Matthew Centrowitz Goes On Twitter To Say “I’ll be racing in the outdoor season as normal.” And Deny “Ugly Rumors”
by LetsRun.com
March 3, 2014
Two-time World Championships 1,500 medalist Matthew Centrowitz today went to twitter to “dispel any ugly rumors as to why I missed a few races.” He said he missed the indoor season due to “illness” and “I will be racing in the outdoor season as normal.”
Happy to say that I’m back running again after missing the indoor season due to illness….. (more)
— Matthew Centrowitz (@MattCentrowitz) March 3, 2014
…I would like to categorically dispel any ugly rumors as to why I missed a few races. I will be racing in the outdoor season as normal.
— Matthew Centrowitz (@MattCentrowitz) March 3, 2014
The Oregonian’s Ken Goe on February 3rd had reported coach Alberto Salazar told him Centro’s indoor season was over because of a lingering viral illness.
While Matt did not say what the rumors were, LetsRun.com heard a rumor offline in the middle of last week that Centrowitz wasn’t running indoors because he might have tested positive. That rumor had really been picking up steam in the last few days. We first heard about it on Wednesday. By the weekend, it was all over the place. Former Nike Oregon Project assistant coach Steve Magness told us yesterday that a reporter from a major US newspaper tracked him down when he was in New York for the Conference USA meet to ask him about the rumor in person and said lots of people were talking about it at the meet. He told the reporter he knew nothing about it. LetsRun.com knows of at least three other reporters besides ourselves who heard something similar and looked into this and found nothing to report.
No news and Matt’s tweets are good news for fans of American distance running.
The off-line chatter ended up on a lengthy unsubstantiated thread on the LetsRun.com message board on Saturday which now has more than 375 posts.
Matthew Centrowitz celebrates his 2011 world championship medal
Before Centrowitz’s tweet came out this afternoon, we reached out to Centrowitz’s agent Ricky Simms and asked him or Matt for a comment. We’ll let you know if we hear anything back from Simms.
Update: We’ve heard back from Ricky Simms. He wrote, “Matthew put out a statement earlier this evening. This story was completely fabricated. It would be appreciated if you could remove the post from your website.”
Before Ricky wrote, LRC’s Weldon Johnson posted here why LetsRun.com allows such unsubstantiated threads to be discussed on our forums and why we think it leads to a cleaner sport.
More: Messageboard: CENTRO!!!!! CENTRO!!! CENTRO!!!!!!
*MB: Centro dismisses ugly rumors
LRC note: This article was initially published without the Magness or Simms information.