America’s Only Men’s Steeplechase Champ Has Died

RIP Horace Ashenfelter The FBI agent, who won 1952 Olympic gold against a favored Soviet rival, died Saturday at 94.

Stars In The News

• Good Read Former 5,000 WR Holder Dick Quax Opens Up About His 4-Year Battle Against Cancer, His 1976 Olympic Silver And His WR
• Andrew Wheating Exit Interview: A Look Back At His Career And Retirement (CITIUS MAG Podcast)
• Joshua Cheptegei Recalls His 1st International Race – A 28:24 Performance On The Roads In India He was thrown into the deep end as the race winner was Geoffrey Kamworor.
• Usain Bolt Continues His Ridiculous Talk About Playing In Premiere League “It’s going to be hard because my career has been so great but if I could win a Champions League or something, it’ll be close to anything I achieved in athletics.”
• 41-Year-Old Kim Collins Hasn’t Retired – He’s Ready For His 14th Indoor Season
• Omar McLeod Says He’s Thrilled He Switched Coaches Mid-Season Last Year To Eldrick Floreal – Also Says He Won’t Do Commonwealths As It’s Too Close To World Indoors
• Fast Running: Could Mountain Star Kilian Jornet Run A 2:10 Marathon? We’ll answer that – no way.
• Did You Know? Pat Tiernan Played Cricket Until 2012

Andrew Wheating Retires

LRC Former Oregon Great Andrew Wheating Retires At Age 30 – A Look Back At The Highs And Lows Of His Career Tons of glory as a Duck and a 3:30.9 1,500m before he even signed his Nike contract. A look at his career. Discuss: ANDREW WHEATING RETIRES
*Favorite Andrew Wheating Moment?

• Good Read: Runner’s World Q&A With Andrew Wheating On His Retirement Asked if he would change anything about his career he said, “No, honestly I wouldn’t. The things that happened in my career happened, and they made me who I am today. I’m thankful for what happened and what didn’t happen and I have no regrets on how it turned out.”
• Register-Guard: Wheating Decides To Hang Up His Running Spikes For Good Wheating’s message to his competitors: “To my competition, I hated every single one of you … for 4 minutes or less. But I loved you just as much when the race was over. … Keep the flame stoked and don’t ever stop believing in your potential. I’ll see ya behind the stands.”
• Ken Goe Article
• Wheating’s Facebook Post Announcement

Another Mid-D Guy Is Also Retiring: Brooks Beasts’ Former NCAA 3rd Placer Shaquille Walker Retires From Track At 24 Years Old Walker said running was interfering with other things in life and he’ll now focus on spending time with his family and pursuing a career as a dentist.
*MB: What? Shaquille Walker would rather be a dentist than an Olympic medallist and Danny Mackey thinks he could have set the AR?

The Commonwealth Games Are In Three Months

• Team England Sprinters James Dasaolu And Ashleigh Nelson Withdraw From 2018 Commonwealth Games No reason is given in the article.
• Hurdlers Alicia Barrett And Jessica Turner Added To Team England For Gold Coast 2018 CWG Where were added in place of Dasaolu and Nelson.
• Irish 100m Record Holder Amy Foster Says Commonwealth Exclusion From Northern Ireland Team Has Left Her “Heartbroken” Her exclusion was a surprise as she had hit the qualifying mark on multiple occasions.
• Scottish Hammer Thrower Chris Bennett Hopes Not To Repeat Mistakes From 2014 CWG Bennett finished last in the final 4 years ago and is hoping for a medal this time around.

The Action Gets Hot Next Week

LRC American Record Alert: The 2018 Houston Half Marathon Is Going To Be Incredible Next weekend’s Houston half is LOADED. There are six sub-60 men in the field but the women’s field headlines with Molly Huddle vs. Jordan Hasay – and they are far from guaranteed to win.

Starting Off 2018 With A Bang

• January 14: Ten Past Champions Headline Super-Deep Fields For 2018 Chevron Houston Marathon And Aramco Houston Half Marathon In the women’s half, Molly Huddle and Jordan Hasay take on US soil record holder Mary Wacera (66:29) and Edith Chelimo (65:52). Alex Korio Oloitiptit (58:51) leads a men’s half field with Olympic silver medalist Feyisa Lelisa, Callum Hawkins, Stephen Sambu, Diego Estrada, Sam Chelanga, Luke Puskedra and Bernard Lagat. In the men’s marathon, defending champ Dominic Ondoro takes on Bazu Worku (2:05:25) while last year’s women’s half winner Veronicah Nyaruai Wanjiru makes her marathon debut against Mamitu Daska (2:21:59).
• January 26: Some Great Races Set For Dr. Sander Invitational (Formerly Armory Invy) With Clayton Murphy Vs. Robby Andrews In The 800 And Kate Grace And Lauren Johnson In The Mile Craig Engels is in the men’s mile and Ajee Wilson and Charlene Lipsey in the women’s 800. Courtney Okolo leads the sprints, Ryan Whiting the throws and NCAA champs Karissa Schweizer and Ariana Washington are also competing.
• February 3: Genzebe Dibaba Returns To The Meeting Karlsruhe 1,500 To Take On German Mid-D Stars Konstanze Klosterhalfen And Gesa Felicitas Krause Dibaba set the indoor WR at 3:55.17 at this meet four years ago.
• February 6: World 1,500 Champ Elijah Manangoi And World PV Champ Sam Kendricks Added To Fields For The Dusseldorf Indoor Meet The men’s 800, meanwhile, has World silver and bronze medalists Adam Kszczot and Kipyegon Bett.

2017 Is Over

• Who Were the Most USADA Drug-Tested Runners of 2017? Galen Rupp topped the list at 16 times while Shalane Flanagan and Ajee Wilson were the most tested females with 12 tests.
• Interesting: Toni Reavis – Marathoning 2017 By The Numbers Reavis compares the number of sub-2:10s since 2010 and breaks them down by country. At a glance, besides Eliud Kipchoge‘s 2:00:25, it looks like the marathon has hit a bit of a plateau.
• IAAF 2017 End-Of-Year Sprints Review Usain Bolt bombed, Wayde Van Niekerk delivered while Tori Bowie and Dafne Schippers impressed for the women.
• 2017 Diamond League Review – Part 1 Highlights from Doha through Paris. *Part 2 DL Review Lausanne through Brussels.

The World’s Biggest XC Fan

LRC Meet Mr. Cross-Country, The Sport’s Biggest Fan Cross-country’s biggest fan, Michael Mahon, resides in Massachusetts, where for the past 33 years he has traveled to over 1,747 career meets, bag of cans in tow. And he doesn’t plan on stopping anytime soon.
*Michael Mahon – Mr. Cross-Country – Share Your Favorite Story Here