XC/Track Cuts Spread to The Rich

MB: Brown University, Despite Its $4.2 Billion Endowment Will Be Cutting Men’s XC, Indoor and Outdoor Track ADs love to get rid of men’s xc, indoor and outdoor track as the same the male athletes count three times for Title IX purposes. The Brown AD seems almost giddy to be axing 11 sports. “I’m excited for the many ways the Excellence in Brown Athletics Initiative will serve our student-athletes for years to come.”

More Depressing News: MB: Breaking: David Rudisha has surgery after breaking ankle in Kenya. Expected to be out 3 months.

US News Of Note

U.S. Education Department Rule That Connecticut’s Policy Allowing Transgender Girls To Compete in Girls Sports Without Treatment Violates The Civil Rights of Girls Who Have Always Identified as Female The CT authorities, however, aren’t backing down citing state law. Will they lose federal funding as a result?
*MB:  Women’s sports may be saved!! Connecticut’s policy of allowing transgender women to compete w/o treatment found to violate Title IX

Cool story: The day after NCAA indoors were cancelled, many of the top DIII athletes went to a local track and race a 5000 The NCAA DIII xc champs Patrick Watson of Stevenson University and Parley Hannan of Ithaca won the races in 14:20 an 16:49. *Race Video

Administrative News

• Interesting Q&A With New UK Athletics Head Joanna Coates, Who Explains How Her Not Being A Track And Field Person Is Going To Help Her Do Her Job “I think you can look at it with a really fair pair of eyes, because you don’t have the emotion, you can be very critical of things. But don’t get me wrong, you do then fall in love with it!”
• Australian Medical Director Says The World Needs To Prepare For Tokyo 2021 As If Vaccine Won’t Exist
• WADA & Quebec To Fund Anti-Doping Project Piloting Artificial Intelligence To The Tune Of $850,000 AI will be used to try to figure out who is doping.

How Some Pros Are Training During Quarantine 

• Ajee Wilson Is Doing 3-Mile Tempos In Sub-18
• Sara Hall Is Doing Track Workouts With Two Of Her Daughters
• Kyle Merber Had Never Run A 100-Mile Week Before; During The Quarantine, He’s Run 8 In A Row With A High Of 105
• Dana Giordano Is Running Time Trials Without A Watch

Podcasts That Might Interest You

• Who Is The G.O.A.T. Of Canadian Mid-D Running? The Canadian Running Magazine podcast debates whether it’s Kevin Sullivan, Melissa Bishop-Nriagu, Mohammed Ahmed or Gabriela DeBues-Stafford.
• Mary Cain Appears On Dana Giordano’s Podcast To Talk About Her New Job With Tracksmith
• Video: Tracksmith’s Matt Taylor Talks To Flotrack

News From Outside The US

• Interesting Read After Retiring At 28, Ciarán Ó Lionáird Is Making A Comeback At Age 32 2,800 words on the comeback on the man who shockingly ran 3:34 and made the 1,500 WC final in 2011 despite not scoring in the 5,000 or 10,000 at NCAAs that year. Bored during Covid-19, but not having run more than 30 minutes since Burning Man 2017, he moved to Flagstaff and started training with Stephen Haas‘ group on April 1 and is shocked by his progress. He’s posting lots of updates since he imagines some may be skeptical since he took 4 years off.
  *MB: Ciarán O’Lionaird Comeback
• This Is Normally Great Manchester Run weekend – A Look Back At The Previous 17 Winners Most are total studs like Tergat, Bekele, Geb and Farah but the list also includes Dathan Ritzenhein.
• Kipchoge Runs 16km In Lewa Wildlife Conservancy To Promote The Lewa Safari Virtual Marathon “I urge everybody to participate and just run where they are. We are all part of the human family and we must keep strong, stay fit,” said Kipchoge. Sign up here.
• Mondo Duplantis Has Been Playing A Lot Of Golf During Covid-19 But Is Ready To Get Back At It
• Great Britain’s Niamh Emerson – World U20 Hep Champ – Is Aiming For Big Things Once Pandemic Ends She missed last year’s Worlds due to injury.
• In Her Own Words, Jessica Ennis-Hill Reflects On Her Achievements From her first memories to the best coaching advice she’s ever received.

Speaking Of HS Studs, These Guys Were Pretty Good In HS

The Ultimate Video Conference
LRC The Big 3, Reunited: Alan Webb, Ryan Hall & Dathan Ritzenhein Discuss Their Greatest Performances, Biggest Lessons, & Much More Alan Webb, Dathan Ritzenhein and Ryan Hall had never sat down and talked about their careers until this week. Find out why Ritz had Webb’s face on his dartboard as a high schooler, how Webb was able to beat Ritzenhein in their famous 10k showdown in 2006, which performances each believes was the best from their careers, their biggest lessons from the sport, their views on new shoe technology, Webb and Ritz’s thoughts on their time with the Nike Oregon Project and Alberto Salazar‘s ban, and much more.

There Was No Olympics For The US 40 Years Ago Either

• Interesting Read: Was The 1980 TJ Rigged So That A Soviet Athlete Would Win? 40 years later, many feel that Australian Ian Campbell or Brazilian Joao de Oliveira should have been the winner as they were given fouls on 9 of 12 jumps. The USSR’s flag bearer was the 3-time Olympic TJ champ Viktor Saneyev.
• George Plimpton’s Epic Recap Of The Moscow Games He said lots of people thought the Soviets were fixing things but he didn’t seem to be convinced.

Bored? Buy A Book – We Enjoyed This One

LRC Book Review: A 46-Year-Old Spends A Summer Training Like A Pro In Flagstaff In “Running the Dream” Matt Fitzgerald joined Ben Rosario‘s HOKA NAZ Elite team for three months in the summer of 2017 as he chased a personal best at the Chicago Marathon. From workouts on Lake Mary Road to strength sessions to a visit to John Ball, he lived the full professional experience.  “[The book] newfound appreciation for one of the privileges of life as a professional runner. Not the chance to travel the world racing in cool locations or the freedom to nap copiously, but the ability to dedicate all of one’s energies to becoming the best one can be – and the opportunity to make memories doing it alongside friends and teammates.” Five out of five stars. Purchase here.

10 Years Ago, Chris Solinsky Ran 26:59.60 To SHOCK THE WORLD

LRC 26:59! How Chris Solinsky Transformed A “Glorified Tempo” Into An All-Time Upset And Performance 10 years ago today, Chris Solinsky shocked the world by running 26:59 in his 10,000-meter debut. Get the inside story from Jonathan Gault and learn how the date of Solinsky’s wedding played a key role in his preparations and why his victory led to a decade-long feud between coaches Alberto Salazar and Jerry Schumacher.
*MB: Chris Solinsky’s 26:59 turns 10 years old today. Share your memories here.z
*MB:  Jonathan Gault’s new story makes Alberto Salazar look totally cringe
*MB: Does anyone have access to a recording of the live broadcast by Stanford of Chris Solinksy’s 26:59?

Speaking of Anniversaries

• Three years ago from Tuesday, Thomas Rohler shocked the world with his 93.90m javelin throw in Doha Yes, he was the Olympic champ but no one was expecting the longest throw in 20 years.
• The Penn Relays And Usain Bolt Recall Him Rocking Philly 10 Years Ago As Well