All Your Non Distance Friday Action

LRC Michelle Carter Unleashes an American Record (20.63m) on Her Final Attempt to Stun Valerie Adams for Olympic Shot Put Gold Medal 32 years ago in Los Angeles, Carter’s dad Michael earned Olympic silver in the shot put. His daughter did him one better tonight in Rio, coming through for gold in the final round under the most pressure imaginable.
*Michael Carter Says “There’s no comparison” between being Olympic champ and Super Bowl Champ (Shot>SuperBowl)

Other (at bottom of shot article): Women’s 100m Round 2, Men’s 400m Round 1, Heptathlon Day 1

Mid-D Prelims

LRC Women’s 1,500 Prelims: Genzebe Dibaba Gaps The Field As Does Dawit Seyaum As All Three Americans Advance We break down the 1st round of the women’s 1,500 for those of you that were out on a Friday night.

LRC Men’s 800 Prelims: Look Out World, David Rudisha Is “Almost Close” To His 2012 Form; Clayton Murphy Scrapes Through, Boris Berian Advances And 2012 Silver Medalist Nijel Amos Goes Home Rudisha looked great, leading all qualifiers with his 1:45.09 as Murphy ran 1:46.18 behind him but only made the semis on time. Amos faded badly and was only seventh in his heat in 1:50.46 while American Charles Jock (6th in heat 4) was also among the casualties.
*MB: Clayton Murphy draws the Heat of Death for 800 semis – Rudisha, Kszczot and Souleiman!!! What should he do?

Non-Distance Rio Previews

Starts Friday LRC M400 Preview: With World Champ Wayde van Niekerk And Olympic Champs LaShawn Merritt And Kirani James, The Stage Is Set For A Classic Olympic Final The Big Three have claimed every global title since 2008 and their matchup in Beijing last year produced the first race in history with three men under 44 seconds. Could they go faster this year – and challenge Michael Johnson‘s WR of 43.18?

Starts Friday LRC Heptathlon Preview: Will Jessica Ennis-Hill Win Another Gold? Or Will Brianne Theisen-Eaton Join Ashton As A Gold Medalist? Or Will The Future Of The Sport Arrive? The women’s multi should be a dandy in Rio. Who will emerge on top?

Starts Friday LRC MLong Jump: Can Great Britain’s Greg Rutherford Hold Off The Americans And Join Carl Lewis As A Two-Time Olympic Champion? With a win, world champ Rutherford would join Carl Lewis as the only men with multiple Olympic long jump titles. His competitors include training partner and last year’s runner-up, Fabrice Lapierre of Australia, world leader Jarrion Lawson of the U.S. and U.S. champ Jeff Henderson.

Starts Friday LRC W 100m: What A Final This Could Be, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce Goes For History Vs. Five Others With A Shot For Gold It should be a tremendous women’s 100m final as five women have broken 10.80 this year and that doesn’t even include Dafne Schippers.

Friday 9:00pm ET LRC WShot Put Preview: Valerie Adams Looks To Become The First Women In History To Win Three Individual Golds In Same Olympic Track & Field Event No woman has ever won gold in the same track and field event at the Olympics. That could change in the very first Olympic field event final in Rio.

Starts Friday LRC Men’s Discus Preview: Can 4-Time Global Champ Robert Harting Defend His Title Or Will Reigning World Champ Piotr Małachowski Spoil Harting’s Celebration? Journalists aren’t supposed to cheer in the press box but we tell you why we’re rooting for Robert Harting in this one.

Starts Friday LRC Women’s Hammer Preview: Will World Record Holder Anita Wlodarczyk Win Two Gold Medals In 1 Competition? The WR holder Wlodarczyk could have two gold medals to her name if Russian 2012 champ Tatyana Beloborodova is banned after she came up positive in London 2012 retests.

General Rio News

• Bomb Scare Causes Basketball Game To Begin With No Crowd A controlled explosion was carried out on a backpack left in a bathroom.
• Former US Airforce Captain Accuses Rio 2016 ORganizers Of Hiding The Truth About Attack On Media Bus Security officials claimed the attack was only rocks thrown at the bus, but the former Air Force captain who was on it says she recognized the sound of gunfire.
• Photo Of North And South Korean Gymnasts Taking A Selfie Together Hailed As “Capturing The Olympic Spirit”
• NY Times: “Many Soldiers, Few Signs, Long Lines: The Rio Games Beyond the TV Screen” The author writes that things look safe at a glance, but locals will tell you differently.
• LA, Paris, Rome And Budapest Warned After Breaking IOC Bidding Rules They broke rules by inviting media to their national hospitality houses during the Rio Games.
• IOC Officials Insist They Have “Absolutely No Regrets” About Awarding Rio The 2016 Games However, vice president John Coates admits that they are the “most difficult … we have ever encountered.”

US Distance News

• Galen Rupp Has Dropped His Mileage And Done Speed Workouts With Matt Centrowitz To Get Ready For The Final Kick In The 10,000 Alberto Salazar says Rupp “would get killed at the end of the 10K” if he didn’t improve his speed, but also said that Rupp is way better than himself, Dan Browne, and Mo Farah in the marathon.
• Good Read: Jared Ward Tapering And Having A Ball In Rio And Dreaming Of A Medal If The 2:0x Guys “Mismanage” The Race Ward has been hanging out watching some other Olympic events as he does an extreme taper going down from 120 miles per week to 70 and 35 in the two weeks before his race.
• Recommended Listen: Great Podcast Interview With Matt Centrowitz Sr. Centrowitz gives an entertaining interview as he talks about his son, the Trials, drugs and more.
• Worth A Look: When They Were Young: DyeStat Photo Gallery Of US Olympians When They Were In High School See a younger Kate Grace and Galen Rupp with Alberto Salazar.
• Good Podcast Interview With Kate Grace Grace says this year she worked on her “ability to push (myself) to the edge” and becoming the “kind of athlete who really loves the grind.”
• Video: Kate Grace Shares 3 Small Changes That Helped Her Make A Breakthrough In 2016 Grace says she used to have only workouts and easy days, but now “every mile has a purpose.”

More Olympic News

• Media Bus Attacked With Three Injured While Traveling Between Olympic Venues According to passengers, the bus came under fire which broke the glass windows, although officials say it’s unclear if it was bullets or rocks.
• Brazil Judge Rules In Favor Of Peaceful Political Protests At Rio 2016 Venues This after spectators were thrown out for wearing T-shirts criticizing the Brazil president.

Doping Updates

• The Guardian: “IOC’s Response To Russia Doping Nothing More Than A Confused Mess” The tension between Russia and the rest of the world has materialized in the swimming pool in the opening days of the Games with some likening it to the Cold War.
• Russian Swimming Doper Yulia Efimova Hits Back At Critics: “I Thought The Cold War Was Long In The Past” Efimova was booed when she entered the venue and has been openly criticized by gold medalist Lilly King, Michael Phelps and others.
• Ukraine Javelin Thrower Oleksandr Pyatnytsya Stripped Of His 2012 Olympic Silver Medal After Testing Positive In Sample Re-Test Belarus’ hammer thrower Pavel Kryvitksi and two Turkish weightlifters were also caught in London 2012 / Beijing 2008 re-tests.

Non-Rio Upcoming Action

• Thursday Night: Leo Manzano Takes On Kyle Merber And Johnny Gregorek At The West Chester Mile Men’s field also has Jack Bolas, Mac Fleet and Kirubel Erassa while the women are lead by Lauren Johnson, Nicole Tully, Rachel Schneider and Ashley Higginson.
• Kim Conley Will Have No Rest After Rio As She’ll Immediately Fly Back To Flagstaff To Start Training For Her Marathon Debut In NYC Conley’s already been thrown a marathon curve ball as she’s lost a week of training since the Rio 5,000 is a week later than the 10,000, which was her goal before she lost her shoe and DNFed at the Trials.
• Dafne Schippers To Run Brussels 100m After Rio

General Doping News

• Italian Steepler Jamel Chatbi Out Of Rio After National Anti-Doping Tribunal Defies Court Order By Suspending Him For Missing Three Tests The Moroccan-born Chatbi has previously served a 3-year doping ban for steroids.
• Usain Bolt Calls For Faith Ahead Of Rio 2016 “We’re weeding out the bad ones. We’re going in the right direction.”
• Yelena Isinbayeva Traveling To Rio To Campaign For Election To The IOC Athletes’ Commission This after her appeal to the Swiss Federal Court to overturn the CAS decision was rejected.
• Vitaly Mutko Calls Russian Ban From Paralympics “Beyond Belief” Mutko added, “I don’t understand what it’s based on.”
• The Guardian: Let’s Hear It For The Paralympics

Two Athletes Angry They Won’t Be In Rio Crush It At Beach To Beacon

LRC Maine Native Ben True (28:17) Becomes First American To Win TD Beach To Beacon 10K; Mary Keitany Blasts 30:45 Course Record After Olympic Snub True and Keitany were frustrated to be left off their respective Olympic teams and both athletes responded by earning historic wins in Cape Elizabeth, Maine on Saturday morning. True led a U.S. 1-2 as Dathan Ritzenhein (28:27) was second with sub-27:00 Kenyan William Malel Sitonik (28:31) third in his road race debut. Emily Sisson (32:20) was the top American woman in fourth.
*MB: Ben MF True 1 and Ritz 2 at Beach 2 Beacon. 1st American win ever.
*MB: Ritz is totally pumped after Beach to Beacon: “I think I can have a really special race in New York.”

Sir Walter Miler MB: Lauren Johnson (4:25) And Kyle Merber (3:54) Win As Drew Hunter (3:57.15) And Mikey Brannigan (3:57.58) PR It’s a Paralympic WR for the autistic Brannigan. *Meet Home

Russia Banned From Paralympics

• In Bold Move International Paralympic Committee Issues Blanket Ban On Russia Athletes From The 2016 Rio Paralympics IPC head Philip Craven said the Russian “medals over morals mentality disgusts” him.
  *2nd Article
• Russia To Work “Immediately” On CAS Appeal Over IPC Suspension
• Russian Federation Head And Lawyers Say Swiss Federal Supreme Court Appeal Against CAS Decision Unlikely To Help Yelena Isinbayeva And Sergei Shubenkov Get Into Rio
• In Denial? Shubenkov Expects Court To Rule In His Favor In Appeal Against CAS Decision

Semenya Will Keep A Lower Profile In Rio

• Caster Semenya Ditches Rio 400 To Focus On 800 Well, that’s one less race that will be a complete farce in Rio.
• GB 1,500 Runner Charlie Grice Has Benefited From Training With Mo Farah In His Buildup To Rio The 3:33 man says he isn’t “ruling out a medal.”
• Long Jumper Ivana Spanovic Hoping To Win Serbia’s First Olympic Track Medal Ever She won Euros and 3 out of 4 Diamond League meets she competed in this year. However, she lost at Pre and World Indoors to Brittney Reese.
• NY Times: Former Marathon WR Holder Tegla Loroupe Gives Refugee Olympians A Lesson In Hope
  *IAAF: Loroupe Calls For An End To Malnutrition
• Aussie Team Captain Jared Tallent Pulls Out Of Rio 20K Racewalk With Hamstring Problem Tallent will still compete in the 50K racewalk, which is his main focus.

Latest Doping News

• CAS Rules That IOC Ban On Russians WIth Previous Doping Offences Is “Unenforceable” This supports the “Osaka rule” precedent which established athletes could not be punished twice for the same doping offense.
  *NY Times: Ruling May Pave Way For 7 Previously-Banned Russians To Get Into Rio
• Yuliya Stepanova Won’t Contest Olympic Ban Despite CAS Ruling Allowing Russians With Previous Doping Bans Into Rio “[This] sends a message that the World Anti-Doping Code and the values of Olympism are merely words on a page. As a result, we will not file an appeal to CAS. As a result, we will not file an appeal to CAS.”
  *Full Statement From Vitaly And Yuliya Stepanov
• NY Times: “Lest We Forget, The US, Too Spent Time In The Doping Wilderness” Though not at the state-sponsored level of Russia, the US has had more than its fair share of doping scandals where top officials turned a blind eye to US doping.
• Michael Johnson Talks Doping, Usain Bolt, Justin Gatlin And The Upcoming US Presidential Election Johnson thinks it’s unfair to call the battle between Bolt and Gatlin “good vs. evil.”
• The Telegraph: It Isn’t Only The Other Athletes Who Are Cheated By Dopers, It’s The Fans
• No Longer Tamper-Proof Doping Sample Bottles Will Still Be Used In Rio

2016 Is The Year Of The Zatopek Books

LRCBook Review: "Endurance: The Extraordinary Life And Times Of Emil Zatopek" By Rick Broadbent Offers A Compelling Look At Zátopek, His Competitors, And The World In Which He Lived

Week That Was

LRCWTW: Video Proof That Usain Bolt Couldn't Break 5:00 In The Mile, Lots Of Condoms And TV At The Olympics, And Is Colby Alexander > Olympic Trials Champion Gabe Jennings?