NCAA News

• Interesting Stat From RW: 20% Of Schools Spending Ridiculous Amounts On College Football Bowls Have Made Cuts To Men’s Running Programs “It is acceptable for up to $118,750 in gifts to be given to a football team for making a postseason game … That max gift amount could cover about 14 percent of the expenses of a typical track and field and cross-country program at one of these institutions.”
• University Iowa Track Coaches Lodges Complaint And Threatens Lawsuit Over Gender Discrimination In Hiring Process But wait, it’s not what you think. The coach complaining is a man who says the university repeatedly passed over qualified male candidates and that the head coach even joked he should get a sex change if he wanted a job.

Doping Stuff

• London Daily Mail: “Bolt dominates the landscape but a spate of failed drug tests threatens to turn Jamaica into the island of broken dreams”
• Usain Bolt Bolt And Mo Farah Are Both Careful To Steer Clear Of Drug Issues In Their Auto Biographies
• Aussie Sprinter Matt Davies Gets 2-Year Doping Ban
• Belgian Cyclist Attempts Suicide After Positive Doping Test He was released from the hospital after night of observation.

A Ton Of GB Press After Passing Of Commentating Legend David Coleman

• Legendary British TV Broadcaster David Coleman Dies At 87-Years-Old Coleman did his first BBC broadcast in for the BBC in 1954 and covered 11 Olympic Games from Rome in 1960 to Sydney 2000.
• Seb Coe On Coleman: “He was so incomparably better than anyone else who did it.”
• Selection Of Coleman’s Famous Verbal Blunders “And the line-up for the final of the women’s 400 metres hurdles includes three Russians, two East Germans, a Pole, a Swede and a Frenchman.”
• Brendan Foster: “David Coleman was unique and nobody will ever dominate the airwaves like this great man”
• The Telegraph: “Coleman, a towering figure in an era of sporting giants”
• David Coleman: A career in pictures
• The Guardian Coleman Obituary

• Sad News: Arizona Hurdler Lezo Urreiztieta Dies Following Complications From Brain Surgery
• RIP: 1960 Olympic 10K Champ Pyotr Bolotnikov

US News

• Tim Ritchie And Neely Spence Gracey To Headline New Year’s 35th Annual NYRR Midnight Run Presented By Emerald Nuts

• Lolo Jones Gives Away Free Shoes To School Kids In Iowa She said this was an important event for her because she remembers times when she was a kid and her family couldn’t afford shoes.
• US Legend Edwin Moses Honored By United States Olympic Endowment For Contributions To Olympic Movement

12-Week Study Shows More Injuries With Minimalist Shoes Than Neutral Trainers In this case the minimalist shoes were Nike Frees and Vibram FiveFingers.

Another GB Paralympian Complaining About Not Getting Enough AttentionRichard Whitehead doesn’t feel he got enough credit for winning a Paralympic gold at the World Champs or running 40 marathons in 40 days for charity.

America’s And Kenya’s Leading Ladies Getting Some Publicity

• Great Profile By Peter Gambaccini: Meet Becky Wade, America’s Best Young Marathoner Earlier this month, Wade ran 2:30:41 and only two American women have gone faster before age 25. Gambicini tells you all you need to know about the Dallas, TX native who went to Rice and just got back from a year-long trip around the world – 22 countries, including a stop for a party at Haile G‘s house where she has video of him dancing.
  *Becky’s Blog About Her Year-Long Trip: Becky Runs Away – A Year-Long Exploration Of Running Cultures Around The World
• 5 Minutes With The Fastest American Marathoner Of 2013 (Records-Eligible), Serena Burla The cancer survivor and mom of a five-year-old has twice run 2:28 – but both were overseas so few have noticed.
• Mary Keitany Says She Doesn’t Think She’ll Be Ready For A Marathon Until Fall 2014, Says Radcliffe’s 2:17:42 Women’s-Only WR Is Her Goal, Not The 2:15 Untouchable Mark She also reveals that her 5-year-old son will be taking the bus to school next year, not walking or running the 1.2 miles.

• Ryan Hill Has Accepted He’s A 5k Guy: “There is no denying that I am a 5K guy now.” Hill, like Pre, wanted to be a miler but making WCs in the 5,000 has convinced him his college coach Rollie Geiger was right – the 5k is his best event.

Upcoming Action (Nothing Like The First Time)

• 58:47 Man Atsedu Tsegay And 13:00/26:52 Aan Abera Kuma Of Ethiopia To Make Marathon Debuts In Dubai Next Month
  Just two days ago, we wondered when the super-hot Ethiopian 13.1 record holder Tsegay would make his debut (he did turn 22 this week after all) and now we have our answer. An Ethiopian making his debut has won Dubai each of the last two years (Ayele Abshero2:04:23 in 2012,  Lelisa Desisa 2:04:45 last year).
• 3 Of Top 4 From 2013 Worlds XC (Korir, Merga, Kipsiro) Plus Steeple Star Conseslus Kipruto Will Race At 2014 Campaccio XC In Italy On Jan. 6th Women’s world steeple champ Milcah Chemos leads the women’s field.