NYRR are crybabies

Gotcha. Wittenberg is (understandably) myopic. She just doesn't seem too self-aware and should shut her yap about it and turn the page.

The sponsorship issues actually have nothing to do with USATF and everything to do with USOC. None of the trials sponsors can conflict with any USOC sponsor, period. You can blame USATF for a lot of things, but preventing certain sponsors from the trials is not one of them.

Even Rojo is guilty of ignoring the subject.

1. Does NYRR invest a ton of $$$ in American Distance Running. YES but this has nothing to do with the crying.

2. Does USOC interfere with allowing a LOC to recoup its investment? YES. It does this for everyone. Houston has the same restrictions. So why is NY crying?

BECAUSE THEY LOST.

Read the SUBJECT line wrote:

Even Rojo is guilty of ignoring the subject.

1. Does NYRR invest a ton of $$$ in American Distance Running. YES but this has nothing to do with the crying.

2. Does USOC interfere with allowing a LOC to recoup its investment? YES. It does this for everyone. Houston has the same restrictions. So why is NY crying?

BECAUSE THEY LOST.

_________________________

OK, so now what? I'll tell you what. Wittenberg has forever damaged her rep and that of NYRR. Now, a large postion of the running community will look at her whining and low blows and see her in a new light. Not a good one.

I find it ironic that Mary cries for the athlete that will be missing a payday by running the trials in January. She makes it sound like her #1 concern is the athlete and their income. REALLY? You lost the bid because someone else was willing to pay the athletes more money. It looks like Houston was more interested in the athletes income.

and since the NYRR are a NON PROFIT (just a tax loophole) then you can still donate that money to all of the athletes. Afterall, it is all about what is best for the athletes and as a NON PROFIT you have to use that cash on something.

BINGO !!! wrote:

Hello people !

DD hit the nail right on the head here! everything else is backstory.

I'm glad BINGO picked up on this. There is a fundamental problem with the whole Trials property, which is owned by the USOC (USATF simply governs which LOC can rent it). The NYRR actually wanted to hold the Women's Trials IN PLACE OF their all-women's race of the ING NYC Marathon, and were willing to tell international women that they couldn't compete in New York for a year. They could fund that easily out of the regular marathon budget, it would be in national and global TV (NBC is already the Olympic broadcaster), and would have the higheset prize money of any Olympic Trials ever. It would be absolutely spectacular.

But the USOC said "no" because of the sponsorship conflicts between Bank of America and ING. New York offered to do a very early start, cover signs, nearly anything to make it work. "No" was still the answer.

BTW, the Bank of America Chicago Marathon could hold the Trials easily because they have BofA and Nike as sponsors (no USOC conflicts there). They have no interest and don't want to spend the money.

Houston now has a new problem because BP was signed as the USOC energy sponsor during the Vancouver Olympics, a direct conflict with Chevron. So, they'll have to rely on the government money which backed their bid. Chevron signage can't appear anywhere near the Trials.

DD

So what? Mary knew all of those things and still wanted the trials. All of the NYRR apologists are telling us how rotten the entire process is and I agree but MARY STILL WANTED THE TRIALS and is crying about not receiving them. That is the issue here.

And how would that work out for the WMM? And why wouldn't it be overshadowed by the concurrent men's race, which presumably would be open to top international runners?

So be it. You say "problem," but really it is just the cost of doing business with the USOC. Nobody should be foolish enough to ever believe that anyone other than the USOC will make a profit from a USOC event. The USOC isn't surviving on hugs and kisses, it's absolutely right to look out for its sponsorship interests and protect its brand fiercely. I'm no USOC/IOC fan, but I do at least recognize this unshakable reality. Couch it as "losing money," yet no doubt the Houston folks see it as an investment in marketing their city and its ability to host major events while NYC must not and understandably so. It's great that NYC hosted the OT once, yet it's not clear that it really belongs there and wouldn't thrive as well or better elsewhere, especially when Houston blew them out of the water in terms of innovation with a bid for both OT marathons. We should really be glad that, given the somewhat recent context of Pittburgh and Columbia, we now have big time bids like Houston that are willing to go above and beyond even what Boston and NYC would be willing to offer. This is a good thing for the sport, at least for now.

I'm sure Houston will put on a great trials and I can't fault Logan for accepting their bid when they offered the most money but this bashing of Mary is ridiculous. She's done more for distance running in this country in the past 5 years than anyone else save for arguably a couple of athletes and coaches.

Mary W has done an excellent job of taking care of her employer. The NYRR. Any investment in American distance running is only if it works in the best interest of the NYRR. That is not a bad thing, but it is a fact. Please don't act like she had any major part in the recent increase in American marathoning. That credit goes to Hansons and Vigil and Larsen and all of their athletes. Even letsrun has been a larger factor than Mary W They were all making investments when nothing was there. Mary has simply responded to others investments. She has a PR machine that has made her out to be a larger factor than she is. The irony is that this same PR machine has not been able to shut her up over this Olympic Trials issue.

Right, altruism doesn't exist in reality. Seems like a typical liberal response to laud the person who publicly throws money around. The Hansons have invested plenty of their own money into the sport (what fraction of her own income or savings has Wittenberg invested into the sport?) and have done more for the development of elite marathoners than anyone else in recent history, though what Vigil/Larsen/Mahon have done with Kastor, Meb, and Hall is also right up there, and all that would have happened without NYRR's input. The big turnaround was happening in 2004, despite what credit NYRR and Wittenberg (among many others) might try to claim. Wittenberg came along soon after and tried to buy into the success that others built, and the Hansons smartly told her no thanks.

Gosh, I know we're all happy to be on this message board, but to suggest letsrun has done more to advance marathoning than Mary W is quite simply preposterous.

How many millions of dollars has NYRR paid in appearance fees and prize money to athletes over the past 5 years? It's not like the NYCM needs to attract the top professional runners in order to get 40,000 joggers to drop $200 each -- those penguins are going to do the NYCM whether or not KG or Meb are there and being paid 6 figures. If MW were seeking to maximize profits at the NYRR, she never would pay millions to the professional runners at the NYCM. To claim that she has had little impact on promoting American running at the highest levels is delusional at best.

hardset nipples wrote:

So be it. You say "problem," but really it is just the cost of doing business with the USOC.

Other sports have gotten around this problem, and pushed back on the USOC because their NGBs were richer and had stronger sponsors than USATF's. There is no rule that the Olympic team selection event has to be called "Olympic Trials." Figure skating just uses a national championship to select their Olympic teams, so the federation and the LOC are free to contract with any sponsors they want. Fans call it the Olympic Trials, anyway, because that's what it is.

USATF could do this, too, allowing the Olympic "Trials" to be held anywhere without the sponsorship restrictions. However, they are so dependent on the USOC for funding their day-to-day operations they won't do it. Their own sponsors don't provide enough money to run the Federation and they are very dependent on USOC money.

Yes, it's all politics/business...

DD

So if many of us are so up in arms about rotating sites around for the marathon trials, why does everyone sit tight when Eugene, OR gets awarded the 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012 USATF National Championships and/or US Olympic Trials? These sites should be moved around too, for promotion of a unilateral growth of the sport. Plus it diminishes a corrupt, Mafia-esque (NIKE) centralization of influence via location.

Bringing in top runners is about marketing the race and its title sponsor to MILLIONS across the nation and across the world, it's not about drawing in thousands of hobbyjoggers. NYCM probably does not break even on entry fees. Learn the business of the sport.

Did they do this in hopes of getting something back like the trials? Or did they do this to help american distance runners? If you do something in hopes of getting something in return when what you are doing is not return enough then you deserve not to get what you ultimately want!

Mary wanted the Trials because stuff like that is why she does the job that she does - what major race director would NOT want to put on the trials? Mary loves elite athletes, almost too much. She is hugely disappointed and I don't blame her in the least bit.

And she is right. NYRR has to cap their local races because there are so many runners in NYC. And a huge chunk of those penguins were in Central Park watching the Trials in 2007. It was amazing. Boston was similarly packed with spectators, though not quite as dense as NY. No other city can pull that off. Isn't Texas one of top-3 fattest states in the country? Do you think a bunch of skinny running dweebs are going to draw any media attention or a crowds?

NY had the Trials start on the Today Show. How does Houston compete with that for exposure?

Mary is right in every aspect, no one can match the exposure that NYC can provide.

arsenio hall wrote:

So if many of us are so up in arms about rotating sites around for the marathon trials, why does everyone sit tight when Eugene, OR gets awarded the 2008, 2009, 2011, 2012 USATF National Championships and/or US Olympic Trials? These sites should be moved around too, for promotion of a unilateral growth of the sport. Plus it diminishes a corrupt, Mafia-esque (NIKE) centralization of influence via location.

I agree and that topic has been covered in other threads here previously.