Kenyan Distance News

• Recommended Read: Eliud Kipchoge Talks About A Slew Of Topics Including Keeping a Training Diary, Kenyan Doping, Making Lots Of Money And Facing Kenenisa Bekele In London Talking about living a relatively modest lifestyle despite his wealth, Kipchoge said, “I don’t envy people with big cars, helicopters and everything… that’s their life. What I want is to inspire someone… I don’t think I need a one million-dollar car to drive around.”
• World Bronze Medalist Amos Kipruto Using The Tokyo Marathon As Build-Up For Tokyo 2020 That is, assuming the 2:05:43 man is selected for the team.
• Choosing The Tokyo 2020 Marathon Squad Is Leaving Athletics Kenya Bosses With Sleepless Nights
• Robert Keter’s 13:22 World Record From The Urban Trail Lille 5k In November Ratified By World Athletics The road 5k has only been officially recognized as a WR since November 2017. The fastest recorded time is Sammy Kipketer‘s 13:00 from Carlsbad in 2000.

Anti-Doping News

• Jessica Judd Rips UKAD Over Reluctance To Release Mo Farah’s Samples She called it “embarrassing” and said it’s no wonder why “athletics is dying a drug-fuelled death.”
  *MB: UKAD is ready to fight any attempt by WADA to seize its stock of Sir Mo Farah’s urine and blood samples
• Russia Accuses UK Anti-Doping Of Creating A “Wall Of Mistrust” Over Mo Farah Samples Denial It’s never a good day when Russia can call you out over anti-doping failures.
  *RUSADA Cites Where The WADA Code Says They Can Carry Out “Additional Analysis Of Doping Samples … Solely On The Instructions Of WADA”
• Kenyan Newspaper Hits Back At GB’s The Times After They Ask If It’s Time For “Disgraced Kenya To Follow Russia To Follow Russia In Exile?” This writer correctly points out that Russia was banned because of state sponsored systematic doping whereas a WADA study has concluded that Kenyan doping is “unsophisticated, uncoordinated and opportunistic.”

Looking Ahead

• February 19: Selemon Barega Announced The 3000m For The Meeting Hauts-de-France Pas-de-Calais In Liévin, France Also announced is Orlando Ortega vs Pascal Martinot Lagarde in the 60H.
• The 2020 Diamond League By The Numbers The season will span 147 days, starting in April for the first time.

USA XC And Houston *USA XC Results

LRC Comeback Queen Hitomi Niiya Breaks Japanese Record (66:38), Jemal Yimer Wins (59:25), 14 American Men Go Sub-62, 7 Women Sub-70:00 At Houston Half Marathon Hitomi Niiya‘s comeback story is pretty cool and Jemal Yimer believe it or not crossed the line first for the first time ever on a day that saw 14 American men go sub-1:02 and 7 women go sub-1:10 as Jared Ward was 1st American and Sara Hall beat Molly Huddle.

• Hitomi Niiya Says She Owes A Lot To Her Pacer Tsuyoshi Ugachi And “The American Guy In Yellow Socks Who Helped Out”
• RRW: Hitomi Niiya Dominates Aramco Houston Half-Marathon, Sets Japanese Record
• Cool Story: Two Runners Who Became 1st To Break 3 Hours In Marathon In 6 Different Decades Crossed Line Holding Hands In Houston

• MB: Houston half: Great day or not for the Americans? Not a single American came close to Kipchoge or Kosgei’s marathon pace
• MB: Who’s Hitomi nitya? Houston half winner
• MB: Is Sam MF Chelanga coming out of retirement??? Runs 61:52 in Houston

LRC 2020 USATF XC Results: Natosha Rogers And Anthony Rotich Dominate It was a good day for the Army WCAP team as their Kenyan Americans went 1-2-3 in the men’s race.

• USATF Recap
• NAU Freshman Corey Gorgas And High Schooler Brooke Rauber Win USATF XC Junior Titles
• MB: USA XC champs are this weekend – Do you recognize any of these entrants? One will be a natl. champ.

Weekend Indoor Action

• Athing Mu Breaks National 500m Record With 1:10.22 At The Virginia Showcase She broke the previous mark of 1:10.30 by Chanelle Price.
  *Also At VA Showcase: Taylor Ewert Breaks Her Own Indoor 3,000m Racewalk National Record
• MB: UW Indoor Preview Results Ben Blakenship won the men’s mile in 3:57.67 over Brannon Kidder (3:58.43). Eleanor Fulton beat out Allie Ostrander in the women’s mile (3:34.82 to 3:35.94). UW’s Sam Tanner won the 1.000m in 2:21.78 (Ben Blankenship was 4th). Kaela Edwards won the 800m in 2:03.81.
• USTFCCCA’s Collegiate Weekend-In-Review At the Virginia Tech Invy, Jacory Patterson broke the collegiate 300m record with 32.28 and Tennessee’s Darryl Sullivan cleared 2.33m in the HJ to move to #4 on the all-time list.
  *Event-By-Event Top-10 Marks From The Collegiate Weekend
• Ukraine’s World Silver Medalist Yaroslava Mahuchikh Clears World Indoor U20 High Jump Record Of 2.01m
• World Athletics’ Weekend Indoor Round-Up: Keni Harrison Opens Her 2020 With A 200m Win (23.18) At The Leonard Hilton Memorial In Houston At other US indoor meets, Tonea Marshal ran a 60H PR of 7.86 and Lorraine Ugen jumped 6.74m in the LJ.
• Renaud Lavillenie Opens Season With 5.80m Victory In Bordeaux In the US, Andreas Dimitrakis became the first Greek to go sub-4 indoors with 3:59.22 on Staten Island and Nicholas Scarvelis broke the Greek SP record with 20.38m. Lucia Vadlejch broke the Slovakian national pentathlon record with 4488 points.
• Jacob Wooten Clears 5.80m PR To Win UCS Spirit National Pole Vault Summit In Reno; Sweden’s Lisa Gunnarsson Wins Women’s With 4.50m

UKAD Not Cooperating With WADA On Salazar Investigation?

UK Anti-Doping Won’t Release Mo Farah’s Blood And Urine Samples To WADA Inquiry USADA is looking into any athletes who were coached by Alberto Salazar but UKAD head Nicole Sapstead said she would block the release of samples stored for future retesting unless there was “credible evidence” to suggest they contained banned substances. She said they save samples to test “when the science moves along.” *2nd Article *Discuss

Upcoming Armory Action

• January 23-25: Katelyn Tuohy, Mary Cain, Justyn Knight And Athing Mu Set Sights For Dr. Sander Invitational Columbia Challenge Tuohy and Cain will face off in the 3,000m along with last year’s winner Amanda Eccleston and Emily Lipari. Robby Andrews, Erik Sowinski, Isaiah Harris are in the men’s 800m while Ajee Wilson leads the women’s race. Knight is in the mile.
• February 8: Short Interview With Nick Willis Ahead Of The Millrose Games Wanamaker Mile “There have been some great battles, and the allure of trying to get my first victory there keeps me coming back every year.”
• More Wanamaker Mile Q&As: 2018  Wanamaker Mile Champion Chris O’Hare *3:50.94 Miler Sam Prakel *GB Miler Charlie Grice *Former NCAA Champ Morgan McDonald 
• Ajee Wilson Will Return To Defend Her Title In The Millrose Games 800m Wilson will face a stiff challenge from GB’s Laura Muir and Jamaica’s Natoya Goule.
• World Champ Grant Holloway Vs. Olympic Champ Omar McLeod Set For Millrose Games 60m Hurdles They’ll take on defending NYRR Millrose Games champion Devon Allen and outdoor national champion Daniel Roberts.

This Week’s Podcast *Subscribe Here

LRC Des Linden Gave The LRC Podcast A $50 Tip, She Joins The Podcast To Discuss Why And Her Great Career + Kipsang Suspension, Rupp’s Coaching Change Des Linden gave a $50 tip to the LRC podcast. She explains why. Listen and subscribe today to the podcast.

Kenya Continues To Lose Credibility / Yet Another Kenyan Gets Popped

• Former World Youth And Jr. 800 Champ Alfred Kipkter  Gets Popped For Whereabouts Failures He ran 1:42.87 after finishing 7th in the Olympics in 2016.
  *MB: Is there really no LRC thread about Kenyan doper A. Kipketer (1:42.87s 800m) being suspended provisionally by AIU
• MB: Kenyan drug testers show up at camp. Top Kenyan athlete jumps out window and jumps over fence to escape
• Other Countries Aren’t Totally Innocent Either Commonwealth 100m Champion Michelle-Lee Ahye Gets Two-Year Ban For “Whereabouts Failures”

Distance Stuff

• Evan Jager Eyes 2020 Comeback Jager hasn’t raced since August 2018 after missing all last year with a chronic foot injury, but says he’s back healthy and “[email protected]#&ING amped” for the 2020 season.
• Mo Farah Talks About His Decision To Return To The Track And His Ambitions To Make History At Tokyo 2020 Just by toeing the line at the age of 37 Farah will make history as the oldest man to run in a 10,000m Olympic final, but he says “it’s gold or nothing.”
• GB’s Former World 1,500m Silver Medalist Hannah England Retires At Age 31 In a post on Instagram, England said she was “proud of my achievements” and “it was a privilege” to be surrounded by so many talented people.

Japanese Distance News

• 2020 Japan Olympic Marathon Trials Winner Shogo Nakamura Wins His First Race Of The Year With A PR Of 61:40 At The Takanezawa Genki Up Half Marathon It was a 13-second PR and a course record.
• Kyoto Wins National Women’s Ekiden Title For 17th Time
• 2020 Japanese Distance Rankings

Doping / Corruption News

• Lamine Diack’s Trial Starts On Monday In Paris The 86-year-old faces the prospect of 10 years in French prison for corruption charges involving the Tokyo Olympics, Qatar World Cup and Russian doping cover-ups.
• The Guardian Reports That Lamine Diack Offered A Deal To Delay Doping Sanctions Against 23 Russian Athletes In Exchange For $1.5 Million In Funding To Help A Friend Win The 2012 Senegalese Presidential Election
• BBC Article On Lamine Diack Trial Diack has been under house arrest in Paris since November 2015.
• 17-Year-Old Malaysian Sprinter Facing Possible 4-Year Ban For Steroid Use
• Thomas Bach Reassures Russian Athletes They Have Same Rights As Other Countries Until CAS Doping Ruling They aren’t provisionally suspended; they can continue to compete until the CAS ruling …which will hopefully uphold their 4-year ban.

Ultra / Mountain Running News

• The Guardian Examines How Some Women Have Been Beating Men In Super Ultra Races And Wondering If It Might Be A Sign Of Genetic Superiority Ross Tucker doubts it unless you are talking maybe about swimming where a woman’s higher fat percentage might help them in super-long swims.
• World Marathon Running Association World Cup Is Expanding Its Calendar In 2020 The 2020 season will have nine events with 12 total races.

The Decade Has Ended

LRC LetsRun.com’s Decade Awards: Alberto Salazar Is Our Person Of The Decade + Best Runner, Best Upset, Doping Excuse Of The Decade, & More! In a decade marked by controversy, it’s fitting that Alberto Salazar is our Person of the Decade as controversy clung to Salazar like a paper clip to a magnet. Plus who wins our world and US athlete of the decade honors?

LRC US And World Runners Of The Decade: Jenny Simpson, Matthew Centrowitz, Caster Semenya And Eliud Kipchoge 

LRC 2019 LetsRun.com World And American Rankings: Donavan Brazier And Ajee’ Wilson Are World #1s The 6th annual world and US distance rankings are here and for the first time ever two Americans are #1 in the world in their events.

• Rojo Speaks: The 2010s Are History: It Was Both The Best And Worst Of Times For Track And Field Fans What a crazy decade. From Chris Solinsky‘s 26:59 at the start of the decade to Brigid Kosgei‘s 2:14:04 at the end, there were plenty of high highs but the lows were also big as well as Olympic champs at 800, 1,500, steeple and the marathon were all banned from the sport. What does it all mean? LetsRun.com co-founder Robert Johnson looks for meaning and tries to figure it all out by taking you back in a time machine to January 1, 2010.