Nick Willis & Andrew Wheating Impress At NZ Champs *Results

• Nick Willis Closes In 51.9 To Dominate 1,500 At NZ Champs In 3:50.90 Willis says he’s feeling so good at 32 years old he may carry his career on to 2020. Nikki Hamblin won the women’s 1,500 in 4:12.02. *Race Video
  *MB: Nick Willis flies last lap in 51.9 to win NZ 1500m
• Video: Andrew Wheating Wins NZ 800 In 1:49.82
  *Video Of Wheating’s Heat He jogged in 1:52.92.
• Jake Robertson Easily Wins 5,000; Wants To Go For The 10,000 NZ Record At Payton Jordan The NR is 27:41.95 by Dick Quax from 1977. Zane Robertson didn’t race due to a calf injury. *2nd Article
• Nick Willis Set A New Speedgolf PR While In New Zealand Willis placed 2nd at the New Zealand Speedgolf Open, shooting an 84 in 38 minutes.
• Tom Walsh Beats Jacko Gill In NZ Shot Put Battle Walsh won with 20.73m to Gill’s 20.33m.
• NZ Sportswriter Wants To See More Walsh Vs. Gill Clashes This was the first time they had competed head-to-head for a year. The problem is Gill competes sparingly. He was at 5 meets in 2014 compared to Walsh’s 14.
• Really Bad Rain/Windy Conditions For NZ Champs
• Gill Going To Sweden Training Camp To Try To Bridge The Gap To Walsh Gill normally trains solo in his parents’ basement.
• Stuart Farquhar Won His 15th NZ National Javelin Title

Recommended Read: Julia Lucas Blogs About The 2012 Olympic Trials 5,000 And Her Retirement From Professional Track And Field “And so, as I emerge from a career that ended not as I would have liked, disappointed with what could have been and almost was, I still look to running. … A race is just a race, but running can be anything.”
*MB: Julia Lucas wrote an article about losing out in the 2012 Olympic Trials 5,000
*LRC Archives: The Women’s 5,000 Final – The Olympic Trials At Its Absolute Best
*“It Should Be Mathematical: One Couple, Two Dreams, .04 Seconds” Popular piece by Michael Heald.
*Official Julia Lucas Appreciation Thread!!!

More Weekend Action

• Bahrain’s Eunice Jepkirui Kirwa Wins Nagoya Women’s Marathon In A CR 2:22:08 Russian 40-year-old Mariya Konovalova was 2nd, setting a PR and Masters WR with 2:22:27. Japan’s Sairi Maeda was 3rd despite taking a hard fall (2:22:48, #8 Japanese all-time). *JRN Recap
• IAAF Recap Of Jamaica’s Carifta Trials: World Junior 110H Champ Jaheel Hyde Moves To 7th All-Time On WJ List With 13.22 He also dominated the 400H in 49.78. 15-year-old Christopher Taylor won the under-18 400 in 45.69 while Akeem Bloomfield won the junior race in 45.41.
• France’s European Champ Yohann Diniz Breaks 20K Race Walk WR He “walked” 6:12 mile pace for 20K.

NCAA News / 2015 NCAA Indoors Start Fri.

• NCAA 800 Previews: LRC Brandon McBride & Natoya Goule Shoot For Second Titles In Loaded Fields The favorites come in with opposite momentum. McBride hasn’t lost a collegiate 800 since May 2013, Goule lost at ACCs.
• MB: Somone Break The Blue Hawks Up – Monmouth Men Win 2015 IC4A Indoor Title!!!
• UConn Women Win ECAC Championships For Second Year Running *Results
• Register-Guard: Another National Championship Could Come Down To The 3,000 For The Oregon Men Edward Cheserek: “If we have a good day we’ll go 1-2-3-4-5.”
• Ken Goe: “The UO men will be one-dimensional at the NCAA Indoor, but it’s a good dimension.” They will rely almost exclusively on points from distance events.
• RIP: Syracuse Sprinter Sabrina Cammock Found Dead In Times Square Hotel During Spring Break *AP: More Tests Needed To Determine Cause Of Death
•  Ken Goe: “What more does Eric Jenkins need to do to make The Bowerman watch list?” Coach Robert Johnson: “How Eric Jenkins isn’t on that list blows my mind.”

Interesting Indoor Stuff

• Be Jealous: There Is A 546m Indoor Track In Oslo
• University Of Iowa Could Get The Indoor Track From World Indoors In Portland After The Meet Is Over They might buy the portable track for a discounted price of $2.4 million, opposed to the $4 million it costs new.
• Indoor Vs. Outdoor PRs: Analysis In Graph Form Compares PRs For Some Of The Fastest Athletes In Each Event The 5,000 has the worst average increase in time indoors compared to out.
• Is Sub 6.50 For An Indoor 60 Equivalent To A Sub-10 100 Outdoors? 71% of the athletes that have run under 6.50 seconds have run a sub-10, but really sub-6.48 is probably more equivalent to a sub-1o.

Recommend Read: A Look Back At The Story Of Javelin Thrower Reg Spiers, Who In 1964 Mailed Himself Home To Australia From London Spiers was stuck in the UK with no money for a ticket, and desperate to make it home in time for his daughter’s birthday, he mailed himself home in a crate. A great story and a must read.

IAAF Recap Opening Days Of African Junior Championships In Ethiopia Highlights included a close 3-way battle in the 10,000 where Uganda’s world junior champ Joshua Cheptegei won in 29:58.70 over Kenya’s Davis Kiplongat (29:59.32). Other winners included Kenya’s Anthony Kiptoo in the 1,500 (3:43.98) and Abrahm Kibiwot‘s 8:47.43 steeple. *Full Results

Bernard Lagat And Deena Kastor Highlight March 29th Carlsbad 5K Kastor set the women’s US road 5K record here in 2002 and Lagat would have got the US record here last year if it wasn’t for a small 13.5-foot course setup error.

Euro Indoor Champs Friday Coverage

• Friday Mid-D/D Results: MB Lee Emanuel Makes 2015 European Indoor 3,000 Final – Kate Avery does not Aníta Hinriksdóttir set a European Jr. record of 2:01.56 in the 800.
• Video: Two Athletes Fall Hard At Finish Line Of 800 Heat Poland’s Karol Konieczny fell over the line and won the heat, but Austria’s Andreas Rapatz fell just before and had a final time of 2:19 by the time he got up.
• Kate Avery “Absolutely Devastated” Not To Make Euro Champs 3,000 Final
• Irish 800 Runner Mark English Thinks He’s Got A Great Shot At A Medal If He Makes Final
• Ireland’s/NJ-NY TC’s Declan Murray Advances To 800 Semis He was in the heat with the crash.
• IAAF Day 1 Recap: GB’s Katarina Johnson-Thompson Dominates Pentathlon With 5,000 Points And Just Misses Natallia Dobrynska’s WR By 13 Points She ran 2:12.78 in the 800, but needed 2:11.86. Sweden’s Michel Torneus won the LJ in a NR 8.30m, David Storl won the SP. Huge favorite Renaud Lavillenie almost went out in the PV as he needed 3 attempts at his opening height of 5.70m. World 400H champ Zuzana Hejnova failed to make the final in the 800.
• Johnson-Thompson Disappointed With Missing Pentathlon WR “I am full of regret from the 800m. I thought I could easily run that time and maybe took it for granted …”
• Legal Bribery? Russian And Ukraine Reach Deal Over Euro Javelin Champ Vira Rebryk Rebryk and other athletes took Russian citizenship last year when Russia annexed Crimea, but were blocked from competing. Now Russia has paid Ukraine “compensation” so Rebryk and the others can compete in the spring.