught:Russian Whistleblower Grigory Rodchenkov Accused Of “Persuading Athletes To Take Unknown Substances” In Russia An investigation in Russia has said Rodchenkov “led a criminal ring” with the investigation leader saying, “We are utterly curious how one can believe allegations by someone suspected of committing criminal offences.”
Olympic Bronze Medalist Sprinter Mariya Ryemyen Among Seven Ukrainians To Avoid Doping Ban After Positive Meldonium Test They avoided suspensions as their samples did not contain a high enough level to prove they used the drug after January 1st. Three of the seven have served past drug bans.
Jessica Ennis-Hill After Being Upgraded To 2011 Gold: “For those athletes who missed out on medals and that was perhaps the highlight of their career, it’s soul destroying.”

GB News

Video:Tom Hanks And Mo Farah Talk About Running, Getting The “Run, Forrest Run” Treatment Not even Mo Farah has avoided being yelled the famous movie line while out on a run.
Mo Farah On Shortlist For BBC Sports Personality Of The Year Award Also on the short list are boxer Nicola Adams, tennis star Andy Murray, triathlete Alistair Brownlee and several Paralympians.
Good Read:GB’s Young Sprint Star Diana Asher-Smith Is Hoping To “Get Some Muscle” On Her “Little Chicken Wings” To Get To The Next Level In 2017 Asher-Smith won 4 x 100 bronze in Rio, but was 5th in the 200 and knows it’s going to be a challenge to get on the individual podium in London. *Short BBC Video Interview With Asher-Smith
UK Sport Makes Last Ditch Plea To Government For Funding Less people are playing the UK National Lottery, which is where most of UK Sport’s income comes from. They are hoping the government will make up the $37 million they will be short over 4 years.
Gemma Steel And Andrew Butchart Head GB Euro Cross Team Euro XC Champs are in Chia, Italy on December 11th.

Marathon On A Track

LRC Would A Marathon On A Track Be Faster Than A Marathon On The Roads?What would happen if this LetsRun meme became a reality?
*MB:Marathon on a Track (Surface) – How Much Faster if Any Do You Think it Would Be?

Usain Bolt Premiere Night In The Books

Usain Bolt Confirms He Won’t Be Racing The 200m Next Year But he’s always said it was his favorite event?
Bolt Talks About Struggling With Motivation Ahead Of Rio As Training “Just Wasn’t Fun Anymore” He says he’s now more “relaxed and happy” because he knows training isn’t “going to be so intense.”
The Telegraph:“You Won’t Find Much Doping Or Corruption In Bolt’s New Film, But Does That Matter? Let Him Be An Inspiration”Ben Bloom writes that the documentary “Clearly fails to foster any semblance of objectivity, [but] was never going to be a warts-and-all expose of athletics’ seedy underbelly – it is a personal journey charting two years in the life of a hero.”
Athletics Weekly Gives Good Review Of Bolt Documentary “[It] doesn’t fall into the trap of trotting out samey platitudes or regurgitating what everyone already knows about its subject.”
Mo Farah, Arsenal And Chelsea Players Among Stars At Usain Bolt Documentary Premiere
Bolt Named “CEO” Of Maison Mumm Champagne Company That would be “chief entertainment officer.”
Bolt Says 2017 Is “Mostly For The Fans”

Distance Profiles / Interviews

Good Read:Profile On NYC Marathon Champ Ghirmay Ghebresalassie Most pros plan their weddings for the off season, but Ghebreslassie kissed his wedding ring as he won in NYC as he had just got married a month earlier. Even crazier, he had only known his wife for a few months.
Matt Centrowitz Feels Racing In The NCAA Prepared Him For Tactical Professional Races Talking about the Rio 1,500 final, Centro said, “I don’t think anyone in that race, especially from Africa, had ever been in a 3:50 1,500-meter race in their life.”
Interesting Q&A With Olympic Steeplechase Champ Conseslus Kipruto Kipruto talks about his first sporting love being soccer, getting lapped in his first 10K, making his own toys as a kid and his childhood dog “saving” him from a kid who wanted to fight.

Doping News: ARD Report Exposes More IAAF-Russian Cover-Ups

Breaking:New Report By ARD And French Newspaper Le Monde Shows IAAF-Russian Doping Cover-Ups And Extortion Was Even Larger Than Thought In addition to Liliya Shobukhova, five other Russian athletes were blackmailed by the IAAF to cover up doping with huge sums of money getting shifted around behind the scenes by IAAF officials. Apparently Shobukhova dropping out of the 2012 Olympics was planned in advance so she didn’t have to get a medal revoked.
*MB: Le Monde and ARD Detail How IAAF Heads Blackmailed Russians for Millions of $ to Coverup Positives
*MB: Russian allegation: British Olympic champ involved in doping coverup. Any insight on who it is?
Allegation: “British Olympic Champion” Caught Up In Alleged IAAF Doping Cover-Up
*MB: Russian allegation: British Olympic champ involved in doping coverup. Any insight on who it is?
AP:“Emails Show ‘Total Protection’ Cover-Up Shielded Russian Cheats”
*Athletics Weekly Article
TASS:Former Russian Athletics Head Valentin Balakhnichev Denies Colluding With The IAAF

More Doping News

After Meldonium Positive, Abeba Aregawi Says From Now On She’ll Consult One Of Sweden’s Top Doctors Before Taking Any Supplements Aregawi’s absence from competition this year was a big boon for the Americans.
Aksana Miankova Of Belarus Will Lose 2008 Gold Medal To Doping

Marathon News

Recommended Read:Former Inmate Writes About Becoming A Runner While In Prison And “Running Boston” On A Treadmill Prison logistics, shoes without shoelaces and a treadmill that wouldn’t stay on for longer than an hour at a time were just a few of the obstacles Keith Giroux had to overcome.
*MB:RunnersWorld Celebrates Sex Offender Running on a Treadmill
Good Read: Dennis Young:“Everyone Says That They Want To Avoid A Repeat Of The 2016 Marathon Trials” From lack of water, poor medical support and a late start time in hot conditions, a lot went wrong at the 2016 Trials and Young concludes “it was probably the local organizing committee’s fault.”
MB:2020 USA Olympic Marathon Team Trials Window / Standards Word is that the standards you’ll need a 2:19 or 1:04 for men and a 2:45 and 1:13 for women to qualify.

IAAF AOY

Usain Bolt And Almaz Ayana Crowned 2016 IAAF World Athletes Of The YearBolt won the award for a record 6th time. Other winners included Andre De Grasse as the male rising star and Harry Marra (who coaches the Eatons) won the coaching achievement award.

Usain Bolt Says He Wishes He “Got Serious” When He Was Younger As He Feels He Could Have “Done A Lot More In My Career” Bolt was quoted as saying, “Maybe if I’d started younger I’d have had four Olympics.” However, he did have 4 Olympics (he didn’t make the 200 final in 2004), so maybe he meant 4 golds.

Doping: Russia Will Stay Banned Beyond February

Ban On Russian Track Will Continue Into 2017 The IAAF taskforce lead by Rune Andersen will report back again in February and hope by then to “identify a clear road map” for Russia’s return.
Good Read:AP:Clean Athletes Wait Years For Stolen Prize Money That Never Comes Apparently the IAAF won’t let you return from a ban if you don’t pay back prize money, but as most athletes are retired and thousands of dollars richer by the time they are caught, there’s no motivation for them to ever pay it back.
Dick Pound Thinks Firm Action Against Russia Will Deter Other Countries From Widespread Doping Pound laments that the IOC didn’t take the opportunity to “send a message” by banning Russia from Rio and criticizing them of showing favoritism because Russia is “big and important.”

Problems In Kenya

Report On Kenyan Rio 2016 Corruption Delivered To Parliament Recommends “Radical Measures” And Criticizes Athletes As Well As Officials The report recommends a detailed forensic audit on sport spending and accuses some athletes of taking overseas allowances despite not going to Rio. The report also criticized Wesley Korir for pacing his wife in a marathon three months before the Games.
Wesley Korir Defends Decision To Pace Wife “Someone thinking that running 40k with my wife almost three months before Olympics affected my race then they know nothing about marathon training and running.”
2012 Olympic Bronze Medalist Thomas Longosiwa Denies Report Saying He Was Paid $8,000 Travel Money Despite Not Going To Rio Longosiwa suspects some official pocketed the cash and just said it was given to him.
Kenyan Sports Minister Hassan Wario Questioned By Police For Four Hours About Disappearance Of $864,000 In Funds Meant For Kenyan Olympic Athletes A NOCK agreement with Kenyan Airways meant that tickets would only cost $870,000, but somehow $1.5 million was spent.
*Kenyan Court Stops Athletics Kenya Constitutional Review Process After Athletes Claim It Has Been “Shrouded In Secrecy”

Previous NXN / HS News

MB: Sophomore Claudia Lane Runs 16:45 At California’s Historic State Meet Course, Woodward Park Lane’s time was #3 all-tme on the course where Sarah Baxter has the record at 16:39.7.
RunBLogRun:Observations From NXN NY Regionals
DyeStat:FM Girls Predicted To Win NXN
DyeStat Boys Projections: American Fork Favored

Could We See A Garrett Heath – Mo Farah Rematch?Farah Wants To Run Great Edinburgh XC On January 7th Farah: “I placed second in this race last year and hope to go one better in 2017.”

Be Inspired

Recommended Read:Overweight High Schooler Was Motivated To Start Running By Bullies Who Called Him “Pillsbury Doughboy;” Now He’s One Of The Fastest Runners In His School’s History Running changed David Czerwonky‘s life as he went from being bullied and over weight, to 30 pounds lighter, a confident and decent high school runner and the school Homecoming King.
Former Competitive Runner With Terminal Lung Disease Finishes Seattle Marathon Pulling His Own Oxygen TankEvans Wilson walked the 26.2 in just under 11 hours to raise money for Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation.
Age Is Just A Number:Sydney McLaughlin And Irene OBera Are USATF Youth And Masters Athletes Of The Year McLaughlin obviously made the Olympics as a 16-year-old while Obera won won W80 gold in the 100, 200, 80m hurdles, 200m hurdles, LJ, 4 x 100m, 4 x 400m, and the heptathlon at the World Masters Championships.