The World’s First Sub-30k On The Roads By A Woman

LRC Joyciline Jepkosgei Smashes 10k Road World Record – Becomes First Woman To Break 30 On The Roads With A Sensational 29:43 The world half marathon record holder wasted no time getting after it as she broke the 5k road WR with a 14:33 split.
*IAAF Recap Benard Kimeli took the men’s race in 27:10.
*MB: Official 2017 Birrell 10k Dicussion Thread – Women’s Sub-30 WR attempt 

Sprinter News

• Yoshihide Kiryu Becomes The First Japanese Man To Break 10 Seconds In The 100m Kiryu ran 9.98 at an intercollegiate meet in Japan.
• Good Read: Ato Boldon Shares Some Career Advice That Helped Him Become A 4-Time Olympic Medalist “I have always had an ability to see the end before I even start. … If you see the end, then the steps that it takes to get to your goal don’t seem as hard, as rigorous, or as time consuming.”
• Devon Allen Has Some Big Track Goals Including Breaking The 110H Decathlon WR And Becoming The First To Run Sub-13 In The Hurdles And Sub-20 In The 200 Oh, and if you didn’t catch Allen’s World’s pre-race starting line magic trick, there’s a GIF of that.
• Usain Bolt Talking More Seriously About Trying To Play Soccer “We have a lot of offers from different teams but I have to get over my injury first and then take it from there.”
• Usain Bolt Does Interview With Olympic Swimming Legend Ian Thorpe; Says He Could Beat Him In A Swim Race Bolt: “You can probably do freestyle, back stroke, breaststroke, whatever, but I can run on water, easy.”

Bad News

• RIP: Xavier “Dag” Samuels – Coach Of 400H DL Champ Kyron McMaster – Killed By Hurricane Irma In Tortola
• Three High School XC Runners From Tennessee Struck By Truck The three were injured, but are recovering. No charges were made as the police determined “the collision … was unavoidable.”

More Road News

• Ben Blankenship (4:07) And Heather Kampf (4:42) Win Close Races At The Minnesota Mile Blankenship won over Trevor Dunbar, Riley Masters and Patrick Casey, who all were clocked at 4:08 while Kampf beat Kenya’s Monicah Ngige by less than a second. *Results
• October 22: Dickson Chumba Going For The Canadian All Comers’ Record At The Toronto Waterfront Marathon Chumba’s PR is 2:04:32 and the Canadian soil record is 2:06:54. Besides the clock, Chumba will have his hands full with defending champion Philemon Rono and Ethiopians Solomon Deksisa (2:06:22) and Endeshaw Negesse (2:04:52).
• Sunday: Georgina Rono (2:21) And Evans Sambu (2:10) Will Defend Their Titles At The Taiyuan Marathon In China
• Sunday: Kenyan Hilary Maiyo (62:41) Will Defend His Title At The Minsk Half Christine Moraa Oiga (71:50) leads the women’s race.

Sporting History

• Good Read: Extensive Q&A With 1976/1980 British Olympic Steeplechaser Tony Staynings Staynings talks about being an 8-time All-American at Western Kentucky University, compares the ’76 Games with the boycotted ones in ’80 and tells a funny story about how he started running.
• Book Review: Browning Ross: The Father Of American Distance Running, By Jack Heath
• All-Time Great Carl Lewis To Receive USATF Legend Award
• Lisa Rainsberger, The Last American Woman To Win The Boston Marathon, To Be Inducted Into The Michigan Hall Of Fame
• UK Athletics To Mark Black History Month With Special Photograph Exhibit

Nick Willis Shares His Wisdom

LRC Nick Willis Q&A, Part II: The Importance Of Moderation, Taoufik Makhloufi’s Absence & Asbel Kiprop’s 5K Potential Willis reveals how he learned his come-from-behind strategy at the 2002 World Juniors in Jamaica – “conserve your energy throughout a race as much as possible and then you let rip on the last lap.”
*MB: Nick Willis shares his wisdom with LetsRun.com

LRC Nick Willis Q&A, Part I: His Abbreviated Buildup For Worlds, The Key To His Longevity, And The Brilliance Of Jenny Simpson 

Horizontal Jumping News

• Christian Taylor Is Taking A Break From The TJ In 2018 To Run The 400 Taylor’s PR is 45.17 from 2014.
• Former World And Four-Time European Long Jump Champion Heike Drechsler Will Work As An Official During The 2018 European Champs Drechsler had her first experience as an official raking the long jump pit during the German Youth Championships.
• Video Interview: Christian Taylor Reflects On Winning His First Olympic Gold At London 2012
• Tips For Sport And Life From Uruguay’s South American Champs Gold Long Jumper Emiliano Lasa

Cheserek Gets Paid

Edward Cheserek Signs Endorsement Deal With Skechers One of the greatest collegiate distance runners in history, who made his name at a school synonymous with Nike, has signed with Skechers – just as the letsrun.com message board predicted way back on August 21st – actually, make that August 11th.

2017 Diamond League / Track Season Review

• Good Read: The Telegraph: London 2017 Captured The Masses, But Usain Bolt And Mo Farah Must Be Replaced A lot of interesting analysis from the 2017 season on the state of the sport, doping and individual athletes. Is Keni Harrison the new Asafa Powell?
• So Much For The Gender Pay Gap? Elaine Thompson Tops The 2017 Diamond League Prize Money List With $134,000 While Five Out Of The Top Six Are Women Mutaz Essa Barshim was the first man with $100,000 in prize money to put him 4th on the list.
• SPIKES Highlights Some Of The Top Performances From The 2017 Diamond League Season
• Random: Learn The Chords For The Diamond League Theme Song

Bolt Updates

• Usain Bolt To Get Two Statues In Jamaica, Not Just One One will be at the national stadium and the other possibly in the region where Bolt was born.
• Usain Bolt Visits Japan, Says He Wants To Do More Charity Work And Still Contemplating Playing Soccer He also mentioned possibly becoming a track analyst.
• Usain Bolt Predicts His World Records Could Stand For 15-20 Years “I think our era … was the best era of athletes. If it was going to be broken, it would have been broken in this era, so I think I have at least 15 to 20 more years.”

Doping Updates

• Doping Report Reveals That 30% Of The Athletes At 2011 Worlds Admitted To Doping About half the athletes at Worlds participated in an anonymous survey about doping. Over 30% admitted to doping, but only 0.5% of athletes at 2011 Worlds (where all were tested) tested positive. *AP Article
• The Guardian: Sport Doping Study Revealing Wider Usage Published After “Scandalous” Delay The research took almost 6 years to officially come out as the IAAF had issues with it and one author accused them of purposely blocking its release.
• AP: Ethiopia Shuts Down Drug Store Selling Banned Substances Ethiopia’s anti-doping office confirmed the pharmacy was offering EPO after they investigated in response to the most recent ARD documentary.