LetsSprint.com

• RIP Legendary Polish Sprinter Irena Szewinska Szewinska remains one of the most successful athletes in history with seven Olympic medals to her name from five Olympic appearances. *IAAF Tribute
• Get To Know Canada’s Commonwealth Games 200m Silver Medalist Aaron Brown, Who Discovered His Talent In 10th Grade Running 11.5 In Basketball Shorts/Trainers Brown is learning to play the piano and feels that the current generation of sprinters doesn’t have “as big egos” as previous ones.
• Belarus’ 2015 World Bronze Medalist Alina Talay Is A Student Of The Sport And Has Coached Herself To A New Level Running 12.41 (3rd Fastest Time In 2018) “Honestly, I have no idea how many hours I spend scrolling through the videos on my phone of exercises, runs, hurdling, everything.”
• Commonwealth Games 400H Champ Janieve Russell Reveals She Got Her Start In The 400 Hurdles By Accident She was mistakenly registered for the 400H at a Jamaican meet and qualified for the prestigious Boys and Girls Champs.

Some Great Races To Look Forward To The Next Couple Of Weeks

• Sunday: Out Of The Boston Freezer And Into The Australian Frying Pan For Yuki Kawauchi At The Gold Coast Marathon The Boston champ will face defending winner Takuya Noguchi and CR holder and two-time winner Kenneth Mungara. The women’s race is led by Agnes Barsosio (2:20:59) and 2:27 Aussie Jess Trengove. Sara Hall will try to defend her title in the accompanying half marathon while the men’s race has Collis Birmingham.
• Fourth Of July: USATF 10k Road Champs Are At Peachtree On 7/4 – Who You Got? Gwen Jorgensen And Lopez Lomong Both Added To The Field
• July 5: Lausanne DL Announces Strong Women’s 1,500 Field, Led By 3:57.64 Woman Gudaf Tsegay, Caster Semenya, Shelby Houlihan And Laura Muir
• Ethiopia’s World Leader Selemon Barega (13:04) Leads Loaded 5,000 Field In Lausanne Barega is up against world champ Muktar Edris and Paul Chelimo.
• A Race You Won’t Want To Miss: Christian Coleman And Noah Lyles 100m Showdown Set For Rabat DL On July 13th USA’s Ronnie Baker is also in the race.
• Sunday: Reigning Champion Maude Mathys Aiming To Repeat For Switzerland At Euro Mountain Running Champs

Distance News

• IAAF Releases Some Interesting Changes To Competition Rules As Of June 2018 The IAAF are no longer recognizing road world records for the 15k, 20k, 25k or 30k (makes sense since they are rarely run and most of the WRs come from half or full marathon splits) and interesting up until now the road 5k was not an official WR, but it will be moving forward.
  *MB: New IAAF rules are out – Will Zoom Vaporfly 4% be banned for violating “spirit of the universality of athletics?”
• Japanese 2:27 Marathoner Miharu Shimokado Quits Corporate League To Go Independent “I want to show that you don’t have to throw the woman part away to get stronger, that we are strong because we are women.”
• Video: Haron Lagat Calls Out IAAF Officials Over Transfer Of Allegiance Issue The IAAF won’t let him run for the US despite him living here for the last 16 years.
• Want To Be A Runner In The Wonder Woman Sequel? Here’s Your Chance Producers are looking for “men and women of all ethnicities to play joggers” in the Arlington, VA area. They are choosing runners today and tomorrow.
• Comrades Marathon Winner Ann Ashworth Publicly Snubs “Unsupportive” Athletics South Africa She declined an invite from them to compete in the World 100k Champs this September saying that they don’t do enough to support SA road runners.

The Best Of

LRC The Best Interviews From 2018 USAs: Centro On How Being Fitter Allows Him To Race Smarter, Coburn On Jebet’s Positive, & The People’s Hero, Jordan Mann We know only a few of the biggest die-hards had time to watch all 79 interviews we conducted in the mixed zone at USAs (you can check out all the videos here). That’s okay. Below, we’ve selected our 10 favorite interviews from 2018 USAs. If you want to be educated, entertained, or both, check this out. From Noah Lyles to Matthew Centrowitz and Emma Coburn, we’ve got you covered.

USA News: The Boston Champ Is Coming To NYC

Des Linden To Run 2018 TCS NYC Marathon Will she face defending champ Shalane Flanagan?

• MB: Bowerman Track Club’s Dan Huling Retires Huling has been one of the US’s top steeplers for years with a best major championship finish of 5th at the 2015 World Champs.
• Michelob Ultra Offers Runners A Chance To Be Coached For The NYC Marathon By Shalane Flanagan They’ll get coaching tips from Flanagan and get to meet her for celebratory drinks after NYC.
• Q&A With Kellyn Taylor On Her 2:24:28 Performances At Grandma’s Marathon Taylor says that normally she doesn’t take splits during a marathon, but for this one she did. “A big mental switch that I had going into this race was to treat it more like a workout than a race.”
• Ken Goe Takes Dig At Des Moines: “Championship Meets In Eugene Rarely Are Interrupted By Lightning”
• Former Loyola Marymount University Star Danielle Shanahan Joins Hoka One One NAZ Elite

The Future Of Women’s Sport Is On The Line

• Seb Coe Defends IAAF New Hyperandrogenism Rules In Meeting With Athletics South Africa “We need to create competition categories within our sport that ensures that success is determined by talent, dedication and hard work, rather than by other factors that are not considered fair or meaningful, such as the enormous physical advantages that an adult has over a child, or a male athlete has over a female athlete.” *IAAF Release
• BBC: IAAF Will Respect CAS Decision On Testosterone Rules After their meeting, the IAAF and Athletics South Africa both decided that the decision would be left up to CAS.

Sprint Stuff

• World 100m Champ Tori Bowie Featured In ESPN Body Issue “If I could pick one body part, I’d probably pick my thighs, my quads. I feel they’re the strongest part of my body.”
  *Full 2018 ESPN Body Issue
• IAAF Inside Athletics: Ato Boldon Video Interview With Sydney McLaughlin This was apparently filmed a while ago as she talked about not going pro and said, “You’re basically running for a paycheck and I don’t think I’m ready to do that yet. To run for food on the table. I’d like to progress in the sport first before I make that decision.”
• Usain Bolt Admits It Was “Kind Of Sad” To Lose His Perfect Record Of Olympic Golds It’s probably easier to live with when you have nine of them, though.
• World 400H CHamp Kori Carter Looks Back At When She Shockingly Qualified For The 2008 World Junior Championships “Making my first national team was a huge moment. It convinced me that I could be somebody in track and field.”
• European 400H Champ Slott Petersen Wins In 55.48 At Copenhagen Games She was supposed to have a duel with two-time world champ Zuzana Hejnova, but Hejnova had to scratch with a knee injury.

Upcoming Diamond League Action: Paris Is Saturday