News From Russia

• Talk About Sending The Wrong Message: Russian Athletics President Valentin Balakhnichev Says He Will Fight Any Attempts To Strip Banned Racewalkers Of London 2012 Medals With the storm of accusations facing Russian athletics, is now the time to fight on behalf of their doped up athletes? Last week, five racewalkers were banned and had results from 2009 onward annulled, but not the Olympics.
• Russian Athletics Federation To Sue German ARD TV Channel Over Doping Scandal They claim that some of the German narration in the documentary “did not match the real words” the Russian athletes were speaking.
• Get Out Before They Kick You Out? 2004 Olympic 800 Champion Yuri Borzakovsky Retiring He’ll run his last race Sunday at the Russian Winter meeting in Moscow.

News From Down Under

• Australian National 10,000 Champ Brett Robinson Wins Briggs Athletics Classic 5,000 In 13:43.13 Over David McNeill And Ben St. Lawrence Former NCAA champ McNeill was 13:45.56) and St. Lawrence 13:52.51. *Full Meet Video *Results
• Nick Willis Will Race Against Zane and Jake Robertson And Augustine Choge Over 5,000 On February 26th In New Zealand Willis: “I’m pretty nervous because there’s a lot of pride on the line. It’s just like when you’re playing table tennis with your mates in the garage next to your house, you want to make sure that you don’t lose to anybody.” He also will compete in the NZ Speedgolf Open on Feb. 21st.

European Stuff

• Poland’s Kamila Licwinko Clears World-Leading 2.00m HJ At German Jumps Meet She tied her own NR while Spain’s Ruth Beitia cleared 1.96m to set a national masters record. Russia’s Aleksandr Gripich won the PV in 5.70m.
• Irish Miler Ciarán Ó Lionáird Blogs About His Early Years Of Training, Giving Some Insight Into The Irish Club System He offers a bunch of sample workouts and training weeks as well as overall training philosophy.
• Former London Marathon Race Director David Bedford “A Little Surprised” About The Lack Of Drug Testing At UK Road Races Drug testing is expensive. We’d rather see anti-doping authorities go after top athletes than people winning sub-elite races. That said, some races could surely afford to pay for it themselves.
• EA Recap Of Lotto Crosscup In Belgium, Which Had A Belgian Winner For The First Time In 14 Years Louise Carton won the women’s race while Ethiopian Tasama Dame won the men’s.
• Czech Republic’s Eliska Klucinova Sets Big PR To Win Pentathlon At Combined Events Meet In The Netherlands At the same meet world heptathlon bronze medalist Dafne Schippers opened her season with a 7.20m 60m and Czech athlete Adam Sebastian Helcelet won the heptathlon.
• Final Entries Confirmed For February 1st European Club Championships: Spain’s Two-Time Euro Champ Alemayehu Bezabeh Leads Field

Other Elite Distance News

• IAAF “Personal Bests” Interview With Nick Willis Read about Willis’ greatest achievement, best piece of coaching advice and why his favorite sports team means he is a “glutton for suffering.”
• Daily Emerald: Internal Competition Drives Oregon’s Distance Men Parker Stinson: “If you have an off day, it’s really hard. It’s already a really competitive practice.”
• Brooks Beasts Sign Dorian Ulrey And Matt Hillenbrand
  *MB: Dorian Ulrey to the Brooks Beasts

More NCAA Weekend Action (Earlier News Further Down Homepage) *NCAA Results

• Arizona State’s Shelby Houlihan Breaks Her Own School Record In The 3,000 With 9:03.71 At Texas A&M Quadrangular Houlihan: “It felt really easy … It was good to get out there and open up fast.” *Full Results
• Iowa State’s Edward Kemboi Opens Season With 1:46.94 800 Win At Big 4 Dual
• Columbia’s Brendon Fish Wins 1,000 In 2:20.83 At Tri-Meet With Yale And Dartmouth *Full Results
• Michigan State’s Leah O’Connor Opens Season With 9:07.88 3,000 At Notre Dame Invy *Full Results
• Wisconsin’s Michael Lihrman Breaks Own NCAA Record In Weight Throw Wisconsin lost in their dual meet with Minnesota.
• Baylor’s Trayvon Bromell Equals Collegiate 60 Lead At 6.54
• Colorado Finishes Strong At Air Force Invite
• Weekend Top 10: List Of Top 10 NCAA Marks For The Weekend In Each Event

News From Europe

• Is There Any Hope Left For XC? Ireland Won’t Send Any Runners To World XC Champs As They’d Rather Their Runners Train For Track Season Even Fionnuala Britton, who is regularly one of the top non-African runners, didn’t want to go as she is focused on marathon training.
• UK’s Olympic Triathlon Champ Alistair Brownlee Finishes 2nd At Northern Cross-Country Championships Andy Davies won the race.
• Ireland’s Ciarán Ó Lionáírd Blogs About Coming Back From Injury, Training At Altitude In Flagstaff With Ben Blankenship And Plans For 2015
• 2015 Will Be A Re-Building Year For UK Olympic Heptathlon Champ Jessica Ennis As She Returns From Pregnancy UK performance director Neil Black says she can get back to the top, but it might take until 2016.
• UK’s World Indoor 60m Champ Richard Kilty Back Being Coached By 1992 Olympic Champion Linford Christie

International Distance Action

• Geoffrey Kipsang Wins Kenyan Police XC Champs For Third Consecutive Year, Beating Doper Matthew Kisorio By 10 Seconds Augustine Choge was 4th. Stacy Ndiwa won the women’s race over Africa XC champ Janet Kisa and world champion Vivian Cheruiyot.
  *2nd Article: Two-Time World Marathon Champ Edna Kiplagat Was 6th Mercy Cherono was also supposed to race, but wasn’t mentioned in the article.
• Ukraine’s Tetiana Gamera-Shmyrko Wins Osaka Women’s Marathon For Third Straight Year She set a NR with 2:22:09, while 38-year-old Jelena Prokopcuka was 2nd in 2:24:07. Kenya’s Selly Chepyego won the Osaka Half in 1:09:43.
  *JRN Recap: Risa Shigetomo Was The Top Japanese Woman In 2:26:39 Osaka is a Japanese selection race for World champs, but Shigetomo was way off the 2:23 standard to get automatic selection.
• Philip Langat And Cynthia Cherotich Win Kenyan Prisons Meeting At Uhuru Gardens
• Kim Hye Gyong (2:31:46) And Sentayehu Merga (2:13:00) Win Hong Kong Marathon

Boston 2024 Names Former Massachusetts Transportation Secretary Richard Davey As New Chief Executive

International Track Results

• Renaud Lavillenie Vaults A World-Leading 6.00m In France It’s the highest he’s jumped since he set the WR of 6.16m last year. He tried, but failed three times, to clear 6.10m. His brother Valentin was 2nd in 5.70m and Greece’s Nikoleta Kiriakopoulou won the women’s competition with 4.67m.
• Poland’s Konrad Bukowiecki Sets World Junior Indoor Shot Put Record With 22.38m Throw The previous record was 22.35m by World champ David Storl.
• Germany Wins Team Competition At Glasgow International Match Over GB, France And Scotland Germany won by only 1 point over GB and France as the French men’s 4 x 400 got DQed, costing them the entire meet.
  *European Athletics Recap Germany got two wins in the distance events from Florian Orth in the 1,500 (3:40.20) and Robin Schemera in the 800 (1:48.41). GB’s Jessica Judd won the women’s 1,500 (4:14.53); Renelle Lamote the 800 (2:01.97).
  *Jessica Judd: “I’ve definitely got the love of athletics back.”
  *GB’s Richard Kilty Gets DQed From 60m For False Start
  *Full Results
• Jamaica’s Federick Dacres Returns From 2014 Knee Surgery To Set The Discus WL With A Throw Of 66.30m At Big Shot Meet
• Italian HJers Marco Fassinotti And Alessia Trost Set World-Leading Marks Of 2.34m And 1.96m At Moravia High Jump Tour Meet

Upcoming Action

• February: Tokyo Field Released: 5 Sub-2:05 Men, Including Defending Champ Dickson Chumba And Geoffrey Mutai, To Battle The women’s field has just 4 sub-2:24 marathoners in it (London has 9, Boston 11, Dubai 12).
• March And Beyond: Geoffrey Kipsang Says He’s Going For Gold At World XC, Then Wants To Break 27:00 At Pre, Then Get 13.1 World Record Kipsang was the Jr. World XC champ in 2011.
• This Weekend: British Athletics Sainsbury’s Glasgow International Match Will Be Streamed Live On Saturday At 13:29 GMT
  *After Running 12.95 In 2014, Pascal Martinot-Lagarde Hoping To Open 2015 With Fast Time At Saturday’s Sainsbury’s Glasgow International Match
• Next Week: Dayron Robles Will Race In Russia On 2/1

Doping News

• Good News If This Isn’t Just A PR Stunt: Russia Will Create A Government Job That Will Concentrate Exclusively On The Fight Against Doping
  *Move Marks U-Turn For Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko, Who Announced The Position, As He Had Previously Said The German TV Documentary Was Simply Something Aimed At Humiliating Russian Sport
• Well Said: Haile Gebrselassie Calls For Life Bans For Dopers

Updates On Pair Of Welsh Athletes Who Got Reduced Drug Bans

• Welsh Athletes Rhys Williams (400H) And Gareth Warburton (800) Target Track Returns Now That Their Drug Bans Have Ended In a video interview Williams says, “Don’t for a second think I’m happy with a 4-month ban, because I’m not. I’ve had to accept the 4-month ban, but I should have received nothing because I’ve done nothing wrong.”
• Full Detailed Q&A With Williams & Warburton They talk about the process testing positive, fighting the ban, and moving forward.
• Williams And Warburton Warn Athletes Not To Take Supplements They apparently tested positive from a contaminated energy drink.
• Welsh Nutrition Company “Baffled” As To How A Batch Of One Of Their Products Would Have Been Contaminated
• Williams Upset That The First Thing You See Now When You Google His Name Is Drugs He says he’s “never cried so much in my life” and spent a fortune in legal fees and chemical testing to fight the ban.

Japanese Road News

• Japan Running News Recap: Saitama Scores First-Ever National Title At National Men’s Ekiden Apparently the first stage was pretty eventful as one team’s runner collapsed and DNFed while another collapsed multiple times before the finish, eventually getting DQed for an illegal handoff as he tossed his “tasuki” over the line.
  *Opinion Piece: Thoughts On Disqualification In The Ekiden And Latitude In Application Of Rules
• John Kariuki Wins Okukuma Half Marathon In CR 63:16 Still recovering from a sprained ankle, Yuki Kawauchi was only 9th in 64:44.
• Kita-Kyushu Women’s Ekiden: Osaka Kunei Unseats Ritsumeikan Uji

LRC Remembering LRCer Van Townsend The running world lost one of its bright lights this week with the death of Van Townsend.
*MB: RIP Van Townsend: Share Your Respects Here