What happened to the University of Guelph womens program?

Rochus you know enough people involved in the sport to know at least some of the cheating Speed River has done over the years, as well as the high injury and departure rate for their women. To see you act as a PR rep for them recently is disappointing.

You say why would you speak to someone who has been dealing with injuries for years if it was a PR series... And yet there was no questions asked about those injuries such as "do you feel you were overtraining" "what do you think contributed to those injuries" etc etc.

In that interview Heather kept mentioning how she'd be out for several months (in some cases up to 8), and would then start training "focusing on nationals" and get hurt again. You didn't think this merited a question/comment/follow-up? If you've consistently been hurt more than healthy - should nationals really be your focus? Should it not be get a year+ of healthy training under your belt? And who is making the decisions on whether such an athlete should be focusing on nationals? Is it a coach, or self-driven..

You know, the sorts of questions a journalist might ask.

The podcasts are very good and they are an effective way to promote the best the sport has to offer. Your work is excellent, and your efforts are appreciated. Thank you.

Any top program has critics and we are seeing a few take advantage of the free and open access the internet message board environment offers. Meanwhile Guelph keeps rolling and both men's and women's track teams are ranked #1 in Canada. Roll Guelph.

Are you bear scout? wrote:

I noticed the title change as well, yikes. If you are or know Bear Scout, can you confirm that here by specifying that you have attempted to change back to your original thread title of Speed River Exodus.

Yes, I'm Bear Scout on Trackie (it started out as a parody account of AUS Scout but now I take it seriously). I've changed the title at least three times now and Trackie has always quietly changed it within a few hours. The reason I brought it up here instead of on that forum is that I have a strange feeling the mods would delete anything I say about it.

I emailed the mods the other day on the email they give out when they make changes, asking why they changed the thread title. I haven't heard back. #SecretSociety

Let's say they are both very good coaches and leave it at that.

Oua pryfe wrote:

not a gryph wrote:

Didn't go to Guelph but this rumour has persisted for years. I wonder how much truth there is to it.

The most recent incidents are related to an assistant coach, likely a different coach then the one you heard previous stories about years ago.

Years ago = 2004-2005

Copying my Trackie post here, in case it is changed or removed.

The OP has posted on Letsrun that Trackie moderators have repeatedly changed the original thread title of 'Speed River Exodus?' to remove the word 'Exodus', after which he or she changed it back to the original title, and then a Trackie mod again changed the title. The moderator note earlier in this thread provides zero explanation, admitting that one of the moderators changed the thread title without even knowing the justification for doing so.

I haven't seen anything in this thread or the original title of 'Speed River Exodus?' that violates the forum rules. The moderator note makes no mention of a violation of any forum guidelines. While it's not the most positive topic, the discussion has been more civil than many other threads on here. Discussing our sport sometimes includes talking about athletes that dope, people that cheat the system, or those that quit the sport; it only follows that groups like Speed River will be discussed in forums. Using the word 'exodus' to describe a large number of distance runners leaving Speed River in recent years is the correct usage of the word, just as describing Justin Gatlin as a convicted drug cheat is accurate and although negative, something that people are going to attribute to that individual when discussing him.

All this to say that Trackie mods appear to be attempting to control or influence the dialogue, or perception thereof, with the repeated changing of the thread title without justification. That they are attempting to do so for a club that is currently spending thousands of dollars on promotional videos to boost, or perhaps repair, their reputation is beyond mere coincidence and reflects poorly on the Trackie moderation.

They own the website and may be wrestling with how to keep an open forum that doesn't descend into a cesspool of baseless attacks on good programs and people. They are losing their audience as negativity becomes the norm on internet forums. As a form of social expression and interaction many people are choosing to stay away from internet forums. This thread is just one example of why they are departing.

The mods may not feel using a word like "exodus" accurately reflects the program. The university in question has won 12 of the last 13 USport University National titles. This past season they finished a close 5th and the distance runners are part of the #1 ranked track team indoors. It's not fair to say there is an exodus going on with the program and the people who own the forum are taking the word off the website. So what.

There is no place for this thoughtful write up backed up with facts. Please refrain from posting stuff like this in the future.

Possible justification wrote:

The mods may not feel using a word like "exodus" accurately reflects the program. The university in question has won 12 of the last 13 USport University National titles. This past season they finished a close 5th and the distance runners are part of the #1 ranked track team indoors. It's not fair to say there is an exodus going on with the program and the people who own the forum are taking the word off the website. So what.

Bruh, have you even read the Trackie thread? It's about the Speed River track club, not the university. The OP even specifically said "post-collegiates".

Statistics about the local university cross country or indoor track and field team are unrelated to the Speed River Exodus thread, which was about the departure of many post-collegiate distance runners from the Speed River Track Club.

Whether or not it is fair to call this an exodus hinges upon the number of post-collegiate distance runners leaving the Speed River club. If a large number of these runners left the club, which they did, but some of the remaining runners experienced success, which some did, that success wouldn't change the accuracy or fairness of applying the word 'exodus' to the large number of departures. Just because you do not like the use of or do not understand the definition of certain words doesn't make it unfair for other people to use them.

Trent just wants everyone to know that this is not his fault and his wife is awesome. Why can't all athletes be like his wife? The world is so unfair.

I for one would like to have more transparency as to who the mods are on Trackie. Previously, when the Canadian track forum was based on other web pages, it was quite clear who the mods were (they were either listed on the front page and/or identified alongside their posts, similar to Letsrun).

I have an official account (under my real name), but often post anonymously. I do so not because I am ashamed/trying to be a dick, but because on occasion I worry about the repercussions of making certain statements under my real name. Canadian track is small and prone to pettiness/drama... since I still compete, I can't afford to be blacklisted by certain coaches or groups because they didn't like what I said (even if it is true).

Because of this, it makes me a bit uncomfortable posting some types of info as I don't know who the mods are. Whoever the mods are, they can almost certainly tell exactly who I am based on IP/geo-location. I don't like to not know who is privy to being able to more or less completely identify me. I think this hurts the discussion to some extent, because some people (like myself) are leery of contributing freely and topics become one-sided/poorly informed.

A good example of this is the Speed River thread. It would be good to have some former athletes go on there and discuss the merits/pitfalls of the program, or provide some more factual context to some of what has been said. They're probably not going to do that the way the board is currently set up.

Have you considered that the people who volunteer their time to moderate Trackie might also want to remain anonymous, for similar reasons to what you've stated - and partly because the posters are allowed to post anonymously - and would stop volunteering if Adam was going to 'out' them? And if Adam didn't have volunteer moderators, he might very well remove the option to post anonymously, due to anonymous posters requesting that the anonymous moderators be outed.

Metric Assassin wrote:

Have you considered that the people who volunteer their time to moderate Trackie might also want to remain anonymous, for similar reasons to what you've stated - and partly because the posters are allowed to post anonymously - and would stop volunteering if Adam was going to 'out' them? And if Adam didn't have volunteer moderators, he might very well remove the option to post anonymously, due to anonymous posters requesting that the anonymous moderators be outed.

I am not sure why a moderator should want/need to remain anonymous for simply enforcing the fairly simple forum rules, especially when they are not identified for their specific actions. Their vulnerability is quite low; are they really going to be suffer significantly in a professional capacity for being among the several humans who might have removed a post that contained some swear words or obvious libel? Almost certainly not, unless they've signed up to be a mod for more spurious reasons (keep tabs on people, have control over what info is public).

I am not objecting to volunteer moderators, I am suggesting that it might be helpful to list the current roster of mods by username or real name as appropriate. This is common on every forum I have ever used (Letsrun, TnFNorth, Milesplit, Reddit, to name a few) . If you are not comfortable having your [user]name tacked on to the position of power that you wield, then you are likely not wielding that power in a responsible, ethical manner (or you are incompetent at your job).

I do think there are some issues with accountability/consistency with some of the current moderation, which might be improved by some kind of identification (right now, I would presume Adam gets all the blame when there are issues with moderation, which is unfair). The lack of knowledge of who is moderating (and thus, privy to certain info that might be identifying) negates the true purpose of allowing anon posting - to give people the ability to speak freely. If you want non-sh*tpost content from anon users, you need to give users some idea of who the audience they're speaking directly to is.

cowardly_CANon, if the moderators don't need anonymity, because all they are doing is removing some swear words or obvious libel, then their identity wouldn't matter to you. I really doubt Adam gave the volunteer mods access to IP info, which they don't need to do their job; he could handle that, if it was ever necessary. You could always just email him and ask, he's a nice guy!

Not sure if anyone noticed this, but the mods just got rid of a bunch of recent posts from the "Question for Oldster" thread, and then locked it. The one post I remember from that thread that was deleted was someone mentioning how that thread and the Guelph one are being mentioned on this Letsrun thread.

BTW I emailed the mods a few days ago about the Exodus title change and STILL haven't heard back.

#TrackieSecretSociety

Track Mods Where You At? wrote:

Not sure if anyone noticed this, but the mods just got rid of a bunch of recent posts from the "Question for Oldster" thread, and then locked it. The one post I remember from that thread that was deleted was someone mentioning how that thread and the Guelph one are being mentioned on this Letsrun thread.

BTW I emailed the mods a few days ago about the Exodus title change and STILL haven't heard back.

#TrackieSecretSociety

My Trackie posts about the Speed River Exodus title change haven't been touched at all by moderators, so they're not removing all mention of this letsrun thread or the original Speed River Exodus title. The simplest explanation is that someone from Guelph emailed the head guy at Trackie asking him to change the title. Looks like that wasn't communicated to at least one of the moderators, as evidenced by the note:

PRIVATE MESSAGE from Moderator:

I changed it the second time after seeing the first note. Was the first time due to a complaint?

If the mods aren't emailing you back, that could be because they don't know the original reason that Exodus was removed from the title by Adam Stacey and are just following his instructions. As for the Question for Oldster thread, obviously that should have been locked or deleted, based on the forum guidelines.

The indoor track season is starting to heat up, so there are likely results from members of the U. of Guelph women's XC team relevant to this thread. Hopefully those women are doing well. Has Petrick raced much indoors this season? How about Yungblut or the top recruits mentioned earlier in this thread, how are they coming along?