3:40 PM EST Friday

Who is the best in the world? "Technically, I think it's Tyson Gay."

- UK 100m champion Simeon Williamson. Gay's 9.77 world-leading time will be tested by Usain Bolt as "Bolt Mania" strikes Paris on Friday.

LRC: Golden League Paris Recap *Results Paris was a great meet highlighted by Bernard Lagat squaring off with Kenenisa Bekele in the 3,000m, where the Ethiopian showed he's just too strong off a fast pace. Other remarkable performances came from Sanya Richards, Usain Bolt and the surprises of the meet Anna Willard and Dexter Faulk. There's much more to talk about so read our recap, see the photos and watch video of the top races. *Official LRC Thread Here *Video of Willard's Win, Bolt's 9.77 *Flotrack Interviews including Khadevis Robinson.
*Bolt Sends Out Worlds Warning With Stormy 9.79 *"It Was Like Flying" Says Bolt
*Kerron Stewart Very Confident As Win Streak Continues Stewart has been as dominant as Bolt lately but nobody seems to notice.
*Great Article On USA's Dexter Faulk As He Gets The Biggest Hurdles Win Of His Career One of the best stories of the summer is the emergence of Dexter Faulk.
*Wariner Finding Form Again Thanks To Clyde Hart Will Coach Hart mentor the men's and women's 400m champion in Berlin this summer? It hinges on Wariner getting fitter.

Super Sanya And The Women's 400m

Sanya Richards won in Paris by over a second and looks unbeatable. Even more impressive is her career record 37th sub-50 clocking. Still only 24, she broke a tie with Marita Koch of East Germany, whom you can read about here.
*Sanya Richards Not Taking Ohuruogu Or Jamaica's Shericka Williams Lightly For Worlds It's hard to believe Sanya Richards has broken 50 seconds more times than any woman in history, is only 24, yet has no international championships to her name. This year she might get the Golden Jackpot and Worlds individual gold.
Ohuruogu To Miss Paris AND London With Hamstring Injury We're used to Ohuruogu missing doping tests, but not the big meets.
*Olympic Champ Might Miss Berlin, Too

Leading Up To Paris
*Usain Bolt Ready To Put On Show in 100m In Paris
*UK's Simeon Williamson Coming Into His Own After British 100m Triumph, Races Bolt Friday
*Bolt Mania Has Struck Paris As Fans Eagerly Awaits Usain's 100m Performance
*Bolt Says His 19.59 Came Without Him Having Started Serious 200m Training
Distance News - 3k Bekele vs. Lagat At 3:05pm
*Women's 800 In Paris To Feature Americans Maggie Vessey, Hazel Clark, Anna Willard And Shannon Rowbury
*Frenchman Mekhissi-Benabbad Going For Sub-8 In Steeple In Paris He'll be rabbited perfectly at 8:00 pace and says he's confident he'll do it.
400m News
*Recommended Read: Jeremy Wariner To Run Paris 400m Great update on Jeremy Wariner from the IAAF as he readies for his first significant race in a long while.
*A Look At Sanya Richards And Jeremy Wariner Len Johnson of Runner's Tribe takes a look at two of the fastest quarter-milers in history.
*Ohuruogu Withdraws With Tight Hamstring The Olympic champion has no momentum in the 400m as Sanya Richards is light years ahead of her right now.
*HJ Loses Some Luster As Ariane Friedrich Withdraws The 24-year-old German beat Vlasic in Berlin.

21-Year-Old 4:08 1,500 Meter Runner Nikki Hamblin Switching Nationality From GBR To NZL

Kara Goucher To Use Rock 'n' Roll Half Marathon In Chicago On August 2nd As Final Prep For Worlds

Liu Xiang Now Training In Spikes

New World Jr Shot Put Record Set

Jordan McNamara Going For Sub 4 Thursday In Eugene link fixed

Athletics Kenya Conotinues To To Embarrass Assert Itself

1 Day Later: Agent Volker Wagner is Banned And As A Result Luke Kibet Can't Run in London Grand Prix

Athletics Kenya Drop Sammy Kitwara From Worlds Team For Running Peachtree 10k The Kenyan Federation runs itself like the US Federation did in the 1960s. In Kenya, or the US for that matter, it is crazy for an administrator to pretend they know better than the athlete and his coach what is best for the athlete's career. In today's era of professionalism, federations should have almost no power to tell athletes where to run. In case you've never heard of Kitwara, click here, he is having a breakout 2009 and the official LRC Best Runner You've Never Heard Of.
*Message Board Thread On Kitwara's Dropping

Gregory Konchellah Will Not Run For Kenyan Federation After They Get Upset He Entered European Meet This Past Week Without Their Permission The Kenyan brass seem to tip their hat on this one. Konchellah was trying to give up his Bahrain passport for a Kenyan one. Somehow the Kenyans act like because the guy entered a meet in Europe and they couldn't perhaps shake him down for some money that his days as a Kenyan are over.

LRC Report #2 From Ethiopia: Sihine Optimistic For 10k As Ethiopian Federation Is Excited About Chances For 1,500 & Steeple Success In 2009 Recently, the Ethiopians have ruled the 5k and 10k. In 2009, they are hoping to rule the 1,500 as well and maybe even add some hardware in the steeple.

Alberto's Crew

Athens *Results

Athens Recap: LaShawn Merritt Runs 44.54 (Wariner A No-Show), Asbel Kiprop Runs 1:43.48 As 3 Break 1:44, Yargelis Savigne Triple Jumps 15 Meters, Jamal Sub-4 Again The 2nd sub-1:44 clocking of the year for Kiprop. This meet was hyped as a Wariner-Merritt showdown at 400 but Wariner ran at an obscure Italian meet the day before, only clocking 45.74.
Message board thread mocking Wariner's 45.74 Americans Erin Donohue (4:05.21) and Sarah Bowman (4:05.67) both set PRs.

LetsRun.com Goes Global LRC's Ethiopian Correspondent: Double Olympic Champ Tirunesh Dibaba Back In Training - Optimistic About Chances In Berlin Yes, that's right. We now have an Ethiopian correspondent who periodically is going to give us insight on the stars from Ethiopia. In his first piece, he catches up with Dibaba at practice and also sees Sihine, Defar and others. Article + photos.

Saturday's Heusden KBC Nacht Meet Website Matt Tegenkamp will run the 5k, if he gets the A standard (13:20), then teammate Evan Jager (left) will go to Worlds in the 5,000m. Jager himself is in the 1,500m. On the women's side, Pamela Jelimo will contest the 800m. Speaking of Coach Schumacher's runners, we saw this today: Runner's World Video Series "From Wisconsin To Worlds" Will Follow Teg, Solinsky and Jager This Summer
*MORE From Europe: Pamela Jelimo To Race 800m In Heusden
*Jana Pittman-Rawlinson, Former World Champ, To Race 400h In Heusden
*Dwight Phillips To Race Competitive 100m In Zaragoza Saturday

Oregon's Jordan McNamara Breaks 4 In Eugene All-Comers Meet

7 Dopers Suspended By IAAF Reason to celebrate this weekend. Our sport actually punishes cheaters!

Looking Ahead To DN Galan In Swedish Capitol
*Gay/Powell To Race Next Friday In Stockholm
*Asafa Powell & Usain Bolt To Race On July 24th (LRC Founders' Day)

Elites In The News

UNC Announces Peter Watson As New XC Head Coach Watson was coaching Auburn's team before the move to Chapel Hill. LRC Boards: *UNC Officially Announces New Coach

Liege: *Results *US Women's 5k Team Set as Julie Culley Gets B Standard Culley is going to Berlin as Bizarri has called it a season. In other action, Lopez Lomong ran 1:46 and C. Smith 1:47. Geena Gall came up short in the 800 in her quest for a sub-2:00 (Gall doesn't need the sub 2:00 to go to Worlds but if she does get it, it means there is no chance Vessey goes) as she loses to Brenda Martinez.

Lucerne *Results  (link fixed) *Nick Symmonds Struggles In Men's 800 - 4th in 1:46.60 In the women's 1,500 Lisa Dobriskey ran 4:08 to win 1,500 over Morgan Uceny, second in 4:09. *Oscar P Runs 47.07

Penny Wise, Pound Foolish?
Walter Dix Finally Resolves His Dispute With Agent Kimberly Holland How much money did Dix miss out on as a result of this dispute? We imagine a ton.

Embarrassing
NY Times Investigates: Many College Athletes Left With Huge Medical Bills As Colleges Drop The Ball

Duncan Kibet Talks Big About Getting The WR In Berlin "I will stand a high chance of attaining the feat (sub 2:03:59) if Haile Gebrselassie goes for the world record ... Whether I win or not, I need the time and Haile is my only challenger."

Administrative News Boredom
*2010-2012 USA Indoors To Be In Albuquerque
*Poor Ticket Sales For World Champs Lead IAAF To Start Advertising Campaign
*IAAF To Have Feeder Events For Diamond League
*BBC Takes UK Athletics To Court

This Week

IAAF Golden League LRC Week In Review We've got it all covered: American female distance runners kicking butt in Europe, the most beautiful race we've ever seen Usain Bolt run, Tyson Gay running a pretty damn good race of his own, the track and field world still bleeding itself to death by focusing on times, and even some compassion as we give props for guys nearly getting DFL (Dorian Ulrey) and running in all-comers meets (Khadevis Robinson). Plus career advice and more.

OSU Athletic Director Impressed With German Fernandez Calls him the greatest distance runner since Jim Ryun.

Morocco:

Bernard Lagat Gets 3:32.56 1,500m Win In Morocco Looks like he's rounding into form at the right time. Saif Shaheen fell in the meet; his status is unknown.

Financial News

Bolt's 9.79 in Paris

Anna Willard's 800m Win