October 21, 2016 | LetsRun.com

Distance Runner News: Nick Symmonds Wants 1 More

Nick Symmonds Hoping To Compete One More Year And Make One Last US World Team After the ankle injury kept him out of the Trials, Symmonds says he is 100% healthy and running 40 miles a week.
Athletics Illustrated Catches Up With Ryan Vail On His Training For The NYC Marathon After a rough streak of three stress fractures in a row, Vail has been doing less volume ahead of NY, but says his workouts have been as fast as ever.
Runner’s Tribe Q&A With Burundi’s Three-Time Olympian Diane Nukuri After setting PBs this year at 5K and 10K she is hoping to run well in NYC at what will be her first marathon of 2016.
Hyuga Endo Breaks Japanese High School 3000m Record With 7:59.18 For comparison, Drew Hunter has the US high school record with 7:59.33 indoors.
Billy Mills Fighting Big Energy Company’s Plan To Build A 1100-Mile Long Oil Pipeline Through Native American Lands

Admin / Doping News

IPC Head Philip Craven Writes Apology Letter To IOC President Thomas Bach After Prank Phone Call Craven harshly criticized Bach on a recorded prank phone call where he thought he was actually speaking to Edwin Moses.
Brazil, Greece, Indonesia, Azerbaijan And Guatemala Anti-Doping Agencies Facing WADA Suspension They are currently non-compliant and have until November 10th to resolve their problems.
Italian Olympic Committee President Says $14.3 Million Was Spent (AKA Wasted) On Rome’s Aborted 2024 Bid
WADA To Appeal After Paris High Court Says Former Lamine Diack Adviser Habib Cissé Should Receive $8,700 In Damages Richard McLaren‘s report found that Cissé was involved in the Russian doping cover-ups, but the High Court of Paris claimed WADA was guilting of “infringement of the presumption of innocence.”
Irish IOC Member Patrick Hickey Still Stuck In Brazil Awaiting Resolution Of Ticket Scandal Charges There are concerns that 71-year-old Hickey’s health is deteriorating and president of the European Olympic Committee is pushing to have him returned home.
Thomas Bach Proposes Holding Some 2020 Olympic Events In Japan Region Hit By Earthquake/Tsunami/Nuclear Disaster In 2011 The goal would be to contribute to the regeneration of the area.

Updates On Tyson Gay Daughter Story

Friends Of Tyson Gay’s Daughter Reveal She Was Very Close With One Of The Men Arrested In Her Death After her death he tweeted, “I love you Trinity,” and other tweets suggest they might have planned on getting married to each other.
Fourth Man Charged In Death Of Tyson Gay’s Daughter The three men previously arrested have pleaded not guilty and have an October 25th court date.

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, 30K and marathon records. 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.
MB: There are 6 Abbott World Marathon Majors – Name the 6 next best marathons that maybe should be majors
MB: Kebenei, Lalang & Jordan join American Distance Project

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

Men's Team USA for Rio 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.

Dreams Become Reality

LRC Evan Jager’s Fairy Tale 2016 Continues As He Gets Married In Sweden Jager married Sofia Hellberg-Jonsén on Saturday in Sweden. Read about the wedding and how they met.
*MB: Sorry Ladies (And Fellas): Evan Jager Is Married!

Road News: Fast Half Action Set For Sunday

World Leader Viola Jepchumba (65:51) Faces World Half Champ Peres Jepchirchir At The Valencia Half Marathon In the men’s race, Abraham Cheroben (58:48) will go for his third straight victory against Solomon Kirwa Yego (58:44) and Stephen Kosgei Kibet (58:54).
Kenya’s Former World 5,000m Bronze Medalist Priscah Jepleting Cherono And Defending Winner Julius Chepkwony Rotich Lead Fields For Thee Venice Marathon
Telegraph Writer Says 85-Year-Old Ed Whitlock Is His New Sporting Hero
Father And Four-Year-Old Daughter Break Stroller Marathon Record By 10 Minutes With 2:31:21 Calum Neff also has the stroller half marathon WR, which he set with his 11-month-old daughter, but used the older (and heavier) child for the marathon.

Assorted Distance News

Recommended Read: Q&A With 60-Year-Old 2:42 Marathoner Brian Pilcher, Who Set 4 American Age-Group Records In Chicago Pilcher talks about how poor pacing at Chicago cost him because he couldn’t hold himself back. Some other interesting insights like 80 miles a week on an ElliptiGO, being coached by Olympian Magda Boulet, and prolific racing.
Interesting “Did You Know” Interview With Olympic 800 Silver Medalist Nijel Amos Amos used to play volleyball, is a part-time DJ and has a bizarre pre-race ritual he does as he leaves his hotel room.
Good Read: Phoebe Wright: “Max Siegel Makes Me Mad, But He Isn’t The Problem With USATF” Wright rips USATF for the distribution of income which hardly any athletes see and explains that “the middle class doesn’t exist” in US track and field.
SPIKES Profile On 85-Year-Old Anomaly Ed Whitlock As he’s gotten older, Whitlock has had to lengthen his runs. “The thing is, three hours doesn’t do it any more. That’s the hell of it. I need four hours now. And it’s only going to get worse.” *BBC Video
UK’s Eilish McColgan Shares Her Top XC Tips Train on tough terrain, throw away the watch and bring toilet paper.
IAAF Preview Of This Weekend’s IAU 24 Hour European Championships

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)?

MB: Molly Seidel returning to Notre Dame for 2017 NCAA track season
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

Latest News On Trinity Gay Shooting

Doping News: Did WADA Hang An Innocent Man?

Ross Tucker Among The Scientists Who Think Irish Sprinter Steven Colvert Should Be Cleared Colvert tested positive for EPO, but different testing methods showed one sample to have 20 times more than the other. Tucker and others argue that kind of inconsistency means the test should be thrown out.
New York Road Runners Introduces Run Clean Anti-Doping Initiative NYRR will now start drug testing at some of their lower-profile races to deter sub-elite dopers. *AP Article
*MB: NY Road Runners to begin drug-testing local amateurs
WADA Signs Agreement With Japanese Drug Maker To Help Combat Doping The drug maker Astellas Pharma gives WADA a heads up on compounds it produces (including those in development) that could be used as PEDs.
Ski Federation Considering Cancelling All Future Events Scheduled To Be Hosted By Russia Pending The Outcome Of McLaren’s Continued Investigation However, the federation president ruled out any kind of collective Russian ban like the IAAF has done.

Very Sad News: Our Thoughts Go Out To Tyson Gay And His Family

Tyson Gay’s 15-Year-Old Daughter Shot And Killed At A Restaurant In Lexington, KY Trinity Gay was shot in the neck by a stray bullet after two cars exchanged gunfire outside the restaurant at 4AM on Sunday. Three men have been arrested and charged in connection with the shooting.

A Father And His 19-Year-Old Son Were Among The Three Arrested They were all charged with “wanton endangerment.”
Trinity Gay Tweeted At 2AM That She Had Witnessed A Shooting She tweeted that she was at the Cook Out restaurant and added, “Of course they start shootin.”
Trinity Gay Was An Rising Track Star And Among The Top Sophomores In Kentucky
MB: Tyson Gay’s 15 year old daughter shot and killed

More NCAA Coverage

Men’s Wisco Race LRC No. 1 Northern Arizona (78 Points) Rolls To Big Win At 2016 Nuttycombe Wisconsin Invitational; Syracuse’s Justyn Knight (23:51) Unleashes Big Kick To Claim Individual Title #1 NAU lived up to it’s ranking with a great performance. In terms of the individual race, Justyn Knight blew everyone’s doors off.

Outside LRC Coverage

Pre-Race Coverage

The Votes Are In LRC LetsRun.com NCAA XC Fan Poll #1: The LRC Nation Thinks NAU Is Way Overrated And That Syracuse Will Repeat The votes are in for our first fan poll of 2016 and our results are very much different than the USTFCCCA poll, at least on the men’s side. The LRC nation thinks #1 NAU is overrated and that Syracuse is the team to beat. Also LRC likes Stanford way more than the coaches poll.

LRC Pre-Race Analysis Who’s #1 On The Men’s Side? How Good Is Stanford? And Three Other College XC Questions Ahead Of Wisconsin/Pre-Nats Weekend

Title IX Taken To Its Extreme?

Pole Dancing At The Olympics? Pole Dancing Seeks IOC Recognition As Official Sport *Discuss

Marathon News Of Note

Doping News

Five Russian Racewalkers Handed Four-Year Doping Bans The five, including 2013 World Championships silver medalist Mikhail Ryzhov, all were part of the Russian national training center in Saransk and tested positive for EPO.
AP: WADA Anticipating More State-Sponsored Doping WADA director general Olivier Niggli spoke on several topics, but we’re not sure what to make of the fact that he apparently “praised” MLB, NFL and NHL anti-doping programs.

Sprint Stuff: Johnny Dutch Confesses, Bolt Leading AOY Votes

Good Read: First Impressions Q&A With US 400m Hurdler Johnny Dutch Dutch’s first track race was a 100m when he was 10 years old. He was so nervous that he peed himself and his competitors laughed at him.
Usain Bolt Movie Coming Out Next Month The documentary “I Am Bolt” will give “unprecedented behind the scenes access” as Bolt says, “My aim with making this film is to show people how my life really is.”
Usain Bolt Leading Fan Voting For AOY Wayde van Niekerk is in 2nd; Mo Farah in 4th. TJer Catherine Ibarguen is dominating the women’s voting.
*Breakdown Of Women’s Nominees For AOY Keni Harrison is the only American on the list and is very far back in the voting.
GB 400 Runner Christine Ohuruogu Reflects On Her 2016 And What Was Her 4th Olympic Games In Rio Ohuruogu was happy to win 4 x 400 bronze, but disappointed to not even make the 400m final, saying she thinks overtraining cost her.

Week That Was

LRC The Amsterdam Marathon Was Super-Deep And Fast, The Toronto Marathon Dropped An Illegal Rabbit Out Of A Car, Ed Whitlock Still Going Strong, EPO Non-Positives And More Learn what’s happening in the running world.

Doping News

And More Than A Decade Later: Federal Court Dismisses Trevor Graham’s Lawsuit Against USADA Graham was banned for life by USADA for his connection with the BALCO scandal, but he sued saying that USADA “violated his 1st Amendment and due-process rights.”
Two More Athletes Disqualified From London 2012 Games After Doping Re-Tests A Russian weightlifter and Ukrainian PVer Maksym Mazuryk both tested positive for a steroid.
Russian Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko Promoted To Deputy Prime Minister This despite allegations against Mutko connection him to Russian drug coverups.
MB: Santa Barbara Triathlete gets 4 year ban for doping, runs race this weekend

RIP Trinity Gay

LRC Tyson Gay’s Fellow Professional Athletes Take To Twitter To Share Their Condolences Asafa Powell, Ato Boldon, Lolo Jones and former NFLer Chad Johnson are among those who sent messages to Tyson Gay.
Thousands Gather At High School Track For Vigil In Honor Of Tyson Gay’s Daughter Tyson Gay was present and spoke to the crowd. *Video

News From Over The Pond

Altitude Training Has Given Mid-D Runner Charlie Grice’s Athletic And Business Career A Boost In addition to training at altitude in Kenya, Grice sells altitude simulation products to athletes, including Mo Farah.
GB Olympic Stars Parade Through Manchester To Celebrate Record Breaking Medal Haul At Rio 2016
Two Men Crash GB Olympic Parade Posing As Medal-Winning Fencers It would make sense that no one would recognize members of the fencing team.
Mo Farah Will Compete At London Anniversary Games Next Track Season That means Farah will have at least two more races at the London Olympic venue in what he says will most likely be his last year on the track.
Jessica Ennis-Hill Says Injury Fears Were Behind Her Decision To Retire As She Didn’t Want To End On A Low Note “My body can’t cope with the volume of training that it used to. It was that fear of, ‘Do I push on that one more year and potentially get injured and come away disappointed?'” *BBC Article/Video Interview

Sunday Marathons *Video Highlights Of Amsterdam

Amsterdam: Daniel Wanjiru Pulls Off Upset And Wins Amsterdam In New CR Of 2:05:19 As Three Kenyans Break 2:06
*Meselech Melkamu Wins Women’s Race In 2:23:21 It was her second marathon win this year.
*MB: Fernando Cabada 2:14:51 in Amsterdam
Toronto: Philemon Rono Shrugs Off Fact That Pre-Race Barricade Crashed Down And Cut His Face, Wins In 2:08:30 Eliud Kipchoge‘s training partner was bloodied pre-race. Shure Demise won the women’s race in 2:25:19.
MB: Eric Gillis comes up short in Canadian record attempt – 4th in 2:13:42
Andy Vernon (63:32) And Elizeba Cherono (73:42) Win Great Birmingham Run Half Marathon
Brits Adam Hickey (64:41) And Rebecca Murray (72:47) Win Manchester Half Marathon

News From Europe

Two British Athletes Not Named Mo Farah Have Been Quizzed By Investigators In Jama Aden Doping Probe The raid of Aden was done in June. Will we hear anything before the end of 2016?
Good Read Ex Cycling World Champ David Millar Writes Great NY Times Column: How To Get Away With Doping
European Athletics – Farah & Beitia Are European Athletes Of The Year, Thiam & Hess Rising Stars Max Hess and Nafissatou Thiam were honored with the Rising Star awards.
Jessica Ennis-Hill’s Coach Says She’s A Better Athlete Than Double Olympic Champ Daley Thompson As She Gave Birth And He Didn’t
*MB: Sexism x 2? Jessica Ennis Hill’s coach says she’s the GOAT because she gave birth to a baby and D. Thompson didn’t
EPO Expert Says Irish Sprinter’s Initial Ban Was A Mis-Justice “The only labs that have experience with this EPO analysis are those working in the WADA laboratories and they are obviously protecting each other.”

And Kenya Alice Aprot Nawowuna Stays Hot – Wins XC Race In Kenya She’s been training and racing a lot since running 29:53 in Rio. The men’s race was won by Abraham Kiptum, who ran a 59:36 half marathon last month.