March 12, 2019 | LetsRun.com

The Beauty of US Olympic Marathon Trials is in Jeopardy

LRC Rich Kenah, Head of Atlanta Track Club (Host of Olympic Marathon Trails) on New Olympic Qualifying: “…reconsider the damage this will do to the Olympic movement” Kenah is worried the simplicity and dream of the US Marathon Tials wil be lost by the new qualifying sytem. The new qualifying system treats the US Olympic Marathon Trials equal to the national marathon champs of Andorra.

World XC Champs Are March 30th

Shadrack Kipchirchir And Courtney Frerichs Lead Team USA For World XC Champs
*Kenyan Headline: “USA Set To Field Kenyan ‘B’ Team – Kipchirchir Leads Four Other Kenyan-Born Runners In US Team To World XC” Five of the six men on the USA squad are Kenyan-born.
GB Names Squad Of 24 For World XC Champs GB is sending a full men’s and women’s teams for the senior and junior races.
Two-Time Euro XC Champ Fionnuala McCormack Leads Irish Team For World XC Unlike GB, Ireland is not sending a full squad, but just two senior men and two senior women.
IAAF Fab Five: World XC Near Misses The IAAF looks back at five great XC runners who got close, but never won a World XC title.
Three Time World XC Champ Wilson Kipketer And Olympic 400H Silver Medalist Sara Slott Open IAAF Heritage XC Display In Denmark The display opened one month before they host World XC Champs on March 30th. They exhibit is meant to “tell the 200 year history of cross country running.”

Non-NCAA Weekend US Results

LRC American Record Holder Athing Mu Gets Beaten By High School Freshman Roisin Willis, Who Sets National Freshman Record For 800 Two weeks after running faster than any American ever at 600m indoors, 16-year-old sensation Athing Mu got beaten by a high school freshman at 800m. Yes, you read that correctly. That’s what happens when you go for sub-2 and tie up.
*Loudoun Valley Sweeps Men’s Distance Relay With 2 National Records

Shadrack Kipchirchir And Unknown Erika Kemp Win USATF 15km Titles At Gate River Run $12,000 for the winners.
*Top 10 Results
*MB: Erika Kemp, Relative Unknown, wins Gate River Run

Jordan Hasay Runs 71:06 At Rome Half The race was won in 66:40 by Lonah Salpeter Chemtai. Guye Adola won the men’s race in 60:17. *IAAF Recap

Doping News

No Changes To Russian Status After IAAF Council Meeting Today The Russian Athletics Federation still has outstanding costs they need to pay to the IAAF and the Moscow lab data still needs to be processed by WADA and analyzed by the IAAF.
New Hitch To Russian Reinstatement As IAAF Task Force Is Probing Allegations Of Discredited Coaches Remaining Active This would not be the first time Russian athletes and coaches have completely ignored their bans.
Seb Coe Says Russia Owes The IAAF About Three Million Dollars
HJer Ivan Ukhov And Four Other Russians Filing Appeals Against Their Doping Bans Ukhov will lose his 2012 Olympic gold and HJer Svetlana Shkolina her world gold.
International Anti-Doping Leaders Call On Watershed Opportunity To Reform Anti-Doping System Leaders of 18 national anti-doping organizations met in Switzerland to discuss what types of changes they’d like WADA to make.

More Thoughts / Opinions On Hyperandrogenism Debate

MB: Craig Virgin Shares His Thoughts On The Caster Semenya Debate Virgin writes, “I absolutely come down on the side of the IAAF and their Pres. Seb Coe when it comes to [this] issue.”
Paula Radcliffe Says Tighter Transgender Rules Are Needed to Avoid “Manipulation” “Right now, transgender women are not a threat to female sport. But you would be naive if you thought that, by not putting in any rules, it couldn’t come to that at some point in the future.”
The Guardian Opinion Piece: “Stop Talking About Testosterone – There’s No Such Thing As ‘True Sex'” Interesting tidbit from the article – did you know Usain Bolt had a 2:07 800m PR?
All-Time Great Ed Moses Shares Thoughts On Caster Semenya: “There’s some medical issues, social issues and sports issues that all combine and it’s really hard to determine what is the right path to go.” He emphasized that she should be treated fairly and we do believe that the IAAF testosterone limit is a fair compromise.

The New Balance US HS Nationals Are This Weekend As Well Meet Info Results *Free Live Webcast

UPSET CITY: MB: FRESHMAN TAKES DOWN ATHING MU – Wins 800 at New Balance Nationals

List Of 2019 New Balance Nationals Winners – The Big Board
Sam Affolder And Loudoun Valley Break DMR Record (9:54.41); Katelyn Tuohy Leads Team To 4th-Straight DMR Win The splits were as follows: Jacob Hunter (3:01), Akere Simms (50.92), Connor Wells (1:55) and Affolder (4:06.21). Tuohy split 4:41.
*MB: Sam Affolder greatest triple ever at nationals? Two 4:06 splits and a 1:51.
MB: Transgender Connecticut Sprinter Accepted To New Balance Indoor Nationals
10 Boys Story Lines To Follow At New Balance Nationals Indoor 2019
10 Girls Story Lines To Follow At New Balance Nationals Indoor 2019 Naturally, #1 is Athing Mu.

Non-LRC Day 1 NCAA News

IAAF Day 1 Recap: Duplantis And Holloway Shine On Day 1
Rayvon Grey (7.97, 26’ 1.75” LJ) And Mondo Duplantis (5.83 , 19’ 1.50” PV) Win National Titles For LSU To Give Them Day 1 Lead
Florida Gators And Grant Holloway Open Spectacularly Holloway got third in the LJ (7.95m, he was in 1st when he stopped jumping), broke the NCAA meet record in the 60H in the semis (7.44), and had the fastest time of the day in the flat 60 (6.53).
North Dakota State Star Payton Otterdahl Is Looking To Be 1st Man To Win SP And Weight Throw At NCAAs Since 2004 He’s halfway there as he won the shot (21.71m, 71-02.75) to become the 1st individual national champ for North Dakota State in any sport.
Arkansas Women’s Coach Lance Harter Is Confident After Day 1: “I think we’re going to be in good shape tomorrow.”
Arizona State’s Samantha Noennig Comes Up Huge On Final Throw (17.91/58-9.25) To Win Shot By 2 cm

The Inside Scoop From The NCAA Press Conference

LRC Grant Holloway Is Too Fast For His Own Good; Now He’s Attempting An Audacious NCAA Indoor Quadruple This weekend will Grant Holloway explode from NCAA megastar into a full-blown legend like Jesse Owens? Mike Holloway hopes so: “If Grant’s not in shape to run a couple of 60s and take four to six long jumps, then I haven’t done my job.”

LRC Answers To The Big Questions At 2019 NCAA Indoors: How To Build An NCAA Program, How To Win NCAAs, & Why Mondo Duplantis Didn’t Turn Pro Texas Tech coach Wes Kittley shares the secrets of how he’s built a national title contender from scratch and Florida coach Mike Holloway tells you how to actually win it all, ” You win championships with quality, not quantity. … Just because you have 100 kids at the meet doesn’t mean that you have 100 kids that can score.”

LRC Team Preview: Can Wisconsin Win NCAAs With A Two-Man Team? And Can Anyone Stop The Arkansas Women? We don’t think Wisco will win and instead are projecting Texas Tech to win the first NCAA title in any men’s sport in school history.

Outside LRC Pre-NCAA Coverage

TFN/Jeff Hollobaugh: 10 Things To Watch For At The NCAAs
DyeStat.com: 10 Men’s Story Lines To Follow At NCAAs
DyeStat.com: 10 Women’s Story Lines To Follow At NCAAs
Arkansas Women Talented, Favored To Win Meet “I think this team may be the strongest that we’ve ever had, and that’s saying a lot considering we’ve won two national titles. … We’ve got experience, we’ve got talent and we’ve got depth.”

Kejelcha Gets The Mile World Record

LRC Final Yomif Kejelcha 3:47.01 Mile World Record! As Johnny Gregorek Is Seventh American To Go Sub-3:50 What a race!
Discuss: YOMIF KEJELCHA WR
*CAN GREGOREK TAKE DOWN THE INDOOR MILE AR?
*CRAZY or GENIUS? Alberto Salazar Says Kejelcha is Going for BOTH 1500 AND Mile records at same time

The Sport Is Changing, But For The Better?

LRC Paul Chelimo Pushes Back Against Recent IAAF Decisions & Explains Why He’s Making His Half Marathon Debut In New York This Weekend Paul Chelimo isn’t a fan of the IAAF killing of the 5,000 in the Diamond League: “I don’t know if they’re trying to kill distance running or what.” And it may cause him to move up to 26.2 sooner than he expected, “I know I’m going to be a great marathoner.”
*MB: Paul Chelimo on IAAF rule changes: “I don’t know if they’re trying to kill distance running or what.”

LRC Did The IAAF Just Kill Off Some Of The Significance Of The Olympic Trials? IAAF Announces New Qualifying System & Entry Standards For 2020 Olympics We’re not opposed to change but we have a lot of questions about the qualification system that will be used for the 2020 Olympics. For example, the men’s marathon standard is now 2:11:30 – what does that mean for the US Trials?
*MB: New 2020 Olympic Standards Posted – They Are WAY Tougher – Will US Olympic Trials take a hit

MB: BREAKING: IAAF Guts The Diamond League? Bans 5,000 And Reduces TV Times From 2 Hours To 90 Minutes If changing the Olympic qualifying wasn’t enough change for you, the IAAF has doubled down and totally altered the Diamond League starting in 2020. The longest event allowed will be the 3,000.

Rundown Of Decisions And Changes Made At IAAF Council Meeting
IAAF Release On 2020 Diamond League Changes Seb Coe stated, “Change is never easy but should, wherever possible, be done from a position of strength which is what we have done.”
IAAF Release On New Olympic Qualification System And Entry Standards

The NYC Half Is Sunday Live Streaming Info, Starts 7:10AM ET Full Entry Lists

This Coming Weekend: RRW: Desi Linden, Paul Chelimo Ready For United Airlines NYC Half On Sunday Linden faces a deep women’s field with WR holder Joyciline Jepkosgei, two-time world marathon champ Edna Kiplagat and defending champ Buze Diriba. The men’s race has USA marathon champ Brogan Austin and Cam Levins.

More Non-NCAA International News

Mo Farah Retains Vitality Big Half Title In 3-Way Sprint In 61:15, Says He’s Confident About London “I’m definitely confident … I’m definitely a better athlete than I was last year in my opinion.” Charlotte Purdue (70:38) also defended her title in the women’s race.
*Farah Says He Misses Track After Half Marathon Win: “Deep down, I miss the track. I look at my fellow athletes and I think ‘woah’ and I just get excited.”
*MB: Farah is DONE – 1:01:15 in the London Half

38-Year-Old Helalia Johannes Of Namibia Runs Massive 3:44 PR Of 2:22:25 To Win Nagoya Marathon As 15 Women Break 2:27 And 2 National Records Fall Two-time Olympic 5,000 champ Meseret Defar improved her PR from 2:27:25 to 2:23:33 to finish 3rd.
*Rachel Cliff Breaks Canada’s National Marathon Record With 2:26:56 In Nagoya The old record was 2:28:00 (Lanni Marchant). Cliff also has the half NR at 1:10:08. 7 Japanese women beat her in the race.

Morocco’s Salah Eddine Bounasr (2:07:52) Outkicks Two Others To Win Lake Biwa Marathon As Yuki Kawauchi Qualifies For Worlds In his last race as an amateur, Kawauchi ran 2:09:21, which Brett Larner thinks will qualify him for Doha.
Bahrain’s Alemu Bekele (2:06:04) Leads 3 Under 2:07 In Barcelona
Adam Hickey British World Cross Trials Win Hickey last made a GBR world XC team 12 years ago as a junior.
Jenny Nesbitt Wins British World XC Women’s Trials And we also are pleased to report that UK Athletics has confirmed they’ll actually send 4 full teams to Worlds this year. Former NCAA star Kate Avery was 4th. We can’t find full results but think they will show up here.
Gjert Ingebrigtsen Says High Mileage And Hard Work Is The Secret To Their Success
*MB: Gjert Ingebrigtsen shares the secret to his sons’ success – high mileage – and claims “they don’t have any natural speed.”

LetsWalk.com

IAAF Council Approve Removing Of 50k Race Walk Distance After Tokyo 2020 Rather than a 20k and 50k, there will two events with TBD distances between 10k and 35k. The IAAF are also looking into implementing chip technology that would detect if both an athlete’s feet leave the ground.
China’s Olympic Champion Liu Hong Breaks 50k Race Walk Record She became the first woman to break the four hour barrier with 3:59:15 (previous record was 4:04:36 and her previous best was 4:13:04), but the IAAF only started recognizing a women’s 50k record in 2017.

Looking Ahead To April 7th Road Action

Swiss Marathon Record Holder Tadesse Abraham (2:06:40) Hoping To Bounce Back From Sub-Par Racing At The Vienna City Marathon He’ll face Kenya’s Robert Chemosin, who has a 59:19 PR to his name.
Defending Champ Nancy Kiprop (2:22:46) Chasing A Hat Trick At The Vienna City Marathon She’ll face three-time Rome Marathon winner Rahma Tusa (2:23:46).
Kenya’s Duncan Koech (2:07:53) And Poland’s Karolina Nadolska (2:26:32) Lead Fields For The Hannover Marathon

Have You Listened To This Week’s LRC Podcast? (Click Here For More Listening Options/Show Notes To Listen To The Highlights)

2019 NCAA Indoor Individual Previews

LRC 3k/5K Previews: Can Wisconsin’s Morgan McDonald & Alicia Monson Sweep All Four Distance Races? Or Will Grant Fisher, Jessica Hull, Or Someone Else Play Spoiler? We break down the longest individual races at NCAAs for you.

LRC 2019 NCAA DMR Preview: Why Every Men’s Team Won’t Win The DMR (& Why The Oregon Women Will) We break down the DMRs for the upcoming NCAA indoor champs by starting by telling you why each team won’t win.
*MB: Rojo claims “several” NCAA footballers can split 46 for 400m in a DMR. Is that true?

LRC 800 Preview: Devin Dixon & Danae Rivers Try To Cap Stellar Seasons With Their First NCAA Titles We think Texas A&M’s Devin Dixon, who set the American collegiate record of 1:45.27 this year, and NCAA women’s 1,000m record holder, Penn State’s Danae Rivers, will be tough to beat in the 800s at NCAAs.

LRC Mile Preview: Ollie Hoare Favored To Win Men’s Title; Can Hannah Meier Complete A Comeback For The Ages In Wide-Open Women’s Race? Prior to this year, Michigan’s sixth-year senior Hannah Meier hadn’t PRed since high school. Yet she enters the NCAA mile as the #1 seed. Can she win it?

Non-Distance News

Up-And-Coming Australian Decathlete Ashley Moloney Is Being Compared To WR Holder Kevin Mayer Who knows how he’ll progress, but 18-year-old World U20 champ Moloney is actually better than Mayer was at the same age.
IAAF Inside Athletics Podcast With Lolo Jones Jones talks about some of her experiences from the summer and winter Olympics.
IAAF Inside Athletics Video Interview With Serbia’s World Indoor LJ Champ Ivana Spanovic
IAAF Profile: Japan’s Koki Ikeda Was An Average High School Distance Runner Who Thought He’d Go To Tokyo 2020 As A Spectator; Then He Discovered Racewalking

LRC Weekly Exclusives

LRC Podcast Kejelcha Is King, Gregorek Joins Sub-3:50 Club, 2019 Euro Indoors, Tokyo, Wife Audio, Transgender Sport And “Scalping” We’ve got a big show for you this week which includes audio from Wejo’s wife as she watches the Tokyo marathon.

LRC WTW: Racing And Time Trialing Are Very Different, Laura Muir Is Dominant, And The Olympic Marathon Trials Will Be Hilly If you thought Kejelcha’s world record was all that happened last week, think again.

2019 NCAA Indoors Results Post-Race Interviews *Broadcast Info

LRC Wisconsin’s Morgan McDonald And Oregon’s Jessica Hull Cross Finish Line 1st Yet Again In 3,000s At 2019 NCAA Indoors The men’s race came down to McDonald vs. Fisher as we hoped it would. Monson vs. Hull never materialized in the women’s race.

LRC Penn State’s Danae Rivers (Narrowly) And Kansas’ Bryce Hoppel (Convincingly) Win 2019 NCAA Indoor 800 Titles Danae Rivers was just 5th coming off the final turn but somehow she got the win over Penn’s Nia Akins at the line. In the men’s race, Kansas’ Bryce Hoppel was clearly the best.

LRC Ohio State’s Julia Rizk And NAU’s Geordie Beamish Pull Off Upsets To Win 2019 NCAA Indoor Mile Titles Two runners who had never even been in an NCAA final before won the mile titles tonight in Birmingham. Men’s winner Geordie Beamish only has a 4:06 PR.
MB: Dude with 4:06 mile PB – Geordie Beamish – just won the 2019 NCAA indoor mile title

MB Chatter

Women In Sport News

First Female IAAF Vice President To Be Elected In 2019 The IAAF has added “minimum gender targets” to its constitution meaning that some positions will be open to women only.
French Sportswear Retailer Decathlon Cancels Plan To Sell Sports Hijab For Women Runners After Public Outcry The company said they received 500 calls and emails with insults and even threats. Apparently France has strict laws that actually ban the Muslim headscarf in state schools and some public buildings (but it is allowed in public spaces).
On International Women’s Day, Laura Muir Says Girls Should “Just Go Out And Have Fun” With Sport

Non-LRC NCAA Coverage

IAAF Recap Of Day 2 Of NCAA Indoors
USTFCCCA Meet Recap: Florida Men, Arkansas Women Capture Team Titles
Floridagators.com: UF Repeats As NCAA Men’s Indoor Champs, Win Three Individual Titles Grant Holloway led the way with wins in the 60H (American record of 7.35) and 60 (6.50).
Arkansasrazorbacks.com: Lexi Jacobus And Arkansas Pole Vaulters Lead Hogs To Their Third NCAA Title Jacobus racked up the 4th NCAA title of her career as the Arkansas vaulters scored 21.
Payton Otterdahl Becomes 2nd Man In History To Sweep Shot And Weight Throw Titles At NCAAs
D2: Ashland Men, Adams State Women Win National Titles
D3: North Central Men, Williams Women Victors

Day 1 At NCAAs LRC Previews: 800s, Miles, 3ks/5ks, Team D2 Schedule Free D2 Stream D3 Schedule Free D3 Stream All LRC Coverage

LRC On, Wisconsin! Badgers Morgan McDonald & Alicia Monson Sweep 2019 NCAA 5Ks The only debate we have is which Badger was more dominant?

LRC Notre Dame Men And Yared Nuguse Edge Stanford & Grant Fisher (3:54 Anchor) For 2019 NCAA DMR Title; Oregon Women Repeat Iowa State had a massive 6+ second lead heading into the anchor in the men’s race but it didn’t matter as Yared Nuguse got the job done with a 3:56 split.
*MB: Grant MF Fisher splits 3:54.24 and loses!!!

LRC 2019 NCAA Mile Semis: Top 7 Seeds All Move On To Tomorrow’s Mile Final; 800 Semis Produce A Little More Drama Includes post-race interviews with Sam Worley, William Paulson, and Karisa Nelson. Updated with 800 interviews: Danae Rivers, Devin Dixon, and Marco Arop.