March 17, 2018 Homepage Archive

Where Your Dreams Become Reality

Archived Homepage For March 17, 2018

Quote Of The Day

“They told me my two biggest rivals (Malcolm Richards and Brian Harvey) were coming after they had finally convinced me to do this again. I really want to defend the record, but it’s quite uncertain. … There is even the possibility of being lapped by them if things don’t go well. But I’ll do my best to prevent something that humiliating from happening.”

– Chris Zablocki talking about his expectations ahead of today’s Armory NYC Indoor Marathon. We think it’s fine if he gets lapped, as long as he comes back to win it.

Meet The Guy Who Outkicked Justyn Knight At NCAAs

LRC How Andy Trouard Went From Northern Arizona’s #4 Man In Cross-Country To A National Champion On The Track A couple of years ago, the odds were pretty high that Andy Trouard wouldn’t even be a runner right now – he was planning on becoming a triathlete. Now he’s the NCAA 3,000-meter champion. Here’s how it happened.
*MB: NCAA Champ Andy Trouard sticks out tongue on last turn of 3k and nearly falls

Bonus Material: Podcast With NAU Coach Mike Smith: The Rise Of Andy Trouard And Why You Should Embrace The Hurt In A 5K

Week That Was

LRC WTW: Proof That US Women Benefit From African Sexism, Insight On DQs At Worlds, Runner Triathletes, NCAA Mid-D Performance Of Week Was From “Baby Nats” It’s been an incredible last two weeks and we try to make sense of it all, whether it’s 2018 NCAAs, 2018 World Indoors or the end of Rod Dixon‘s near 45-year-old Kiwi Marathon record.

Distance News

Good Read:Toni Reavis Takes A Historical Look At Men’s Half Marathon Performances After Galen Rupp’s 59:47 Some interesting stats are that there has been 366 sub-60 half marathon performances, but only 9 of them are non-African and only 6 of them came before 2000.
Alberto Salazar Says That Wind And Hills Nullified Any Advantage Galen Rupp Got From The Elevation Drop In Rome Salazar also thinks that Jordan Hasay is ready to break 2:20 at Boston if the conditions are right.
Emily Infeld Tells The Story Behind Her Shocked Photo After Nipping Molly Huddle For World 10,000m Bronze In 2015 Infeld: “This image makes me smile. Without doubt it is the biggest moment of my career and a defining moment for me in the sport.”
Interesting Stats And Analysis From World Indoors All the distance races had splits for every 100m for every athlete. Turns out that Drew Windle had the fastest final lap (25.01) in the 800; even faster than winner Adam Kszczot.

Olympic / Paralympic News

IPC President Andrew Parsons Pays Tribute To The Late Stephen Hawking “He embodied the word ability more than anyone. In the Paralympic Movement we always say that Para-athletes see challenges as opportunities to do things differently. Although not a Para-athlete, Hawking did just that …”
*MB: RIP Stephen Hawking
Opponents Of Denver’s Potential 2030 Olympic Bid Claim The City Should Hold A Public Referendum
Pyeongchang Paralympics Sets New Record For Ticket Sales They sold 320,531 tickets, passing the mark set at Sochi 2014 four years ago.

The World Half Champs Are Next Saturday

Geoffrey Kamworor Will Go For His Third Consecutive World Half Marathon Title, But Interestingly His First Happened By “Accident” Kamworor only decided run the 2014 World Half Champs after a disappointing 6th place finish at the Tokyo Marathon. He bounced back only 5 weeks later to beat WR holder Zersenay Tadese.
Kenya’s World Half Silver Medalist Bedan Karoki Pulls Out Of World Half Champs Due To A Hamstring Injury Karoki ran 58:42 to win the RAK Half last month.
Japan’s Miyuki Uehara Withdraws From World Half Team Due To Achilles Injury

Sunday Action

IAAF Recap: Galen Rupp Runs 59:47 FTW At Huawei Rome-Ostia Half Marathon Rupp won by 57 seconds on the point-to-point course after going out very hard – 59:24 pace at 10k. Ethiopia’s Haftamenesh Tesfay Haylu (69:02) won the women’s race.
*MB: Rupp Wins — 59:47 in Rome
Ethiopia’s Two-Time 1,500m Olympian Meskerem Assefa Comes From Behind To Win Nagoya Marathon In 2:21:45 Kenya’s Valary Jemeli was runner-up (2:22:48) as Japan’s 22-year-old Hanami Sekine was 3rd in a 2:23:07 debut.
Kenyans Anthony Maritim (2:08:08) And Ruth Chebitok (2:25:49) Win Barcelona Marathon
Kenya’s Erick Kiptanui (60:05) And Ethiopia’s Etagegn Woldu (71:27) Beat The Wind And Rain To Win Lisbon Half The top 12 men went under 61 minutes.

NYC Half Is Sunday Watch if Live on Watch ESPN at 7:18 am ET Tracking / Results

MB: Official 2018 United Airlines NYC Half Live Discussion Thread – Race is at 7:18 am ET on Sunday on ESPN3

LRC A Reinvigorated Dathan Ritzenhein Talks NYC Half, Hansons-Brooks, L-Carnitine, And His Upcoming Return To The Marathon We also talked to Emily Sisson about her goals for Sunday’s race and when will she make her marathon debut.
RRW After Eight Month Layoff, Liz Costello Returns to Racing at NYC Half The Princeton alum briefly retired in 2014 but is now enjoying herself as a member of Mark Coogan’s Team New Balance Boston squad.
Blockbuster Fields Set For 2018 NYC Half Marathon: 2016 Champion Stephen Sambu Faces Dathan Ritzenhein, Wilson Chebet (59:15), Chris Derrick, Abdi Abdirahman, Shadrack Biwott The women’s race has last year’s runner-up Emily Sisson, Vivian Cheruiyot, Desi Linden, Mamitu Daska (66:28), Buze Diriba (66:50), Betsy Saina, Aliphine Tuliamuk and Allie Kieffer.

More NYC Action: Malcolm Richards (2:19:01) and Lindsey Scherf (2:40:55) Break Indoor Marathon World Records Chris Zablocki, who had the men’s record, only managed a 2:29:13.
*MB: New indoor marathon world records set – 2:19:01 and 2:40:55

Sprint Stuff

Andre De Grasse Pulls Out Of Next Month’s Commonwealth Games De Grasse said he is healthy, but not at 100% fitness and wants to focus on getting ready for outdoor season.
USA’s World Indoor 60m Bronze Medalist Ronnie Baker Talks About The High And Low Of His Career, Both Of Which Happened IN 2017 Last year Baker won the 100m at Pre Classic, but strained his hamstring at USAs and didn’t make the final.
GB World 4 X 100 Silver Medalist Dina Asher-Smith Talks About Her Love For Sprinting Asher-Smith actually started off as a cross-country runner and finished 5th out of 300-400 runners in her first race.
USATF Domestic Relay Program Starts Next Weekend At The Prairie View Relays In Texas The program will help prepare potential USA relay runners for the USA vs. World race at Penn Relays.

Random But Interesting

Mo Farah And Usain Bolt To Go Head To Head … But Not On The Track Bolt and Farah are going to play for opposing teams at the Unicef charity soccer game in June.
Building On Nike Campus Dedicated To Seb Coe
Athletics South Africa Sponsor Puma Denies It Had Anything To Do With Logo Controversy At South African Meet Last Week Some athletes including Justin Gatlin, Caster Semenya and Akani Simbine had to cover their uniform logos with tape.
Following Backlash, Strava Changes Heat Map Privacy Settings So It Is Easier For Users To Opt Out This follows reports that Strava’s global heat maps revealed sensitive military information.
*MB:WAPO: “U.S. Soldiers are revealing sensitive and dangerous information by jogging”
*MB:STRAVA no longer showing All Segments…

Post-NCAA Champs Updates

2018 NCAA DI Program Of The Year (Best Team XC, Indoor And Outdoor) Standings Post-Indoor Update NAU is just ahead of Arkansas and Oregon on the men’s side while Oregon is only just beating New Mexico and Stanford for the women.
Post-NCAAs Women’s Bowerman Watch List Southern California‘s Kendall Ellis, LSU‘s Aleia Hobbs and Harvard‘s Gabby Thomas were added to the list after they each set collegiate records at NCAAs.
Michael Norman And Karissa Schweizer Are National Indoor Track Athletes Of The Year Heptathlete Tim Duckworth and triple jumper Keturah Orji were the field athletes of the year.
List Of 2018 NCAA DI Indoor T&F All-Americans

Bucket List Alert: This Might Be Your Last Chance To See A Meet At “Historic” Hayward Field

The Oregonian:Ducks Get Ready For Final Season At Current Hayward Field There will be just two regular season meets, then NCAAs and with specific construction plans unknown, that could be it for the current version of Hayward Field.

Mid-D / XC

Drew Windle Looking Forward To Getting More Racing Opportunities Now That He’s A World Silver Medalist “There is a lot of politics in the sport to get into better meets. … Having a silver medal, it’s kind of hard to argue not putting me into better meets.”
Sarah Healy Makes History With Dominant Irish XC Champs Victory She became the first athlete to ever win minor, junior, intermediate and senior cross-country titles.
Baylor Lariat:Roger Bannister’s Legacy Lives In Baylor Track Community Even without ever meeting him, coaches and athletes throughout the world are mourning the loss of legend and role model Bannister.
Another Nice Tribute To Roger Bannister In The Independent

News From South Africa

Caster Semenya And Sprinter Akani Simbine Will Highlight At South African Champs Starting Thursday Semenya will compete in both the 800 and 1,500.
Wayde Van Niekerk At “Positive Stage” Of Healing From Surgery “Rehabilitation is going very well. We are in the positive stage now and I am looking forward to the process of working towards the upcoming season.”
South African Triathlete Who Almost Had His Legs Sawed Off Vows To Return To Competing Our thoughts and prayers are with Mhlengi Gwala. At this point doctors still are trying to save his legs and are concerned about the level of nerve damage. *Crowdfunding Page Raises More Than $63,000 For Mhlengi Gwala’s Recovery You can contribute here.
*If You Missed The Original Story:SA Triathlete Mhlengi Gwala In Hospital After Gang Tries To Saw Off His Legs Thankfully the saw was too blunt to cut through Gwala’s legs and he was able to crawl to the road for help. The motive for the attack is a mystery as the gang didn’t take his phone, wallet or bike.
*MB: Three men attempt to saw off legs of South African triathlete

More Sunday Road Action

Yuki Kawauchi Going For The Course Record At The New Taipei City Marathon Two years ago Kawauchi finished second in 2:14:12 as William Chebor set the record at 2:13:05. Women’s CR holder Kim Ji Hiyang (2:28:06 PR) leads the women’s field against Kenya’s Rael Kiyara Kguriatukei (2:25:23).
Marius Kimutai (2:05:47) Is On A Three-Race Winning Streak, But Will Face Three Time Champion Erupe Loyanae (2:05:37) And Deribe Robi (2:05:58) At The Seol Marathon Margaret Agai (2:25:52) and Mulu Seboka (2:21:56 from 2014) lead the women’s race.
Defending Champ Hillary Maiyo (61:05) And Two-Time Runner-Up Christine Oigo (71:32) Lead The Fields For The Gdynia Half Marathon

Marathon On The Track

The Armory NYC Indoor Marathon Is Tomorrow At Noon They will be hoping to break the indoor marathon WR for the third straight year. The fields are led by defending champ and current WR holder Chris Zablocki (2:21:48 indoor) and Lindsey Scherf (2:32:19 outdoor PR). The women’s record is held by Finland’s Laura Manninen (2:42.30).
Recommended Read: NY Times Profile:“Is Chris Zablocki The Best Extreme Marathoner?” Zablocki has a 2:13 PR while taking on a “Yuki Kawauchi-type” racing schedule with 47 marathons (and 19 wins) in the last seven years. The article includes a quote from LRC’s Jon Gault, who profiled Zablocki back in 2016 and called him “the most interesting man in running.”
Armory NYC Indoor Marathon Story Lines Zablocki faces rivals Malcolm Richards (2:13 PR) and Brian Harvey (2:17 PR). $7,000 prize money goes to the winner if they break the record.

Mid-Week Results

20-Year-Old Clarence Munyai Breaks Wayde Van Niekerk’s South African 200m National Record The Under-20 Africa champ and Rio Olympian ran 19.69 to break van Niekerk’s previous mark of 19.84.
Japan Sweeps Team Titles; China Gets Individual Wins At Asian XC Champs In Guiyang China

From The Weekend

GB’s Laura Weightman Wins Podium 5K In The UK In 15:25 The time moved her to 4th on the UK all-time list.
2018 USATF Hershey National Youth Indoor Champs Come To A Close With 29 Meet Records

Assorted Other News

Usain Bolt Has A Line Of Hot Sauces Available In Australia Usain’s Insane Hot Sauces come in three flavors and are inspired by a Bolt family recipe.
Irish Hurdler Thomas Barr Welcomes IAAF Decision To End “Ridiculous” National Swapping “If I was to move away to a different country for a year, I wouldn’t think I was French or German just because I was living there for a short period of time. It was a little bit ridiculous that it could happen overnight.”
BBC:UK Anti-Doping Tells Athletes Not To Refuse Tests Even If Testers Are Using Discontinued Sample Bottles This seems obvious, but maybe they don’t want athletes trying to use that as an excuse to evade a test.
Trail Runners Find Abandoned Puppies On Barkley Marathons Course The pups were rescued and taken to an animal shelter and one was adopted and named Barkley.

He Already Was The XC Coach Of The Year …

LRC Portland Coach Rob Conner Sends Free T-Shirts To His Supporters On LetsRun.com Coach Conner looked up the guys who backed the Pilots in the Running Warehouse Prediction Contest and sent them free T-shirts. Pretty cool.