December 18, 2015 | LetsRun.com

Track Corruption = Regime Change in Africa?

LRC Report: Lamine Diack Has Confessed to Seeking 1.5 Million Euros from Russian Athletics Federation; Has Admitted That The IAAF Intentionally Slowed Doping Cases Involving Russian Athletes The IAAF corruption case just got weirder as French newspaper Le Mondereports that Diack told French police he needed the money to fund opposition to Senegal’s then-president, Abdoulaye Wade, during the country’s 2012 elections. *Guardian
*Senegal govt denies Russian funding claim
*MB: Diack confesses to soliciting bribes from Russia

5 Recommended Reads

Shannon Rowbury Talks At Length About Her 2016 Campaign And Her Improvement Under Alberto Salazar
MB: For those of you who hate indoors: Rowbury says Alberto’s focus on indoors and 2-peaks has really benfitted her
Hajo Seppelt Responds To Fine By Russian Court “It was interesting to learn that a court in Russia can take a decision based on complete ignorance of the facts.”
*MB: Russian court rules that Hajo Seppelt/ARD documentary was based on inaccurate info – says they must pay $42 fine
UK Columnist Slams IAAF For Tweeting “Happy Birthday” To Doper Heike Dreschler “There is no way [IAAF] can hope to protect the future of athletics when it refuses to disown the sport’s poisoned past.”
Lengthy Q&A With Evan Jager From January Edition Of TFN
Jessica Ennis-Hill’s Coach Toni Minichiello Writes 1,000-Word Essay On What Makes Her A Champion Minichiello, who has known her since age 9, says the key in addition to talent is that she’s always been super-competitive and smart.

Sprint/Jump/Throw News

Last Athlete To Have Competed At The 1936 Olympic Games, “Gabre” Gabric, Dies At 101 She was competing in throwing events as late as age 95.
Usain Bolt Film Documentary Being Made – Preview Will Be Shown At Berlin Film Festival The producers of the film made one on Manchester United that grossed more than $70 million.
CBCSports.ca Names Andre De Grasse Its Canadian Athlete of The Year – “From zero to national hero in 7 months.”
Profile Of Marquis Dendy By Dave Hunter Dendy credits his college improvement to weight training and eating 6, not 3, meals a day.
Germany’s Cindy Roleder Reflects On Her Amazing 2016 And Says She Was Thrilled With 100H Silver For good reason – she went into Worlds with a 12.80 PR and left with a 12.59.
Asafa Powell Attended Rihanna’s Annual Diamond Ball And Got To Meet Will Smith

Interesting US News

Galen Rupp May Have Run 61:20 In Portland, But Jake Stout Broke The World Record In the Race WR for fastest half in an animal costume (1:21:16).
After Appalachian Trail Record, Scott Jurek Is Trying To Figure Out What’s Next – Racing Isn’t It “For me, the beauty of this sport is it’s a lifestyle. Right now I am trying to figure out what running means to me. What do I want to do to push my boundaries and explore the edge of physical and mental performance? And racing doesn’t feel like something I need to do. Phasing into a different part of my career is a better way to put it.”
Athletics Illustrated Asks, “Why did Running Times fail?” A Manifestation Of The Modern Runner Or A Symptom Of Market Conditions?
Garrett Heath Interview After Club XC Win (Audio)

Elite Distance News

John Hancock Announces The Return Of Defending Champions Lelisa Desisa And Caroline Rotich To 2016 Boston Marathon
Impressive: Former World Marathon Bronze Medalist Steve Spence Runs Sub-5:00 Mile For The 40th Consecutive Year The 53-year-old ran 4:55 to keep the streak alive again. He’ll try to take advantage of his current fitness and “knock off 2016 ” in January. *Discuss
New Olympic Trials Standards Catch Athletes Off Guard As All Of A Sudden They Have Just 9 Weeks To Train Some had given up or had other racing plans. 2:18 man Josh Eberly: “The night before I found out [about the new standards] I was talking to my wife about whether to go for it in Houston.”
Eliud Kipchoge Focused On Going For Marathon Gold In Rio 2016 “Rio Olympics is my main focus next year and I will take the opportunity fast if given a chance.”
Team Europe Selected For January 9th Great Edinburgh XC Euro champions Sifan Hassan and Ali Kaya lead the squads.

Guardian’s Sean Ingle: “Time Has Come For Sebastian Coe To Lead New IAAF Legacy Of Openness” A lot more IAAF dirty laundry will be airing as the IAAF Ethics Commission’s disciplinary hearing starts Wednesday and the second WADA report from Dick Pound comes out next month.

Club Nats *Results

Amy Van Alstine, Garrett Heath And BAA (Women) And Hoka One One (Men) Win 2015 Club XC Titles Alan Webb (182nd) beat Nick Symmonds (219th).
*IAAF Recap

SPAR European XC Champs Were Sunday *Results

Sifan Hassan Runs Away With Euro XC Champs As GB Dominates The Team Race Former NCAA champ Kate Avery was 2nd, 8- seconds behind Hassan.
Turkey’s Ali Kaya Wins Comfortably As Spain Takes Places Two Through Five To Destroy The Field
Junior Men: Italy’s Yemaneberhan Crippa Defends His Individual Title As France Wins A Close Team Race Over Italy
Junior Women: Konstanze Klosterhalfen Finishes First To Lead Germany’s Team Victory
U23 Men: GB’s Jonathan Davies And Spain Are Winners
U23 Women: Victories For Belgium’s Louise Carton And Team GB
Fionnuala McCormack Finds Silver Lining In Team Bronze For Ireland The former 2-time champ was disappointed to finish 4th, but happy with the team bronze.
*Irish Examiner Article
BBC: Britain Tops The Overall Medal Tables As Every Team Member Takes Home Hardware
IAAF Recap

Thursday News Of Note

16-Year-Old Sprint Star Candace Hill Goes Pro, Signs With Asics And Gets NYTimes Profile Hill ran 10.98 last year. She’s the latest sprint star to sign out of the traditional Nike camp. De Grasse signed with Puma, Bromell with New Balance and now Hill with Asics. Hill will be wearing Nike at every Olympics she competes in. Too bad USATF didn’t bid out that contract.
*MB: Candace Hill becomes the youngest US track athlete ever to go pro, signs with Asics
Marquis Dendy And Jenna Prandini Win Bowerman Award As Top Collegiate Track Athletes Of Year A guy who failed to make the final at Worlds in the LJ/TJ beat out a gold medalist in the PV as they only consider the collegiate season.
2-Time London Marathon Winner Tsegaye Kebede Will Make Dubai Marathon Debut On January 22

Important Doping News

We 100% Want This To Happen UK Govt. Is Considering Making Doping A Crime Doping is basically theft to the tunes of millions of dollars in major sports.
In Annual News Conference, Vladimir Putin Addresses “Poison” Of Doping Putin says Russia will eradicate the problem but says it’s unfair to suspend everyone. “Those who are guilty – the coach, the organizer, the athlete – they should be held responsible. Those who have nothing to do with it should not answer for those who are violating something. It’s not fair and it’s not right …”

Cross-Country News Of Note

Full British Team For Great Edinburgh XC Race On January 9th Is Released Mo Farah is the headliner.
Foot Locker 12th Placer Hannah DeBalsi Is Sports Illustrated’s High School Athlete Of The Month (Long Profile) She’s bound for Stanford next year.

NY Times Has Two Running-Related Articles In One Day

LRC Thanks Its Best Partners In 2015

Meter Magazine: The Perfect Holiday Gift If you’re looking for a holiday gift, what about a subscription to Meter, a running magazine you actually want to read. The founders of Tracksmith (makers of premium performance running apparel) wondered what happened to the inspirational stories of our sport and its heroes and Meter was born. Meter is something you’ll want to read and keep. Get a subscription today.

Lance Armstrong In The News

Despite Lifetime Ban, Lance Armstrong Won A 35K Ultra Trail Race In California This Weekend Armstrong’s ban doesn’t apply to unsanctioned trail races which aren’t under the WADA code. The race director says he paid an entry fee and got no special treatment.
Competitor.com Article With Quotes From US Trail/Ultra Runners Sage Canaday And Joe Gray
*MB: Lance Armstrong Wins 35K Trail Run
*MB: Ryan Hall vs Lance Armstrong in a 50 mile trail race…. Who wins?
Good Read: Betsy Andreu Interview: “Doping Problems In Track Even Worse Than They Were In Cycling”

2015 Foot Locker XC Photo Gallery (200+ Photos)

Did You Not Get All Your Gifts On Black Friday And Cyber Monday? We Have A Solution For You

LRC Book Review"Two Hours" By Ed Caesar - A Wonderful Book Worthy Of 5 Stars And One We Consider "The Definitive Book On The Modern Elite Marathon"

Looking for a great Christmas present? We have a suggestion. Ed Caesar's new book Two Hours covers everything you would want to know about the marathon, from its roots in ancient Greek lore all the way up to the establishment of big-money major-city marathons in the late 20th century. It includes incredible behind-the-scenes access of Geoffrey Mutai in 2011 when he destroyed the course records in both Boston and New York. 5 out 5 stars.

LRC Cyber Week Special: 2 LetsRun.com Shirts For The Price Of One

Say It Ain’t So

LRCDid Mike Rossi - The Viral Marathon Dad - Try To Cheat LetsRun.com Out Of $10,000 On Saturday?

Has Mike Rossi cut yet another course, this time in an attempt to win $10,000 from LetsRun.com?
*MB: Did Mike Rossi (viral marathon dad) cheat his way into Boston?

Banquet Photos (Click For Gallery)

Book Review – The Animal Keepers Is Certainly A Keeper

LRC Book Review"The Animal Keepers" By Donn Behnke - A Terrific Tale Of What It Means To Be A Team

We highly recommend this book - hell, we call it "a triumph" - by Chris Solinsky's high school coach, Donn Behnke. Purchase here. 5 out 5 stars.

Here We Go Again?

LRC USATF Releases Qualifying Standards For 2016 OIympic Track And Field Trials – Will We Have Yet Another Controversy As A Result? The Olympic Trials standards are out and we’re already worried there may be a huge controversy next summer. USATF’s guidelines only list an “approximate field size” and USATF had told LetsRun.com that the “sport chairs have the option to fill it out to that field size if they wish.” That’s ridiculous. Make it clear now.

International News

Blanka Vlasic’s Words Of Wisdom We loved this one – “Don’t underestimate the power of defeat.”
45-Year-Old Kelly Holmes Wants To Compete Again – At 10k – “I’d love to get back to competing, probably 10k.” Not at a big time elite level, obviously. “I miss the thing of not having real targets anymore, so that challenge. I’m not necessarily missing the elite side of it, just the fact that I would love to have something that I could set a target for and then the training would become more exciting.”
Hakone Ekiden Entry Lists And Rankings Japan’s biggest sport event is January 2nd and 3rd.
Final Athletics Kenya Cross-Country Race Of The Year Is Saturday

Week That Was

LRCThe High School Season Ends With A Bang At Foot Lockers, The Dallas Marathon Impresses, Galen Rupp Blitzes A Holiday Half, Bill Walton & Meb, And Ryan Hall's Olympic Chances

The high school season came to a close with a bang at Foot Lockers, Galen Rupp ran a really good half marathon at a holiday fun run, while the rest of the American pros congregated at the Dallas Marathon for the most impressive American starting line of the year. A holiday treat.

Will Rupp Run The Trials?

MB: Galen Rupp solo 1:01:20 half marathon in Portland
*Rupp Says He Hasn’t Made A Decision About The 2016 Olympic Marathon Trials “I’m keeping my options open … I’m not sure what I’ll do.”
*LRC Will Galen Rupp Do The Olympic Marathon Trials?

Sunday Dallas Marathon Duo To Rio Relay Presented by AT&T

LRC The Greatest American Starting Line Of 2015 Was In Dallas For The Marathon Relays: Meb, Deena, Ryan Hall, Leo, Centro, Molly And More, Video And Recap What a star-studded field in Dallas. Interviews with Ryan Hall, Abdi, Chelanga, Ward, Puskedra, Leo, Centro, Robby, Ryan Hill, and Deena, Bersagel, and Becky Wade.
More LRC: Leo, Centro, Ryan Hill, And Robby Andrews Talk Mid-D, Pro Sports And World Indoors After Dallas Relays Good news for track fans as all 4 want to do World Indoors.
*Becky Wade TV Profile Her mom says, “If you had asked me the most athletic of my children, Becky would not be at the top of that list.”

From Tragedy To Triumph

LRC Feature The Miracle In The Black Hills: A Coach, A Fallen Teammate And A Season For The Ages In July, Black Hills State’s Gage McSpadden was struck by lightning and tragically killed at the age of 21. The team’s dream of a first-ever NCAA appearance, one that McSpadden had guaranteed, appeared to be shot. No one will ever forget how they responded.