Q & A Time With A Top NCAA Coach

LRC Q&A: Washington Coach Greg Metcalf Talks About The Win At Wisconsin, A Showdown With No. 1 Colorado At PAC-12s And Whether This Is His Best Team Since The Loaded 2008 Squad Only #11 in the pre-season polls, the Huskies dominated at Wisconsin, putting all seven women in the top 50 and going 1-6 in the open race, and are now #2 in the land. Now it’s on to PAC-12s, which features four teams ranked in the top 11 nationally. The UW staff has already scored the PAC-12 meet on paper; where do they have Washington finishing? Plus should NCAAs be hosted by UW at Chambers Bay golf course (site of the 2015 U.S. Open golf tournament)?

• NAU Men The Unanimous Favorites In Updated NCAA Coaches’ Poll Stanford moves up from 11th to get the 2nd place ranking while Syracuse drops to 6th.
• Colorado Women New #1 In NCAA Women’s Rankings The women’s rankings have been all over the place as the previous #1 Providence drops to 4th and Washington moves to 2nd.
• Justyn Knight And Brenna Peloquin Are NCAA Athletes Of The Week After Winning Wisconsin

On The Roads

• Paris Marathon Champion Cyprian Kotut Added To Field For Next Sunday’s Frankfurt Marathon He will face Tadese Tola and Mark Korir. World half champ Peres Jepchirchir withdrew from the women’s race citing lack of fitness.
• Ed Whitlock Says That Just After The Halfway Point In His Record Breaking Marathon He Thought It “Was Going To Be An Absolute Disaster” Whitlock ran in 15-year-old running shoes to shatter the 85-89 age group record with 3:56:33.
  *MB: ED WHITLOCK 3:56:33 WORLD RECORD MARATHON M85-89. PLEASE STOP IT.
• 60-Year-Old Brian Pilcher Broke Four American Masters Records At The Chicago Marathon Pilcher took the half, 25K and 30K records while tying the marathon mark. One of the records to go down actually belonged to LRC’s Employee 1.1‘s late uncle, Patrick Devine.
• Portland Marathoners Upset By Race Organizer’s Response To Course Error A missed turn thwarted many potential Boston qualifying attempts, but the “event” director (who emphasizes that he considers it an “event” and not a “race”) initially downplayed the mistake.

5 Of The 6 US Olympians Will Be In NY For The Marathon After All

Rio 2016 U.S. Olympic Marathon Team Invited To Serve As Grand Marshals For TCS New York City Marathon On Sunday, November 6 Galen Rupp won’t be attending due to family commitments.

Who Was The Best In 2016?

IAAF Announces Nominees For 2016 World Athlete Of The Year Ashton Eaton, Keni Harrison and Christian Taylor were the only Americans to make the cut.

• Breakdown Of Men’s Nominees Usain Bolt completing the triple-triple and Wayde van Niekerk‘s WR gold medal run will be hard to beat.
• In Their Own Words: How Did The Men’s AOY Nominees Describe Their Seasons? Van Niekerk: “I’d love to give you the long testimony, but I don’t remember a thing. I don’t even think I was in that race; that’s how unreal it was.”
• Women’s “In Their Own Words” List HJer Ruth Beitia: “I’m aware that I’m 37 years old. … Even at my age, I have the same enthusiasm and happiness.”

Olympic News

• Thomas Bach Confident About “Significant Reduction” In Tokyo 2020 Costs After Meeting With Tokyo Governor They apparently figured out a way to save almost $2 billion, but when predictions were saying costs could reach $30 billion, that still doesn’t sound too great.
• Thomas Bach Accuses Rome City Council Of “Politically Motivated” Decision To Oppose 2024 Olympic Bid

The Biggest XC Weekend Of The Regular Season Is In The Books *Live Wisco And Pre-Nats Results *All Results

LRC No. 4 Oregon Men & No. 2 Colorado Women Deliver As Edward Cheserek (23:34) And Erin Finn (19:44) Dominate At 2016 Pre-Nats The Oregon men scored 85 to runner-up No. 5 Arkansas’ 110, while the Colorado women (93) easily held off No. 9 Oregon, 93-154. Cheserek won by 21.4 seconds while Finn won by 23.7.

XC Message Board Talk
MB: Official 2016 Wisco/Pre-Nats Discussion Thread
MB: Justyn Knight will win NCAA D1 Cross Country Nationals
MB: Syracuse officially not the favorite
MB: Grant Fisher beat Sean Mcgorty
MB: Breaking: Allie Ostrander is “currently injured and will likely redshirt the cross country season”

LRC No. 4 Washington Women Win 2016 Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational As Boise State’s Brenna Peloquin (20:00) Pulls Away To Win Individual Crown Boise State’s Brenna Peloquin came into the year as the #2 runner on her team – now she’s the NCAA favorite. #1 Providence certainly isn’t the favorite any more as they are missing a few studs.

Breaking News LRC Allie Ostrander Is “Currently Injured And Will Likely Redshirt The Cross-Country Season” We wish we had better news to report about the woman who was 2nd at NCAAs as a freshman last year. *Discuss

US News Of Note

• Great News Jamie Nieto Now Walking With A Walker He was paralyzed doing a backflip in practice in April.
• Connie Price-Smith, Butch Reynolds, Buddy Edelen, Al Feuerbach, And Frank Zarnowski Are USATF Hall Of Fame Inductees For 2016
• Interesting Read Meet Sam Lapray: The Real Estate Developer/RunGum Co-Founder And Assistant Coach To Nick Symmonds
• Alysia Montano Does Q&A With USADA About Having To Compete Against Russian Dopers Montano talks about being wronged by dopers and what’s motivated her to continue competing clean.

Long-Distance News

• After Comeback Victory In Chicago, Abel Kirui Wants To Make History At London 2017 By Becoming The First To Win Three World Marathon Titles Kirui has slipped from being the 6th fastest marathoner of all time to 33rd on the world all-time list, but has shown he is still a force in non-paced races.
• Mo Farah Says He Wants To Take A Shot At The 10,000 World Record In His Last Year On The Track Farah blamed his focus on championships for not ever making a record attempt, saying, “I wouldn’t have won what I have done in terms of medals, had I gone for the record.”
  *MB: Mo Farah 2 go for the World record in the 10k in 2017
• 2015 Berlin Marathon Champ Gladys Cherono Pulls Out Of NYC Marathon With Back Injury
• Ultrarunner Pete Kostelnick On Pace To Break 36-Year-Old Trans-America Record Averaging more than 70 miles a day to run across the country in less than 46 days, 8 hours and 36 minutes.
• Florence Kiplagat Makes Low-Key Return To Kenya After Chicago Marathon Victory There was no big airport celebration with the traditional milk “mursik,” but she still snapped a photo with David Rudisha.

The UK Media Has A Lot More On Retiring Jessica Ennis-Hill

• The Telegraph: “Jessica Ennis-Hill Has Earned Right To Relish Every Minute Of Her Retirement”
• Many Calling For Jessica Ennis-Hill To Be Made A “Dame”
• Good Read: Jessica Ennis-Hill’s Grandfather Used To Give Her $6 For A PB And $3 For A Medal, But Eventually Had To “Renegotiate” The Deal
• GR: The Guardian: “From Reluctant Athlete To Olympic Gold – Farewell To Jessica Ennis-Hill” Ennis had her first hangover when she was 16. She got up the next day, threw up, and competed in a junior track meet.
• GR: BBC Has A Poem For Jessica Ennis-Hill
• Ennis’ Coach Toni Minichiello: “Jessica Ennis-Hillis is dedicated, humble and funny – she’s the best ever.”
• Steve Cram: “She fully deserves to be called an all-time great.”
• Former Olympic Heptathlon Champ Denise Lewis: “Jessica Ennis-Hill’s poise, dignity and brilliance will be sorely missed.”
• The Guardian: “It’s fitting that Ennis-Hill’s reign mirrored the meteoric rise of women’s sport.”
• Collection Of Tweets From Athletes Paying Tribute To Ennis-Hill
• Jessica Ennis-Hill’s Career In Pictures
• SPIKES Takes A Look Back At Ennis’ 2012 “Super Saturday” Victory

Doping Stuff: Was An Irish Sprinter Wrongly Banned?

• Irish Sprinter Steven Colvert Calls Anti-Doping System A “Farce” After New Evidence Shows He May Have Wrongly Been Banned For EPO Use When Colvert tested positive for EPO (unusual for a sprinter) he screamed his innocence. Now more than 2 years later with his ban over, he’s still screaming as multiple scientists have cited “flaws in the procedure” which tested his sample.
• News Week: “Why An Irish Sprinter Serving A Doping Ban Deserves A New Hearing” Even the WADA expert at Colvert’s original hearing said there was such a small amount of EPO in his sample that “you need to be an expert to clearly identify it.”
  *Lab Times Journal Article With Research By Four Norwegian Scientists
• Norwegian Skiing Star Blames Sun Cream After Failing Drug Test For Anabolic Steroid A team doctor has admitted that he gave the skier the cream to treat sun burns on her lips during altitude training.
• USADA Head Travis Tygart Lashes Out At Fancy Bear Hackers As “Con Artists” “This is just another desperate attempt to distract from the real issue of (Russia’s) state-sponsored doping.”

News From Oregon

• MB: Kate Murphy Commits To Oregon The 4:07 high school OT qualifier announced on Twitter that she’ll be a Duck next year.
• The Oregonian: “Lots Of Coming And Going Within The Oregon Track Program” Nine additions have been made to the roster, but some key athletes have transferred or quit, including school shot put record holder Brittany Mann, who transferred to USC.
  *Register-Guard: Oregon Track And Field Bolsters Its Roster
  *MB: Why are so many Oregon athletes transferring?
• Wrong Person Awarded First Place At Portland Marathon Apparently workers at the finish line couldn’t tell the difference between a 2:36 marathoner and a 2:36 half marathoner.
  *MB: Portland Marathon gives 1st place to wrong runner
• The Oregonian: Some Portland Marathoners Upset After Running A Half Mile Too Long The race director’s response was troubling as he said, “It’s not a big deal” since only slower runners were affected. *Fox 12 Oregon Article