Pre-Super Saturday Previews And Features
LRC Armory Track Invite, Camel City, Karlsruhe & Nitro Athletics Down Under: Your Guide To One Of 2017’s Busiest Running Weekends There will be A TON of action across the globe on Saturday, from the West Coast of the US to the East Coast to Germany to Usain Bolt in Australia. There’s no way you can watch the entirety of all five meets, so we preview the best matchups in chronological order and suggest you enjoy the best races from the each meet a la carte, including Hellen Obiri vs. Laura Muir over 3,000, Leo Manzano vs. Paul Chelimo in a mile and a Robby Andrews-led squad going for the 4 x 800 WR.
Camel City LRC Q&A: Leo Manzano On How He Went From Unable To Walk To 4th At The Olympic Trials In 9 Weeks, Why He Excels In Championship Races, Breaking 1:44 In The 800 & Much More Manzano reveals that last year he came back from pneumonia not one, not two, not three, but four times to take fourth at the Olympic Trials. This year, fortunately the 32-year-old says things are going great and he’s expecting a big year and next few years as he wants to compete as long as he can like Meb K and Bernard L.
USA XC LRC Men’s Preview: Chris Derrick Looks For His 4th Title Against Red-Hot Leonard Korir And 2016 Olympian Shadrack Kipchirchir You’d better be tough (and talented) if you want to make the 2017 World XC team as the conditions are going to be difficult and the field is stacked with 8 of the top 9 from the Olympic 10,000 Trials. Derrick — and almost everyone else — missed out on last year’s race, but he’s back after three-peating from 2013 through 2015 but he’ll have his hands full with the Kenyan-born talent in Scott Simmons‘ group that is taking America by storm.
LRC Chris Derrick Is Back, Baby! After Struggling With Injuries, Derrick Hopes To Win USA XC Title #4 This Weekend Derrick battled a series of injuries during the last Olympic cycle, but he ran 27:38 on the track in November and has been logging 100+ “Badger” miles in Flagstaff this winter. Healthy once again, he’s hoping to regain his title at Saturday’s USA XC Champs, a race he won three times from 2013 to 2015. The bad news is he me may not do World XC.
*MB: Who will win 2017 USA Cross Country Championship in Bend Oregon this Saturday afternoon?
LRC Women’s Preview: Who Will Win a Wide-Open Race? There’s no clear favorite in this one, which could lead to an exciting race on Saturday. Olympian Courtney Frerichs, 2015 champ Laura Thweatt, Aliphine Tuliamuk, Sarah Pagano and Kellyn Taylor are the biggest names entered.
Camel City LRC Q&A: Canadian 800 Star Melissa Bishop Opens Up About Her Olympic Heartbreak, What It’s Like Racing Caster Semenya And Why She Stayed In Canada For College In HS, Bishop was dropped by US colleges on the recruitment trail when she got injured. Now a decade later, she is the Canadian record holder at 1:57.02 and very well could be the Olympic champ had CAS ruled differently. Bishop, who was 2nd at Worlds in 2015 and 4th at the Olympics last year, is opening her 2017 season on Saturday at the Camel City Elite in North Carolina. We caught up with the 28-year-old over the phone on Sunday to about Camel City and her plans for 2017.