Olympic News: US Officially Decides To Bid For 2024 Games

• USA Will Officially Bid For 2024 Olympics They will decide in January which city (LA, San Fran., DC or Boston) will bid.
• Group “No Boston Olympics” Showed Up Outside Closed-Door Meetings To Protest Boston’s Bid
• InsideTheGames Visitor Poll Votes Boston As U.S. Bidder
• Pope Francis Supports Rome’s 2024 Olympic Bid, But Others Call It “Madness” Those against it cite financial issues as well as recent issues with the Mafia.

Distance News

• Results 2014 Hoosier Open: NAU’s .US 12K Champion Brian Shrader Runs 13:40.94 Texas’ Craig Lutz was 2nd in 13:47.09. UMKC’s Courtney Frerichs won the women’s 5,000 in 15:48.12. *Men’s Race Video *Women
• Michigan Coach And Former 3:50 Miler Kevin Sullivan Runs His 1st Marathon In Honolulu On A Whim Sullivan on his unplanned debut: “When Nick Willis and Will Leer asked if I wanted to join them on their long run, I simply said, hell if I am going to run 16-18 miles and wait to get picked up, I might as well just run the whole thing.” The 40-year-old ran 2:40:22.
  *David Monti Tweets Before The Start Willis And Leer Jumped In The Creek To Rescue A Woman Who Had Broken Her Arm
  *Willis’ FB Status On The Race *Leer’s Tweet
• Shawn Forrest, An Australian 61:25 Half Marathoner And Former All-American At Arkansas, Diagnosed With Type 1 Diabetes Forrest went to the ER when his body started shutting down and he was almost blind with an “off the charts” blood sugar count. He hopes now with proper treatment he’ll be able to get back on track with his running.
• RunningTimes Catches Up With Teen Runner With MS, Kayla Montgomery, After Her First Season Of College XC At Lipscomb University Montgomery was in Lipscomb’s top 7 all year. The team finished 4th in the DI South Regional.
  *Archives: ESPN Video On Recent High School Graduate Kayla Montgomery, Who Became A State Champion While Battling Multiple Sclerosis

2014 Club Nats *Men’s Results *Women’s Results *Masters

LRC Results: Ryan Hill And Laura Thweatt Win Zap Fitness dominated the men’s team competition as the BAA was 2nd. In the women’s team, the BAA won over the Boulder Running Company/adidas. Perhaps more importantly, German Fernandez was third in the men’s race.
*MB: German’s back baby!! 3rd at 2014 Club Nats

Scott Reid In Orange County Register: Stephanie Hightower Betraying Sport To Chase Her “Own Self-Serving Agenda” He accuses of her of working behind the scenes to take Bob Hersh‘s spot on the IAAF Council, saying she pushed to alter the USATF selection procedure to do so.
*MB: Damning indictment of Stephanie Hightower

• Sara Hall, Paced By Ryan, Sets PR To Win Dallas Half Marathon In 1:12:26 39-year-old Logan Sherman won the men’s race in 68:21. *Results
• Meb Keflezighi “Dusts” Ryan Hall In First Leg Of Dallas Mavericks Vs. Texas Rangers Relay Challenge At The Dallas Marathon However, the Rangers “recovered” and beat the Mavs by almost 9 minutes. In the elite race, Kimutai Cheruiyot won the marathon in 2:17:11 as Shitaye Gemechu won the women’s race in 2:46:46. *Results
  *MB: 1/2 Marathon Jogger steals banner moment from Women’s Full Marathon Winner
• RRW: Wilson Chebet (2:15:35) And Joyce Chepkirui (2:30:23) Complete First Kenyan Sweep At Honolulu Marathon
• Better Than Prize Money? Eritrea’s World Half Marathon Silver Medalist Samuel Tsegay Wins Cross Nacional Castellano-Manchego XC Race In Spain Spain’s Alessandra Aguilar took the women’s race as she and Tsegay won their body weight in cheese, wine and chocolates.
• Athletics Weekly Recaps UK’s Weekend Domestic XC/Road Racing Scene

We Wish This Wasn’t True

Actor Who Plays Louie Zamperini In “Unbroken” Admits He’s Never Run A 5k He also admits to taking “a little bit of artistic license” and inventing Zamperini’s “finishing style.”

Confused By The Latest Doping Scandal? Get Caught Up Here

• Science Of Running: Everything You Need To Know About Doping Scandal By Steve Magness
• The Guardian Does A Good Job Of Summarizing The IAAF/Russian Doping Scandal
• Shalane Flanagan Rips Rita Jeptoo For Being A Doper “I literally catered my whole race around (trying to beat) that woman.”
• Great Anecdote About Seb Coe And Doping Once when a friend was nailed for doping (later totally exonerated) he said, “If Diane Modahl is on drugs then there is no hope for athletics.”
• Kenyan Press Wants To Know Why Papa Diack Wired $200,000 To Athletics Kenya In 2010
• Irish Columnist Says She’ll Give Up Track And Field If Bolt Is A Doper She, like us, thinks he’s a freak of nature.

Interesting Reads

• Good Read: Pat Bucher Catches Up With Haile G – Haile G Says He Wants One Last Hurrah At Marathon The 41-year-old is going to up his training and go for it one last time. “I don’t know where (which marathon) at the moment, but something at the end of May, or Berlin (late September), just for myself. The problem is everybody expects me to be in front, so it’s not easy. They know Haile Gebrselassie is a front runner, and if they don’t see you at the front …?”
• Polish Hammer Thrower Anita Wlodarczyk Aims To Become First To Throw 80 Meters The WR holder at 79.58 was inspired by Poland’s Olympic champ Kamila Skolimowska, who died of a blood clot at age 26.
• Why Qatar’s Quest For Sporting Dominance Has Backfired Badly
• Maggie Vessey And Alysia Montaño Are 2 Of 4 Finalists For Spikes’ Personalities Of The Year Vote for who you think “showcased athletics in an unusual fashion” in the inaugural SPIKES Personality of the Year awards.

Pro News: Zatopek 10K

• Zatopek:10 Classic In Melbourne: Aussie Brett Robinson (28:45) And Kenyan Veronica Wanjiru (32:22) Win 10,000 In Very Windy Conditions NR holder Alex Rowe won the 800 in 1:46.91; an impressive season opener in the windy conditions.
  *RunnersTribe Recap: Robinson And Eloise Wellings Win Australian National Titles Robinson became the first Aussie to win the race in 5 years while Wellings ran 32:26 to finish 2nd to Wanjiru.
  *Full Results
• Usain Bolt Says He’s Finally Ready To Settle Down And Have A Wife And Kids Talking about attention from the ladies, Bolt said, “You do get a lot of offers for sure, it’s one of the perks. You try to stay quiet, but I love women, and you try not to take advantage, but it’s hard.”
• Jo Pavey Named Sports Journalists Association’s Sportswoman Of The Year

Airing The Sport’s Dirty Laundry

• LRC IAAF Spokesman Nick Davies Writes LetsRun.com About Reports IAAF Did Not Follow Up For Retesting 150 Suspicious Samples From 2006-2008 Davies says the blood test info is “taken completely out of context” and “will do nothing to combat the scourge of doping in athletics.”
• The Telegraph Claims They Have Seen “Documents Which Show Hundreds Of Cases Of Abnormal Readings, Suggesting Cover-Up By IAAF” A sensationalist headline as they admit, and the IAAF has stated, that “reasons for abnormal blood values are many and are often perfectly innocent.”
  *MB: 225 Athletes from 39 Countries Implicated in Doping
• The Head Of The Russian Athletics Federation Valentin Balakhnichev Has Stepped Down From His Role As IAAF Treasurer While Investigation Is Conducted He stepped down voluntarily and says he plans to return to his position after the investigation is over.
• The Guardian Claims To Have Seen Leaked Emails Implicating Lamine Diack’s Son In 2017 Worlds Bribe With Doha Article includes quotes from alleged emails.
• Related To IAAF Accusations? WADA To Conduct Its Own Investigation Into Russian Doping Allegations Originally they had left it to the IAAF, but now after “careful review” they will conduct their own probe.
• AP Column: Russia Is Athletics’ Lance Armstrong Case
• Speaking Of Lance: Lance Armstrong On Decision To Dope: “Once we realised … that we had brought knives to a gun fight, we all went out and got guns. Virtually everybody in the business made that decision.” Armstrong compared himself to Bill Clinton and Tiger Woods, but said they were given a chance to redeem themselves and he wasn’t.
• EightLane.org: From Russia With Love: Why 2014 Could Be The Beginning Of The End For Athletics Blogger warns, “2014 will be remembered as the year of Armageddon for the credibility of global track and field.”
• DailyMail: “Calls To Name British Athlete On Doping List Intensify … And Suspicious Blood Samples May Be Re-Tested”
• The Telegraph: Athletics In The Fight Of Its Life UK journalist calls this a “new low even in this sport.”
• Chairman IAAF Medical And Anti-Doping Commision Dr Juan Manuel Alonso Defends IAAF On Twitter “Blood samples taken before 2009 were thoroughly examined.”