February 27, 2017 | LetsRun.com

BU Last Chance

LRC Q&A Q&A With Andy Powell: Oregon Distance Coach Discusses the Greatness of Edward Cheserek, Learning from Centro and Salazar & How He Peaks Athletes For NCAAs We caught up with Powell after Cheserek’s collegiate record 3:52.01 mile in Boston and he shared details on Oregon’s training system, how Cheserek bounced back from his defeat at NCAA XC and his relationship with Centrowitz, whom he coached to World Championship bronze in 2011.

LRC Fast Times in Boston: Edward Cheserek (3:52.01) Breaks NCAA Mile Record, Mo Ahmed (13:04.60) Sets Canadian Record to Lead 4 Men Under 13:10 The record-breaking 2017 is underway. Kyle Merber 2nd.
Discuss: Ches FTW!!!!! Merber goes home devastated
*MOH AHMED 13:04 OFF 8FLAT 3K!! Ahmed 13:04.6, Jenkins 13:05. 8, True 13:06.7, Hill 13:07.6, Kincaid 13:12.2, Lomong 13:12.2, Campbell 13:14.4, Derrick 13:19.3

BU Last Chance

LRCFast Times in Boston: Edward Cheserek (3:52.01) Breaks NCAA Mile Record, Mo Ahmed (13:04.60) Sets Canadian Record to Lead 4 Men Under 13:10

The record-breaking 2017 is underway. Kyle Merber 2nd.
Discuss: Ches FTW!!!!! Merber goes home devastated
*MOH AHMED 13:04 OFF 8FLAT 3K!! Ahmed 13:04.6, Jenkins 13:05. 8, True 13:06.7, Hill 13:07.6, Kincaid 13:12.2, Lomong 13:12.2, Campbell 13:14.4, Derrick 13:19.3

A Magical Day In Japan As Both All-Comers Records Fall @ Tokyo *Results

LRC Wilson Kipsang Enters All-Time Great Status With 2:03:58 Japanese All-Comers Record In Tokyo Kipsang now has 4 sub-2:04 clockings to his name. No one else has more than 2. Andrew Bumbalough ran 2:13:58 in his debut.

LRC Kenyan Sarah Chepchirchir Announces Herself As A Marathon Star, Wins Tokyo In 2:19:47; American Sara Hall Runs Big PR Of 2:28: 26 Betsy Saina went for it big-time and blew up and dropped out.

Conference Champs Weekend *Conference Championships Central

MPSF: Results
Oregon Ducks Win MPSF Men’s Title; Women Get Second To USC The men beat USC by 6 points while the women lost to USC by 20. Katie Rainsberger just beat out BYU’s Shea Collinsworth in the mile with 4:35 and Ali Cash won the 3K (9:09).
Colorado Closes Out MPSF With Two Titles From Ben Saarel In The Mile And John Dressel In The 3K
*MB: Are Saarel, Klecker, and Perrin really 3:55-3:56 milers? Six second adjustment…really?
UO’s Hannah Cunliffe Breaks Jenna Prandini’s MPSF 60m Record With 7.15 Seconds Oregon dominated the event going 1-2-4.
USC Women Win MPSF Title; Men Take Second
California wins men’s DMR in 9:34 as a sans-Edward Cheserek Oregon squad was a DNF. Colorado got wins from their women’s DMR (10:58), and Joe Klecker (13:56) and Erin Clark (15:50) in the 5,000s.
Ken Goe Has A Nice Profile On Cheserek Walking Through His Career Highlights As He Prepares To Break The Record For Most NCAA Titles Coach Andy Powell says that Cheserek wants to try and “run some fast times” this year.

SEC: Results
Texas A&M’s Fred Kerley Wins SEC 400 After Running 44.94 In The Heats To Put Himself Sixth On The All-Time List Alabama’s Jereem Richards set a 200m world lead with 20.34.
Arkansas Sweeps Men’s And Women’s SEC Indoor Championships The third straight title for the women and fifth in the last six years for the men. In the mid-d events, recent 800 record setter Jazmine Fray won in 2:02.62 while Andres Arroyo won the men’s race (1:47.18) and Karissa Schweizer took the mile (4:37).
Georgia’s Keturah Orji Sets The NCAA And American Triple Jump Record With 14.32m
Tori Weeks Is The Newest Collegiate 15-Foot Pole Vaulter Tori set a PR of 15-0 (4.57m) to beat her identical twin, Rio Olympian Lexi Weeks, at SEC Champs.
Day 1 Recap/Video Highlights: Georgia Men, Arkansas Women Are Ahead Going Into Final Day
Georgia Men First, Women Second After SEC Day 1
Georgia’s Kendell Williams Sets Record By Winning Her Third Straight SEC Pentathlon Title

ACC: Results
Impressive Doubles From Miami’s Shakima Wimbley And Southern Illinois’ Julian Harvey Wimbley set a 400 world lead in 51.20 and won the 200 in 22.83 while Harvey took the HJ (2.21m) and LJ (8.17m world lead).
Justyn Knight Runs 13:50 And 8:05 To Claim 3000/5000 Double At ACC Champs
Notre Dame Women Gets Impressive Wins In Women’s 5K And Mile Anna Rohrer dominated the 5K in 15:38 while Jessica Harris ran 4:33.80 to just beat out Clemson’s Grace Barnett by .06. They also won the DMR in 11:02.
Virginia Tech Men Run Away With Men’s ACC Title V-Tech relied on a slew of distance wins as they went 1-2 in the 800 lead by Patrick Joseph‘s 1:46.23, Vincent Ciattei took down NCAA champ Henry Wynne to win the mile, they won the DMR in 9:31 and Hanna Green took the 800 in 2:02.28.
Miami Women Repeat As ACC Champions
Virginia Men, Louisville Women Lead ACC After Day 1
Thursday Recap: Virginia Tech Men (9:31) And Notre Dame Women (11:02) Take DMR Titles

Big 12: Results
Texas Men And Baylor Women Take Home Big 12 Titles As Close Battles Come Down To The Last Events
It Was The First Big 12 Title Ever For Baylor
Joshua Thompson And Kaela Edwards Lead Oklahoma State Distance Domination Edwards won the 800 while Thompson took double victory in the mile and 1,000m. Kansas’ Stryma Livingston took the 800 in 1:48.40.
Oklahoma’s Dylan Blankenbaker Just Edges Oklahoma State’s Hassan Abdi In Close 5,000 Blankenbaker just nipped Abdi by .02.
Kansas Men Lead After First Day
Baylor Women In The Lead After Day 1

Big Ten: *Full Results
Indy Star: Daniel Khuhn Leads IU To Men’s Big Ten Title Kuhn ran the 5th-fastest 600m in history with 1:15.23. and ran a leg on IU’s 9:34 winning DMR. Penn State’s Isaiah Harris won the 800 in 1:47.23.
Penn State Women Nip Purdue By 2.5 Points To Win Big Ten Champs

Big Sky: NAU Men And Women Sweep Big Sky Indoor Titles *Results

Masters News

Recommended Read: Runner Self Detects A Heart Attack Based On His Split Times Slowing In A Workout Chris Gould‘s pain never went above 2 on a 1-10 scale, but he knew something was wrong when he planned to run 1,200m at 81 seconds per lap and only managed to close in 89.
RIP: GB’s Former Mile World Record Holder Derek Ibbotson Dies Aged 84 Ibbotson won 5,000m bronze at the 1956 Games and broke John Landy‘s mile WR in 1957 with 3:57.2.
*Video Of Ibbotson’s WR Race
RW: “99-Year-Old “Upsets” 92-Year-Old In Thrilling Sprint” .05 separated the two at in the USATF Masters 60m dash. The video is worth a watch.
USATF Athlete Of The Week Is Masters Record Setter Kathy Martin In the W65 mile she broke the American and world record with 6:01 and also set American records in the 800 and 3,000.

Cross-Country News

Japan’s 2:22 Marathoner Kayoko Fukushi Looks Back Fondly At Her World XC Experiences She believes running XC (she was 6th at 2006 Worlds) helped her achieve more on the roads, where she won World Marathon bronze in 2013.
Messed Up: Dozens Of Spikes Deliberately Placed On Trail To Sabotage Runners One runner’s foot was impaled by one of the nails on the North Carolina trail. Officials have gone on to find 50 to 60 nails so far.
Georgia Taylor-Brown, The “Forgotten Star” Of The UK Cross-Country Scene, Hopes To Make Comeback At Tomorrow’s National Championships Three years ago she was 4th in the Euro Jr. XC race and 17th at World XC Jrs., but has since struggled with injury and needed two operations for a stress fracture in her foot.
IAAF: Only One Month To Go Until World XC Championships In Uganda It will be the fifth time World XC will be hosted by Africa, but the first time for the mixed 4 x 2k relay.

Olympic News

IOC Vows To “Further Adjust” Candidature Process For The Olympics After Budapest 2024 Withdrawal Thomas Bach may use this as an excuse to push through with giving LA and Paris the 2024 and 2028 Games at the same time as he argues the current system “produces too many losers.”
Budapest 2024 Athletes’ Committee “Indescribably Sad” Over Bid Withdrawal
CBS Los Angeles: “Hosting Olympics Is A Risk LA Is Willing To Take” Mayor Eric Garcetti: “There’s 88 percent support, LA has been able to turn a profit and will do it again.”
Olympic Columnist: “Thomas Bach Must Now Push For 2024 And 2028 Vote This Year”
Study Finds Only 7% In The UK Were Inspired To Take Up Sport By The 2012 Olympics Part of the London 2012 legacy was to inspire “millions” more young people to take part in sport.
*Only 4% Say They Would Prefer GB To Focus On Winning Medals In Tokyo 2020 Ahead Of Investigating In Grassroots Programs/Facilities

Week That Was

LRC WTW: Will They Be The Sport’s Next Superstars Or Are They On Their Way To Being Overpaid Flops? Our Young Phenom Report Card: Alexa Efraimson, Konstanze Klosterhalfen, Casey Clinger, Cameron And Tyrese Cooper, Plus Jeremy Wariner Does The 1,200 We span the globe and recap the week in running.

Sprint/Field News

60m World Leader Ronnie Baker Ran XC In Alaska As A Kid, Now He’s Making A Name For Himself As A World Class Sprinter The TCU grad still lives and trains in Fort Worth.
Becca Peter Of Pole Vault Power Discusses Whether Mondo Duplantis Is The Best High School Vaulter Ever Duplantis has vaulted 18′ 10″ but Peter points out Casey Carrigan held the world record in high school back in the ’60s.
Nice Profile On Harry Jerome: Canadian World Class Sprinter Who Died Too Young At The Age Of 42 Vancouver Sun
Track & Field News In-Depth: Can Jenn Suhr, Sandi Morris Or Demi Payne Get Yelena Isinbayeva’s World Record?
Irish Hurdles Legend (4th At This Year’s Olympics) Thomas Barr Gives Some Tips Watching the Irish journalists go nuts during his run was one of our highlights of the Olympics.
Thando Roto Ran Wind-Aided 9.98 In S. Africa

2017 Abbott World Marathon Majors Kick Off In Tokyo This Sunday

Andrew Bumbalough Ready For His Marathon Debut In Tokyo Sounds like he might be shooting for 2:11+.
Wilson Kipsang Revved Up To Reclaim Marathon WR In Tokyo The CR is 2:05:42 by Dickson Chumba and this year’s course is faster with a couple of hills taken out.
A Look At Some Of 2:07:48 Marathoner Arata Fujiwara’s Training In Iten Kenya Before Tokyo Marathon
Olympic Champ Jemima Sumgong’s Training Partner Sarah Chepchirchir Running Tokyo

Update on NOP & The Sunday Times

LRC More From Leaked USADA Report- Alberto Salazar and Dr. Brown Used Risky “Procedures and Prescriptions Medications” to Increase Testosterone and Boost Performance USADA’s leaked report says Salazar, “repeatedly ignored the medical evidence and his athletes’ long-term health prospects”.

LRC Leaked USADA Report From 2016 Says Alberto Salazar “Almost Certainly” Broke Anti-Doping Rules, Used Prescription Meds And Drug Infusions To Boost Performance The Sunday Times got the report from the Russian Fancy Bear hack. Much of it is previous allegations about L-Carnitine, but we also have allegations that Mo Farah (and others) were given prescription drugs for performance-enhancing (not medical) reasons and this tidbit that Alberto told Lance Armstrong: “Lance call me ASAP! We have tested it and it’s amazing.” *Discuss

Steve Magness Says He Was A “Human Guinea Pig” For The Nike Oregon Project Magness was once given a litre of the amino acide L-carnitine to test for Salazar which is 20 times the maximum legal amount.
The Guardian‘s Sean Ingle Thinks “Alberto Salazar And Mo Farah Still Have Many Questions To Answer” Meanwhile, Salazar says The Sunday Times “simply recycled old allegations” from two years ago.
Salazar Denies Drug Allegations On L-carnitine Salazar said “[It’s] a widely available, legal nutritional supplement that is not banned … any use of L-carnitine was done so within WADA guidelines.”
Ken Goe: “If There Is Evidence Alberto Salazar Broke Rules, Where Is It?”
MB: Ex NOP coach Vern Gambetta refers to Salazar as “Diabolical Maniac”
Mo Farah Says He Is “Deeply Frustrated”; Denies Breaking Drug Rules Farah accuses The Sunday Times of adding his name to the story to make it “more interesting.”
MB: The Farah “prescription drug” was for VITAMIN D

International Weekend Action

Sam Chelanga (28:19) And Mary Wacera (31:41) Win Over Deep Fields At World’s Best 10K Chelanga won by 2-seconds over Phillip Langat and Stephen Sambu while Wacera beat out Mamitu Daska to win her third title.
MB: Germany’s Konstanze Klosterhalfen Solos 4:04.91 To Win German National 1,500 By 20+ Seconds
New Zealand’s Olympic Bronze Medalist Eliza McCartney Breaks The Oceania Pole Vault Record With 4.82m At Auckland Track Challenge At the same meet, Ryan Crouser extended his world lead with a 22.15m throw to beat NZ’s Tom Walsh and Jacko Gill and Brett Robinson won the 5,000 (13:22).
Genzebe Dibaba Sets Ethiopian 1,000m National Record, But Misses World Record At Madrid Meet Dibaba ran 2:33.06, missing Maria Mutola‘s 2:30.94 WR. In other action, Adam Kszczot won the 800 in 1:46, Grenada’s Bralon Taplin took the 400 in 45.19, Ruth Beitia cleared 1.98m in the HJ.
IAAF Indoor Round-Up: Ivana Spanovic Improves Her Long Jump World Lead To 6.89m At The Balkan Indoor Champs
Croatia’s Sandra Perkovic And Sara Kolak Have Impressive Openers At Croatian Winter Throwing Championships Perkovic threw 70.23m, the seventh 70m+ competition of her career.

Sport Politics

Sarah Barker For Deadspin: “The IAAF Seeks To Restrict The Mark For African Runners” Barker addresses the nation switching debate, summing it up by saying, “This issue comes down to a debate over the definition of athletics. Is it a national sport in which all runners are assigned to a team by accident of birth, or is it an individual sport of free agents in which athletes attempt to maximize their potential by being mobile, by joining the team that offers the most beneficial contract?”
InsideTheGames: “Budapest Withdrawal Deals Blow To IOC And Casts Further Doubt Over Agenda 2020” Out of the original five cities bidding for the 2024 games, three pulled out even before the real race started.

Russian Doping Updates

WADA Confirms There Might Not Be Enough Evidence To Sanction Some Russians From McLaren Report A WADA statement said “Many samples were disposed of by the Moscow laboratory” and “Requests to Russian authorities by Professor McLaren for additional evidence went unanswered.”
Alan Abrahamson: “Less Rhetoric, More Constructive Problem Solving” Abrahamson criticizes the upcoming US Congress hearings on Russian doping, arguing they should focus on issues at home.

Latest Doping News

Russia Doesn’t Expect To Get Any More Athletes Into Next Week’s European Championships US-based long jumper Darya Klishina is the only Russian competing as of now.
WADA Admits McLaren Report Evidence Not Sufficient To Impose Suspensions In “Many Cases” Apparently a stumbling block is proving that athletes knew their samples were being tampered with … However, if they were tampered with, then that means they were almost certainly doping anyway.
Civil Lawsuit Trial Against Lance Armstrong Starts November 6th In Washington D.C.

Doping Updates: Russians Return

IAAF Approves The Application Of 3 Russians To Compete As Neutral Athletes The athletes are Euro indoor champ Anzhelika Sidorova (pole vault), Kristina Sivkova (sprints) and Aleksei Sokirskii (hammer). Six other Russians had their applications denied while many others are still under review. *BBC Article
Video: Dawn Harper-Nelson Posts Emotional Video On Twitter Saying She Is “Afraid For Her Life” In the tearful message, she complains that it “isn’t fair” USADA won’t let her take a specific medication for her high blood pressure.
*MB: Dawn Harper Nelson – 3 month drugs ban

Thursday’s Most Newsworthy Info

LRC USATF Announces Rosters For 2017 IAAF World Cross-Country Championships Olympic silver medalist Paul Chelimo is running in the newly-created 4 x 2k relay.

New Zealand’s Best Ever? Kim Smith Retires She’s pregnant with baby #2 and a foot injury is preventing her from training how she wants to. She retires as the Kiwi record holder from 3,000 to the marathon. Once she ran a 14:39 indoors and won the race by nearly 3 minutes.

Steve Schwarzman Gives $2.5 Million To USATF Foundation 25 athletes will get $25,000 a year for the next 4 years.
Highlights Of SEC Meet To Be On Regular ESPN Sunday 8-10pm Live streams will be on ESPN.com for the rest of the meet.
Hungary To Withdraw 2024 Summer Olympic Bid, Leaving Paris And LA As Two Choices
Michael Phelps, Adam Nelson To Testify Before House Committee On “Ways To Improve And Strengthen The Anti-Doping System”
A Monday-Tuesday Conference Meet: Texas State Women And UTA Men Win 2017 Sun Belt Indoor Meet

Centro Sr.’s Book Gets Some Publicity

Matt Centro’s Sr Gets Q&A In Washington Post About His Biography And His Son’s Olympic 1,500m Gold

LRC Exclusive LetsRun.com Exclusive: Read Chapter Two Of Matt Centrowitz’s New Book “Like Father, Like Son” LetsRun.com doesn’t beat around the bush. Neither does Matt Centrowitz. He’s so confident you’ll like his book, he’s letting you read a whole chapter for free. Purchase the book now and come back at the end of February and participate in the first ever LetsRun.com Virtual Book Club.

LRC Review Legendary Athlete, Father And Coach Matt Centrowitz Just Published An Autobiography – We Suggest You Read It

UK News

Scottish Half-Marathon Record Holder Callum Hawkins Dominates Scottish XC Champs Morag MacLarty took the women’s title.
Dewi Griffiths Wins His 6th Welsh National XC Title, Closing In On Steve Jones’ Record Of 9 Beth Kidger won the women’s race.
Jessica Judd And Ben Connor Triumph At English National XC Championships
Team GB Ready To Introduce Multi-Sport Olympic Trials Ahead Of 2020 Games Based on the US Trials model, the BOA wants to organize trials that will take place across 3 cities over 2 or 3 weeks and include 8 or more sports.
England Under-20 Champs Recap: Alicia Barrett Breaks 31-Year-Old UK Junior 60m Hurdle Record With 8.20-Seconds

Recommended Read: NY Times: “Feyisa Lilesa, Marathoner In Exile, Finds Refuge In Arizona” Lilesa and his family are settled in Flagstaff, but he still worries about his people in Ethiopia as he shares that his younger brother was beaten and detained by military and his sister-in-law lost her job.

2024 Olympics Stuff

Will LA Be The Last Man Standing? Petition Calling For Paris 2024 Referendum Gets Over 5,000 Signatures That number really isn’t too impressive considering the online petition has been up for a week.
In Case Anyone Can’t Take A Hint: Budapest 2024 Chairman Officially Confirms The Bid Is Closing

Euro Indoor Champs Are Next Weekend *Event Schedule

Distance Update

Americans Molly Huddle, Meb Keflezighi, Abdi, Jared Ward, Chris Derrick, Amy Cragg, Desi Linden And Emily Sisson Running 2017 United Airlines NYC Half Wheelchair star Tatyana McFadden is also a headliner.
Ben True Talks NASCAR, His Good 2017 Indoor Season He’ll be racing Evan Jager, Eric Jenkins, Ryan Hill, Lopez Lomong and Chris Derrick at the last chance meet in Boston this weekend. True is pissed he’ll have to miss the Daytona 500 as he’s good friends with driver Landon Cassill.
Olympic 1,500m Champ Faith Kipyegon Looks Forward To Running 10km At World XC Champs Next Month in Uganda For the first time ever the women are running 10km. Kipyegon was a two-time World Junior XC champ.
Rio Silver Medalist Eunice Kirwa + USA’s Janet Cherobon-Bawcom Running Nagoya Women’s Marathon It’s the largest women’s-only marathon in the world with 19,112 finishers last year. Pretty impressive.

Wednesday Distance News

Linden-Flanagan-CraggSt-Boston15 Shalane Flanagan Pulls Out Of 2017 Boston Marathon With Fracture In Her Back Desi Linden and Jordan Hasay now carry female American hopes with Galen Rupp on men’s side.
*Flanagan Talks To Runners World With More Details On Her Injury: “Never take a Ferrari off road.” She got injured running on a treadmill due to the snow in Portland.

Laura Muir To Attempt 1,500/3k Double At European Indoor Champs Next Weekend Full British team named.
Asbel Kiprop Is Back Running Cross-Country, Running 4 X 2,000m Relay At World Cross In Uganda Kiprop said, “My first (world) cross-country was the worst.” The crazy thing is he won the world junior title in Mombasa but it was so hot he hated it. World Cross in Mombasa was the most interesting event LRC’s Wejo has ever been to.
Kyle Merber Talks About Breaking 4 X Mile World Record, Getting Engaged Sorry, ladies. Track and field’s most entertaining twitter follow is off the market.
Cas Loxsom Gets IAAF Profile: “I’m as close as you can be to a 600-metre specialist.” Cas wants to win USA Indoors and run Word Relays in the Bahamas.
Molly Huddle Blogs About Her New York City Marathon Debut And What It’s Like Being A Pro In NYC
Bram Som (Coach Of Olympic Champ Faith Kipyegon) Talks About Being One Of The Top Pacers In The World

2016 Was A Record Year For Us In Terms Of Traffic – Thanks For Visiting

An Inside Look At How LRC Operates How a Ragtag Crew Of Almost Journalists Created Running’s Most Controversial Website Author Charles Bethea embedded himself with us during the US Olympic trials and got a behind-the-scenes look at how we operate. His article in Outside magazine includes some really nice quotes from Tim Layden, “… their best quality is that they don’t give a shit about offending people,” and Nick Willis, “It gave me a ton of inspiration. LetsRun is one of the primary reasons high-quality coaching and training have improved in America.”
*MB: Long Article on Letsrun… in Outside Magazine