November 30, 2016 | LetsRun.com

2017 London Worlds Will Be Hear Before You Know It

LRC IAAF Announces 2017 World Championships Entry Standards – Which Ones Got Easier And Which Ones Got Harder? Find out what the pros will have to run, jump or throw if they want to compete in London next summer. Also why is the IAAF sexist

Our Weekly Recap

WTW Galen Rupp Bombs, Ben True Shines, Meet America’s 13-Year-Old Phenom, The Return Of Chris Derrick And Much More Thanksgiving may be a holiday for most Americans but a ton of US pros decided to go to work and race last week. We break it down and give you the scoop on Mary Cain‘s knee injury.

Marathon On A Track

LRC Would A Marathon On A Track Be Faster Than A Marathon On The Roads? What would happen if this LetsRun meme became a reality?
*MB: Marathon on a Track (Surface) – How Much Faster if Any Do You Think it Would Be?

Usain Bolt Premiere Night In The Books

Usain Bolt Confirms He Won’t Be Racing The 200m Next Year But he’s always said it was his favorite event?
Bolt Talks About Struggling With Motivation Ahead Of Rio As Training “Just Wasn’t Fun Anymore” He says he’s now more “relaxed and happy” because he knows training isn’t “going to be so intense.”
The Telegraph: “You Won’t Find Much Doping Or Corruption In Bolt’s New Film, But Does That Matter? Let Him Be An Inspiration” Ben Bloom writes that the documentary “Clearly fails to foster any semblance of objectivity, [but] was never going to be a warts-and-all expose of athletics’ seedy underbelly – it is a personal journey charting two years in the life of a hero.”
Athletics Weekly Gives Good Review Of Bolt Documentary “[It] doesn’t fall into the trap of trotting out samey platitudes or regurgitating what everyone already knows about its subject.”
Mo Farah, Arsenal And Chelsea Players Among Stars At Usain Bolt Documentary Premiere
Bolt Named “CEO” Of Maison Mumm Champagne Company That would be “chief entertainment officer.”
Bolt Says 2017 Is “Mostly For The Fans”

Distance Profiles / Interviews

Good Read: Profile On NYC Marathon Champ Ghirmay Ghebresalassie Most pros plan their weddings for the off season, but Ghebreslassie kissed his wedding ring as he won in NYC as he had just got married a month earlier. Even crazier, he had only known his wife for a few months.
Matt Centrowitz Feels Racing In The NCAA Prepared Him For Tactical Professional Races Talking about the Rio 1,500 final, Centro said, “I don’t think anyone in that race, especially from Africa, had ever been in a 3:50 1,500-meter race in their life.”
Interesting Q&A With Olympic Steeplechase Champ Conseslus Kipruto Kipruto talks about his first sporting love being soccer, getting lapped in his first 10K, making his own toys as a kid and his childhood dog “saving” him from a kid who wanted to fight.

NCAA News

Justyn Knight Says Not Making The Rio Olympics Motivated Him This XC Season “I told myself to remember the feeling of hurt and make sure not to feel like that again.”
IAAF Profile: “The Best Is Yet To Come For Edward Cheserek” Cheserek shares he ran “14-something” when he started running in Kenya “without even training” and Coach Andy Powell says he’s “never worked with anyone as good as Cheserek,” including Matt Centrowitz.
Good Read: NY Times Obituary For Legendary Texas Coach Stan Huntsman When Ohio University (where Huntsman got his master’s) cut their track program, he was so angry he mailed back his degree and had the school remove his plaque from the hall of fame.
*USTFCCCA Tribute In his career, Huntsman produced 41 N.C.A.A. individual champions and 201 All-Americans.
*MB: Former “UT” Track Coach Stan Huntsmann Has Died
Register-Guard: Kate Murphy Headlines Oregon’s 2017 Recruting Class The Ducks are also getting Susan Ejore, a Kenyan junior college transfer who was NJCAA XC runner-up.

Craziness In Kenya

More News From Africa Wayde van Niekerk And Many South African Stars Likely Won’t Be At 2017 SA Champs – They’ll Be At World Relays Instead

Sports Politics: New USATF President Next Week

Ken Goe On USATF Presidential Election: “Vin Lananna Is Aiming High And Thinking Big (Again)” Goe compares the contrasting campaign platforms of Lananna and Jackie Joyner-Kersee while Pole Vault Power’s sport activist Becca Gillespy Peter thinks Lananna is “more qualified to be president.”
Q&A With Vin Lananna, Who Tells Masters Athletes Why He Should Be USATF President
Lananna’s Campaign Page
Joyner-Kersee’s Campaign Page
USTFCCCA Endorces Vin Lananna For USATF President
LA Mayor Eric Garcetti Says Donald Trump Expressed His Support For LA’s 2024 Olympic Bid During A Phone Call Wednesday Garcetti supported Hillary Clinton during the election and had slammed Trump as a “racist” and a “bigot.”
*LA 2024 Bid Chief Executive Says “Donald Trump Loves The Olympic Games And Will Be A Big Supporter” And That He “Can Be A Flag Waver For The Olympic Movement”
Hugh Robertson Elected To Replace Seb Coe As Chairman Of British Olympic Assocation Hugh was Sports Minister for the 2012 Olympics and has been serving as the BOA vice-chairman.

An Inside Look At What Going Pro Out Of HS Is Really Like

LRC New $50,000 BMW Or A $70,000 Lexus? What It’s Like To Go Pro In Track & Field As A Teenager In recent years, Ajee Wilson, Mary Cain, Alexa Efraimson, Drew Hunter, Kaylin Whitney, Candace Hill, Vashti Cunningham and the Lyles Brothers have all gone pro early. We take a look at that it entails.

Lots Of The Top Individual Talent Will Be At NXN This Year Live Webcast Saturday @ 12:30PM ET Results

Embed from Getty Images

LRC 2016 NXN Girls’ Preview: Fayetteville-Manlius Favored For 10th (!!!) National Title; Consensus U.S. #1 Brie Oakley Takes on 4:07 1500 Runner Kate Murphy in Individual Race American distance fans, it’s time to meet Brie Oakley. Oakley, who only started running last year, posted the top Tully Runners speed rating in six years at the Colorado state meet (32 secs faster than Katie Rainsberger ran in ’15) but Murphy hasn’t lost all fall and has killer track speed. Team-wise, F-M are the favorites but will need all five scorers to run well as there’s a big gap to #6.

LRC 2016 NXN Boys’ Preview: Casey Clinger Looks To Make History & Lead American Fork (UT) To Its First National Title No boy has ever won two NXN individual titles, but defending champ Casey Clinger could do just that on Saturday. He’s also the top man on the nation’s top team, American Fork, which will be looking to improve on its runner-up finish last year and win it all in Portland.

MB: Sophomore Claudia Lane Runs 16:45 At California’s Historic State Meet Course, Woodward Park Lane’s time was #3 all-tme on the course where Sarah Baxter has the record at 16:39.7.
RunBLogRun: Observations From NXN NY Regionals
DyeStat: FM Girls Predicted To Win NXN
DyeStat Boys Projections: American Fork Favored

GB News

Video: Tom Hanks And Mo Farah Talk About Running, Getting The “Run, Forrest Run” Treatment Not even Mo Farah has avoided being yelled the famous movie line while out on a run.
Mo Farah On Shortlist For BBC Sports Personality Of The Year Award Also on the short list are boxer Nicola Adams, tennis star Andy Murray, triathlete Alistair Brownlee and several Paralympians.
Good Read: GB’s Young Sprint Star Diana Asher-Smith Is Hoping To “Get Some Muscle” On Her “Little Chicken Wings” To Get To The Next Level In 2017 Asher-Smith won 4 x 100 bronze in Rio, but was 5th in the 200 and knows it’s going to be a challenge to get on the individual podium in London. *Short BBC Video Interview With Asher-Smith
UK Sport Makes Last Ditch Plea To Government For Funding Less people are playing the UK National Lottery, which is where most of UK Sport’s income comes from. They are hoping the government will make up the $37 million they will be short over 4 years.
Gemma Steel And Andrew Butchart Head GB Euro Cross Team Euro XC Champs are in Chia, Italy on December 11th.

Could We See A Garrett Heath – Mo Farah Rematch? Farah Wants To Run Great Edinburgh XC On January 7th Farah: “I placed second in this race last year and hope to go one better in 2017.”

Be Inspired

Recommended Read: Overweight High Schooler Was Motivated To Start Running By Bullies Who Called Him “Pillsbury Doughboy;” Now He’s One Of The Fastest Runners In His School’s History Running changed David Czerwonky‘s life as he went from being bullied and over weight, to 30 pounds lighter, a confident and decent high school runner and the school Homecoming King.
Former Competitive Runner With Terminal Lung Disease Finishes Seattle Marathon Pulling His Own Oxygen Tank Evans Wilson walked the 26.2 in just under 11 hours to raise money for Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation.
Age Is Just A Number: Sydney McLaughlin And Irene OBera Are USATF Youth And Masters Athletes Of The Year McLaughlin obviously made the Olympics as a 16-year-old while Obera won won W80 gold in the 100, 200, 80m hurdles, 200m hurdles, LJ, 4 x 100m, 4 x 400m, and the heptathlon at the World Masters Championships.

Saturday Action

MB: Chris Derrick runs 27:38.69 in Japan, race is dominated by 3:28 man Ronald Kwemoi in 27:33! November is full of intrigue in Japan. Race video available.
*Japan Running News Recap

Rio 5,000 6th Placer Andrew Butchart Coasts To British Euro Cross Trials Victory Butchart won over fellow Olympians Callum Hawkins and Andy Vernon while Gemma Steel won the women’s race.
Uganda’s Timothy Toroitich And Ireland’s Fionnuala McCormack Win IAAF Series XC Meet In Alcobendas, Spain Toroitich won over Eritrea’s Aron Kifle and steepler Jarius Birech while McCormack dominated by more than 30 seconds.
IAAF Weekend XC Report: Ethiopia’s World U20 Champions Selemon Barega And Beyenu Degefa Win In France At the Tuskys Wareng XC race in Kenya, Ronald Kirui and World 5,000 finalist Irene Cheptai took the wins.
Japan Post Group Wins Japan National Corporate Women’s Ekiden Championships The team featured Rio track Olympians Ayuko Suzuki and Hanami Sekine.

Drug News: New Fancy Bears Release

Latest Fancy Bears Hack Targets USADA, British Athletes And Craig Reedie The hackers shared email exchanges which discuss “high profile” Americans who have unusual blood values and a tip that two US athletes were using cocaine to lose weight before Rio. The emails also reveal Reedie’s home phone # and some Brit TUEs, including Adam Gemili taking painkillers after a hamstring tear. *2nd Article
After Finishing 5th In Beijing 2008, British Women’s 4 X 400 Squad In Line To Receive The Bronze Medal Russia was already DQed and now the Belarus squad that finished 4th is too after Sviatlana Usovich was caught in doping retests.
Irish Journalist Says He Was Uninvited From Usain Bolt Documentary Premiere Because He Asks/Writes About Doping
Belarus Hammer Thrower Aksana Miankova To Be Stripped Of Her 2008 Olympic Hammer Gold She’s also DQed from the London 2012 Games (7th place) after her frozen samples from both Games came back positive. Belarus’ Beijing 4th place shot putter Pavel Lyzhyn and Nastassia Mironchyk-Ivanova (London 2012 7th place LJ) were also caught in doping re-tests.

News From The UK

NCAA Photo Galleries 1,000+ Photos Men’s Gallery Women’s Cross Gallery *NCAA Banquet Photo Gallery

Doping Updates: Chernova Finally Loses Her 2011 Gold

Video: Full English Video Of Latest ARD Russian Doping Report The story by ARD and French newspaper Le Monde show the scale of cover-ups and extortion by the IAAF extended to more athletes besides Liliya Shobukhova.
Russian Heptathlete Tatyana Chernova Stripped Of Her 2011 World Title And 2012 Olympic Bronze You’ll remember Chernova was previously caught doping, but only given a selective ban that had her keeping her championship medals. Russian mid-d runners Ekaterina Sharmina and Kristina Ugarova were also given doping bans.
*Jessica Ennis Will Now Have Three World Titles To Her Name *2nd Article
Summary Of IOC Retesting From The 2008 & 2012 Games No surprise – Russia has twenty more positives and ten more stripped medals than the next closes nation.
Rune Andersen, Head Of Task Force Dealing With Russia’s Suspension, Will Report An Update To The IAAF Tomorrow With the Rio Games long over, it’s easy to forget that all Russian track and field athletes are still banned from international competition.
InsideTheGames’ Nick Butler: “IOC And WADA Need To Stop Fighting If Genuine Improvement Is Ever Going To Be Made In War On Doping” Butler slams all the politics behind the anti-doping movement.
IAAF Launches Online Portal To Report Doping Anyone can report suspicious activity or tips anonymously through this site.
What A Joke: Russian TV Station To Air Film About “Foreign Athletes Doping” Although it sounds like it probably will bring up some valid concerns about the TUE system.
IAAF Athletes Commission Declares Full Support For Proposed IAAF Governance Structure Reforms The proposed reforms include a new Integrity Unit which will “enforce higher ethical standards.”
Usain Bolt Video Interview: “Doping Cheats Be Given Life Bans”

End Of Year Track News

SPIKES Looks At The Top Moments Of 2016 For AOY Finalists Almaz Ayana, Elaine Thompson And Anita Wlodarczyk
Wayde van Niekerk Beats Out Caster Semenya For South African Sports Star Of The Year Van Niekerk’s 74-year-old coach Ans Botha was named coach of the year.
Remaining London 2017 Worlds Tickets On Sale Today
Friday: IAAF Prepares To Host End Of Year Award Event In Monaco

Olympic News

IOC Warn Tokyo 2020 TO Keep Costs “Significantly Less” Than Their Announced $20 Billion Budget Cap The IOC doesn’t want countries to think they need to spend $20 billion to host the Games.
Rio 2016 Claim “Only” Two Workers And 700 Suppliers Remain Still To Be Paid InsideTheGames writes, “But the sums owed are still thought to amount to millions of dollars in what is an unprecedented situation in recent Olympic history.”
Rio Mayor Admits Economic And Political Problems Caused Challenges “Every Day” Before Rio 2016
Eurosport Confirmed As Exclusive German Broadcaster For Next Four Olympic Games

Election Season Isn’t Over Yet

PoleVaultPower’s Becca Peter Interviews USATF Presidential Candidates Jackie Joyner-Kersee And Vin Lananna Read how each candidates responses differed to a series of questions about their views on a variety of issues impacting the sport.

High School XC

Results: 2016 Foot Locker Regional Cross-Country Results 30 of the 40 finalists are set. Find out who they are here. The Affolder brothers (one in 10th grade and one in 12th) went 1-2 in the Northeast.
Kate Murphy Raised Her Arms In The Shape Of An “O” As She Led Lake Braddock’s Girls To NXN
Race Cheats Starting Young: NJ High School Runner Caught Cheating At NXN Northeast Meet For the second time this season, Terry Varicelli was caught hopping into the race at the end, this time “finishing” in 27th place with a time about 2:30 faster than his PR.
*MB: High school runner caught cheating again
MB: Freshman Graydon Morris Qualifies for FLN
More Super Saturday Coverage Including NXN Action Is Here
NXN At-Large Teams Announced
MB: DJ Principe 15:17 Breaking Bowdoin CR
MB: Quick predictions of At-Large Bids for NXN Announced here.

Doping News: ARD Report Exposes More IAAF-Russian Cover-Ups

Breaking: New Report By ARD And French Newspaper Le Monde Shows IAAF-Russian Doping Cover-Ups And Extortion Was Even Larger Than Thought In addition to Liliya Shobukhova, five other Russian athletes were blackmailed by the IAAF to cover up doping with huge sums of money getting shifted around behind the scenes by IAAF officials. Apparently Shobukhova dropping out of the 2012 Olympics was planned in advance so she didn’t have to get a medal revoked.
*MB: Le Monde and ARD Detail How IAAF Heads Blackmailed Russians for Millions of $ to Coverup Positives
*MB: Russian allegation: British Olympic champ involved in doping coverup. Any insight on who it is?
Allegation: “British Olympic Champion” Caught Up In Alleged IAAF Doping Cover-Up
*MB: Russian allegation: British Olympic champ involved in doping coverup. Any insight on who it is?
AP: “Emails Show ‘Total Protection’ Cover-Up Shielded Russian Cheats”
*Athletics Weekly Article
TASS: Former Russian Athletics Head Valentin Balakhnichev Denies Colluding With The IAAF

More Doping News

After Meldonium Positive, Abeba Aregawi Says From Now On She’ll Consult One Of Sweden’s Top Doctors Before Taking Any Supplements Aregawi’s absence from competition this year was a big boon for the Americans.
Aksana Miankova Of Belarus Will Lose 2008 Gold Medal To Doping

Upcoming Distance Action

Sunday: Uganda’s Former World XC 5th Placer Timothy Toroitich Faces Steepler Jairus Birech And Eritrea’s Aron Kifle At Alcobendas Spanish XC Race Women’s race has former Euro XC champ Fionnuala McCormack vs. Ethiopia’s Etenesh Diro (5th in the 2012 Olympic steeple).
Sunday: IAAF Preview Of IAU 100K World Championships: Sweden’s Jonas Buud And GB’s Joasia Zakrzewski Are The Favorites
Next Sunday: Daniel Tapia, Sergio Reyes, Stephanie Bruce And Clara Santucci Lead US Field For CIM Marathon The international field is lead by Elisha Barno (2:09:45) and Sarah Kiptoo (2:26:31).

D3 Runner Gets Mauled

LRC Video: Deer Collision Sends NCAA D-III Runner Flying During Cross-Country Race If you think a cramp is the worst thing to fear in a race, you’ve never had anyone yell, “Watch out for the deer!”