Breaking: NY Times: “Russian Sports Agent And U.S. Marathon Officials Under Federal Investigation” The FBI suspects that Russian agent Andrey Baranov may have bribed US marathon organizers (including NYC Marathon officials) to allow his athletes to used PEDs at their events. Baranov is the agent who last year complained that he could get his clients into many big city marathons, but not NYC.

2016 TCS NYC Marathon Press Conferences

Men’s Press Conference LRC Ritz Is Running to Win, Abdi Is On the LRC Training Plan & 5 More Observations From Talking to the Top U.S. Men in New York Also included: Meb Keflezighi (who is not running NYC) discussing his recent problems throwing up in races.

Women’s Press Conference LRC Molly Huddle Isn’t Dreaming of The Win, Kim Conley Loves Marathon Training, Kids Are Slowing Sara Hall Down and & 3 More Observations From Talking to the Top U.S. Women in New York

Team GB News

• Interesting Read: The Telegraph: “Where Do British Olympians Go After Glory? To A Unique Kind Of Job Fair” The “Athletes Future” job fair helps retiring Olympians figure out after a lifetime of sports “what the hell they’re going to do next.”
• Former World Indoor Champion Sprinter Jamie Baulch Says Don’t Write Off 400 Hurdler Dai Green Just Because He Lost His Funding “I’ve seen it time and time again when lottery funding gets stripped from an athlete and a year later they come out and run better than ever. Talent doesn’t go anywhere.”
• Brits Adam Gemili And Katarina Johnson-Thompson Still Searching For New Coaches They each left their UK based coaches after last season and are considering moving to the US. *2nd article
• Young Heptathlon Duo Ready To Take Over For Retiring Jessica Ennis-Hill 23-year-old Katarina Johnson-Thompson and 19-year-old Morgan Lake have potential, but will need to step-up a lot if they’re going to get to Ennis-Hill’s level.

Looking Ahead On The Roads

• December 4: Former WR Holder Patrick Makau Returns To Fukuoka To Shoot For A Hat-Trick Victory Makau has won the past two years, but will face two others with sub-2:05 PRs, including World silver medalist Yemane Tsegay (2:04:48) and James Kwambai (2:04:27). Field also includes Yuki Kawauchi, Eritrean record holder Yared Asmerom, Poland’s Henryk Szost and 2012 Olympic 10,000 bronze medalist Tariku Bekele in his debut.
• December 4: Olympic Champ Jemima Sumgong Vs. Two-Time World Champ Edna Kiplagat At Montferland Run 15K In The Netherlands
• Seb Coe Will Be At The Beirut Marathon Next Weekend

Week That Was

LRC Mark Wetmore Works His “Magic,” Foreigners In The NCAA, What Rita Jeptoo’s Doping Suspension Means For Her Coach And Agent + American Marathoners Bobby Curtis And Lindsay Flanagan In Frankfurt Colorado shined at PAC-12s. Is the Colorado magic really magic or just about developing talent? Plus a look at Rita Jeptoo‘s doping suspension, the number of foreign studs in NCAA XC, and the Americans at the Frankfurt Marathon.

Admin / Corruption News

• Canadian Olympic Committee Announces 4-Year Investment Plan To Boost Olympic Medal Prospects Maybe they can use some of that money to actually send some of their top marathoners to Worlds.
• Trump Hotel Used For Officials At Rio 2016 Implicated In Brazil Corruption Investigation Two businesses controlled by the Trump Organization are under investigation for diversion of pension fund money.
• Russian Paralympic Athletes Facing A Bleak Winter As Still Banned From Five Of The Six 2018 Paralympic Sports This means they might not even be able to qualify for the Winter Games if their bans aren’t lifted in time.
• Wood From Disaster Hit Areas In Japan To Be Used To Build Tokyo 2020 National Stadium
• Minsk, Belarus To Host 2019 European Games

NCAA XC *Full Schedule/Results

MB: Oficial NCAA XC Conference Weekend Discussion Thread

USTFCCCA Weekend Recap

Big 10 Men Wisconsin Regains Big 10 Crown Lead By Individual Win From Morgan McDonald
Big 10 Women Erin Finn Dominates Leading Michigan To A 7-Point Victory Over Penn State

Big 12 OSU Men (9th Straight), ISU Women Crowned Big 12 Champs Texas Tech’s Bernard Keter and Kansas’ Sharon Lokedi are the individual champs. *Results

Ivy Men: Penn Wins First Cross-Country Title Since 1973 Yale’s James Randon won the individual title.
Ivy Women: Harvard Wins First Title Since 1985 Courtney Smith led the way.

Big Sky NAU Men And Women Sweep Big Sky XC Titles NAU’s Futsum Zienasellassie and Weber State’s Ellie Child got the individual wins.

PAC-12 Men Wetmore And CU Do It Again Edward Cheserek has won his 4th PAC-12 title but the big news is CU has somehow won yet again. Oregon was just 4th.
*Oregon Men Go Home Devastated
*The Oregonian: Cheserek Is The First To Win Four Individual PAC-12 XC Titles Steve Prefontaine and Henry Rono only won 3.
PAC-12 Women Washington’s Neale And Colorado Win #1 Colorado was supreme – scoring just 32 points – the lowest at PAC-12s since 2008.

ACC Men Syracuse (29 Points) Crushes It, Led By Justyn Knight
*Justyn Knight Over King Ches?
ACC Women Anna Rohrer And NC State Win
*The Frazier Sisters Are Back! 

Big East Men Tiernan And Providence Georgetown Win Tiernan is the first 4-time Big East champ.
Big East Women Piccirillo And Providence Win

Mountain West Men Uchikoshi And Boise State Win
Mountain West Women Alice Wright And New Mexico Win NCAA favorite Brenna Peloquin was just 4th.
*Brenna Peloquin Fades And Finishes 4th At Mountain West

SEC Men: Alex George Leads Arkansas To Win
SEC Women: Arkansas And Schweizer Win

News From The Commonwealth

• Mary Keitany Says Her NY Training Has Gone Well “The training has been good and I feel ready for it.”
• Good News Agnes Jebet, Who Won World XC At Age 19 But Has Been Out For 18 Months, Is Back Training And Racing She wants to defend her title in Uganda.
• Nicole Sifuentes Always Said She Was Retiring After 2016 – Now She’s Changed Her Mind
• More Than 100 Activists March To Kenya’s Parliament To Demand Support For Intersex Children On International Day Of The Intersex Child
• Statistician Mark Butler Explains How The IAAF Narrows Down Its World Athlete Of The Year Candidates
• Eliud Kipchoge And Jemima Sumgong Win AIMS Best Marathon Runner Award For 2016
• Ed Whitlock Used To Be On The Same Track Team As Chris Chataway And Alan Turing In The UK

Doping News

• Wow WADA’s Independent Observers Blast Rio 2016 For Shoddy Anti-Doping Work The Brazilians weren’t very organized and the anti-doping effort in Rio took a huge hit. There was no blood testing of any weightlifters. In terms of out-of-competition testing, they often hit less than 50% of their daily target. Zero footballers (soccer players) were tested out of competition. *Full Report Here
  *WADA Insists Rio’s Integrity Not Undermined By Revelation That Half Of Drug Tests Aborted Because Athletes Couldn’t Be Found
• We 100% Agree Donovan Bailey: “I think for one you should press reset and get rid of all the records which were on the books if there has been a doping issue.”

The Power Of 4

• Oregon XC Is Being Dominated By 4 Ibrahim Brothers – All Born In Kenyan Refugee Camp
• Quadruplets Are Going To Run NYC Marathon This Year

Distance News

• Good Read This Is #1 NAU’s Coach Eric Heins’s Last Year As A College Coach As He’s Quitting So His Wife Can Enjoy Her Dream Job And He’ll Have More Time For His Family *Discuss
• Ben Rosario Enjoys Being The Underdog But Ultimately He Wants NAZ Elite To Be A “Big Dog” (Video)
• IAAF Middle And Long Distance AOY Voting Closes At End Of Week If Almaz Ayana doesn’t win the women’s award, there is no justice.
• Since Uganda Is Hosting World XC In March, They Aren’t Messing Around – 49 Athletes Ordered To Start Training Next Week
• Osaka Marathon Is This Weekend – A Look At The Elite Fields The World’s 7th largest marathon is an oddity as it has an elite field that’s not great, but just good enough to ensure there isn’t a Japanese winner.