Before Berlin on Sunday, a Look Back

LRC Classics #1 A Look Back at a Race for the Ages: Eliud Kipchoge Takes Down Kenenisa Bekele & El Guerrouj at the 2003 World Championships in 5000 14 years ago, three of the greatest distance runners of all-time squared at 5,000m and hardly anyone realized it.

Drug Updates

• Rita Jeptoo Appears In Court, Says That Her Coach Claudio Berardelli Didn’t Give Her EPO Berardelli and another coach and doctor were accused by Athletics Kenya of giving Jeptoo EPO, but Jeptoo claims none of them were involved and she doesn’t know how EPO got in her system.
• Sad Story: Chinese Anti-Doping Whistle Blower Xue Yinxian Is Seeking Asylum In Germany After Revealing State Sponsored Doping From The 1980s When Yinxian refused to inject a top Chinese gymnast with steroids, she lost her post and was harassed. When she blew the whistle in 2012, China allegedly retaliated by preventing the hospital from giving her medical treatment for her two strokes.
• Anti-Doping Hearing For Jamaican Sprinter Jason Livermore Concludes; Will Learn His Fate On October 30th The 200m Commonwealth Games bronze medalist Livermore tested positive for a steroid, but was taking them on a doctor’s orders and had declared them on his doping control form, however did not have a TUE.
• NADOs Accused Of Abusing Authorities As 28 Countries Now Call For Russia To Be Banned From The 2018 WInter Games

More Weekend Road Results

• Abraham Cheroben Runs World-Leading And #3 All-Time 58:40 As The Top 3 Go Under 59 Minutes And The Top 7 Under 60 Minutes At Th Copenhagen Half Marathon The women’s race was quick too as Eunice Chumba took it in 66:11 with the top 3 sub-67.
  *MB: Booom – 58:40 in Copenhagen half
• Silas Kiplagat Wins Mitchell Street Mile In Australia In 3:58; Aussie Brittany McGowan (4:43) Takes Women’s Race It’s always funny when non-track people write about running. You get priceless post-race analysis like how Kiplagat’s time “was only 15 seconds outside the world record.”
• Birhanu Legese (45:38) And Mercyline Chelangat (53:08) Take Titles At Dam Tot Damloop 10 Mile In The Netherlands
• Barselius Kipyego (59:14) And Violah Jepchumba (66:06) Break Course Records At Usti Nad Labem Half Marathon Kipyego lead two others under the 60-minute barrier as the top 3 finished within 16-seconds of each other. *Results
  *A Week After Running A 28:55 10K, Yuta Shitara Breaks Japanese NR With 60:17 For 8th
• Former Ethiopian Makda Harun Sets Sydney Marathon CR With 2:28:06 Win Japan’s Shota Hattori won the men’s race in 2:15:16.
• Salah-Eddine Bounasr (2:11:18) Becomes First Moroccan Winner In 37-Year History Of The Beijing Marathon Ethiopian Meselech Beyene won the women’s race in 2:27:21.
• Asefa Mengstu Negewo (2:10:01) Defends His Title At The Cape Town Marathon; Betelhem Moges Takes Close Women’s Race (2:30:22) By 6 Seconds
• Gideon Kipsang Wins Belfast Half Marathon In 64:38
• Athletics Weekly: Great Britain Weekend Round-Up

Olympic News

• Alan Abrahamson Says His Mother Has Some Good Advice For The IOC Abrahamson’s mother, who doesn’t even follow sports, asked her son why the IOC was having people fly around the world to the IOC “for a meeting for something that has already been decided.”
• Thomas Bach Criticized For Not Watching Netflix Russian Doping Documentary “Icarus” The sad thing is we’re not surprised.
• NY Times: Paris Won The 2024 Olympics By Learning From Its Mistakes Paris had suffered three failed Olympic bids in the past 25 years.
• AP: IOC President Thomas Bach Confident 2018 Winter Olympics Will Go On In South Korea Despite North Korea Tension/Missile Tests
• InsideTheGames Summary Of 131st IOC Session – “All Bach And No Bite” If this article is any indication, besides the 2024/2028 announcement, it was pretty boring.
• Paris 2024 Hold Celebratory Concert After Award Of Olympic Games
• LA Mayor Leads Celebratory Parade Through The City After Official 2028 Games Decision

Russian Doping / IOC Corruption Updates

• Good Read: USA Today: “IOC Must Make Choice Between Greed And Good” Nancy Armour rips the IOC for its culture of corruption and Thomas Bach for not having a “spine.”
• NY Times: IOC Investigation Of 2014 Winter Games Russian Doping Might Soon Yield Bans And IOC member says that they are analyzing which Sochi urine samples had been tampered with and should have the first from the first 50 bottles in a few days. *Reuters
• Russia Looking Certain To Avoid 2018 Winter Games Ban As IOC And WADA Condemn NADO Statement Calling To Exclude Them WADA head Craig Reedie actually accused NADOs of looking “backwards rather than forwards.” We’re sure Reedie would love everyone to forget his and WADA’s ineptness and the fact that many believe he should resign.

More Sunday On The Roads

• James Mwangi (59:07) Aims To Retain Copenhagen Half Marathon Title Against Strong Field The field also has Abraham Cheroben (58:48), World XC silver medalist Geoffrey Yegon and a slew of other men around the one hour mark. The women’s race is led by Brigid Kosgei (67:35), Pascalia Chepkorir (67:17) and Eunice Chumba (68:04).
• Edwin Kiptoo Going For Hat Trick At The Dam Tot Damloop 10 Mile In The Netherlands Kiptoo will face former world half marathon bronze medalist John Mwangangi, 59:20 half runner Birhanu Legese and Fernando Cabada. The women are lead by Worlds 10,000 5th placer Susan Krumins, who faces Kenyan Mercyline Chelangat (13th at Worlds).
• Defending Champion And South African All-Comers Record Holder (2:08:41) Asefa Negewo Leads Cape Town Marathon Field Negewo faces fellow sub-2:10 men Laban Mutai (2:08:01) and Seboka Nigusse (2:09:25) and South African 5,000 NR holder Elroy Gelant in his debut. Agnes Jepkemboi Kiprop (2:23:54) leads the women’s field against Betelhem Moges (2:24:29), Germany’s Lisa Hahner (2:28:39) and SA’s Irvette van Zyl (2:31:26).

Anti-Doping Updates

• Good Read: NY Times Tribute: Gary Wadler, Antidoping Pioneer, Had A Gift For Straight Talk Wadler was one of the first to start educating people about the prevalence and dangers of doping in sports.
  *AP: Anti-Doping Pioneer And Expert Gary Wadler Dies At Age 78 Wadler was a leading critic of the way US sports leagues (NFL, MLB) handled their “anti-doping” programs.
• 95 Of 96 Russian Doping Cases From McLaren Report Cleared By WADA These were cases with not enough hard evidence due to samples destroyed by the Moscow lab, but WADA is still pursuing others among the 1,000 McLaren found.
• IOC And WADA Respond After Group Of National Anti-Doping Organizations (NADOs) Call For Russia To Be Banned From 2018 Winter Olympics The NADOs called on the IOC to “stop kicking the can down the road and issue meaningful consequences” and accused the IOC of “dereliction of duty.”

Weekly Recap

WTW Running’s Version Of Sergio Dipp, A New 10k WR, Galen Rupp, Jordan Hasay And More We take a look back at the week in running and along the way introduce you to a new road race in Colorado.

Distance News

• Copenaghen Half Marathon, With 5 Sub-60 Men And 5 Sub-69 Women, Will Be Broadcast Live On Sunday At 6 AM ET (11 CET)
• Olympic Champion Kipchoge Signs Endorsement Deal With Isuzu He’ll get 7 million Kenyan shillings ($68k) and a new car.

Non-Distance News

• Did You Know That Vashti Cunningham Isn’t The Best 19-Year-Old HJer In The World? Ukraine’s Yuliya Levchenko Is She was 2nd at Worlds and 2nd on the 2017 performance list.
• Japanese Are Worried That Construction Workers On 2020 Stadium Are Working Too Hard One worker committed suicide recently and said he was overworked after doing 200 hours of overtime in a month. There is a shortage of construction workers in Japan after the tsunami.
• Akani Simbine Is Disappointed With His 5th Place In 100 In Worlds – Says Hip Injury Cost Him A Medal He’ll go for the 100/200 double at Commonwealths in 2018.

News From Japan

• Kiryu’s 9.98 100 Wasn’t The Only Great Performance At Their Collegiate Champs Yume Kitamura set a national university record 2:00.92. A Japanese woman has never broken 2:00.00. A new meet record in the men’s 800 was also set (just 1:47.92).
• 4 Japanese Athletes Were In Prague 10k Where Jepkosgei Broke WR Kenta Murayama was hoping to break the Japanese NR on the roads of 28:05 but ran over 29:00.

News From Kenya

• Elijah Manangoi And Governor Of Narok County To Establish Training Camp, Hoping To Help Reduce Youth Unemployment Unfortunately, professional running is close to being a zero sum game. Only the fastest few get paid.
• Former WR Holder Patrick Makau Isn’t Sure Which Stud Will Win The 2017 BMW Berlin Marathon

Sad News: Jamaican Sprinter Jordan Scott Dies In Car Crash In Kingston, Jamaica The 20-year-old was driving with with fellow sprinter Michael Campbell, who ran in the 4 x 100 heats for Jamaica at Worlds. Scott died in the crash, but Campbell survived and is currently in hospital.

Other Distance News

• Team USATF Wins DecaNation Title For Tenth Time In 13 Years The US scored 122 points at the international ten-event meet to beat France by 19 points. Big names competing and winning for the US included Shannon Rowbury (2,000), Courtney Okolo (200/400) and Sam Kendricks (PV). *Full Results
• Jake Gyllenhaal Movie About Boston Marathon Bombing Victim Jeff Bauman Premiering At Boston Hospital Today “Stronger” is in theaters on September 22nd. *Trailer
• September 16: 2017 USATF National 24-Hour Championships Return To Cleveland For 9th year

For The Running Form Nerds

• Interesting Read: Great North Run Form Analysis: Mary Keitany Vs. Vivian Cheruiyot And Mo Farah Vs. Jake Robertson Has Keitany’s form actually deteriorated over the years? Why is Robertson’s form better during the race, but worse in the kick?
• Women’s World Champs Marathon Form Analysis A look at winner Rose Chelimo, Edna Kiplagat and Amy Cragg.

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