January 20, 2021 Homepage Archive

Nick Willis Breaks A WR

LRC Nick Willis Sets World Record By Breaking 4:00 In The Mile For 19th Straight Year Willis, 37, ran 3:58 in Florida to break a tie with fellow Kiwi legend John Walker.
*MB Nick Willis is going for history tonight. Will he set the all-time record of most seasons with a sub-4 minute mile at 19?

British XC Distance Debate Heats Up

Paula Radcliffe And Laura Muir Among Those Criticizing UKA’s Pushing To Equalize XC Distances A joint statement stated that they were concerned that longer distances could decrease participation and that they disagreed with the notion that shorter distances mean the races are inferior. Other top women to sign include Charlotte Purdue, Laura Weightman and former NCAA XC champ Kate Avery.
*Full Letter And List/Credentials Of The 23 British Pros Who Signed
UK Athletics Chief Joanna Coates Responds To Paula Radcliffe And Laura Muir Over XC Distance Debate “We probably didn’t assume how much noise this would make, but I don’t think it’s a bad thing. This is a sport which isn’t used to be consulted with, but it’s good to have this debate.”
English Cross-Country Association And Three English Area Associations Issue Statement Criticizing UKA’s Equal Distance Initiative They accused UKA of having a “flawed” survey with “questions skewed to obtain a certain result.”
*7,500 Respond To Online XC Gender Equality Survey Joanna Coates: “Just the sheer number of people who have replied proves there are a lot of differences of opinion.”

Looking Ahead

January 31:Osaka Women’s Marathon To Be Run On 2.8km Loop Course Japan Olympic team members Mao Ichiyama and Honami Maeda were planning on chasing the 2:19:12 national record (organizers recruited male pacers to help chase the record), but it’s unclear if the course change will affect those plans.
February 6:Mondo Duplantis Vs. Renaud Lavillenie Vs. Sam Kendricks Set For Rouen Pole Vault
February 17:Grant Holloway Leads Solid 60H Field For Copernicus Cup He’ll face world indoor champ Andrew Pozzi and Olympic silver medalist Orlando Ortega.
March 4:Decathlon WR Holder Kevin Mayer And Olympic Heptathlon Champ Nafissatou Thiam Entrants For Torun Combined Events Meet
Peachtree Road Race Set To Return In-Person In 2021, But On Two Separate Days Runners will have a choice to race on Saturday, July 3rd or Sunday, July 4th.

More Results From A Jam-Packed Weekend

Women’s Under-20 World 4 X 800 Record Goes Down As Well As #2 And #3 On All-Time Indoor 2-Mile List At Virginia Showcase High schoolers Roisin Willis (2:05.97), Bailey Goggans (2:20.49), Juliette Whittaker (2:05.25) and Sophia Gorriaran (2:05.49) broke the 30-year-old record with 8:37.20 despite a weak second leg due to Goggans’ injury. In the 2-mile, Sydney Thorvaldson ran 9:4795 to beat out Brynn Brown (9:51.00). Only Mary Cain has run faster.
*MB: SYDNEY THORVALDSON: 9:47.95 2 mile to beat Brynn Brown!

World Bronze Medalist Gudaf Tsegay Runs 4:02.35 All-Comers 1,500m Record To Highlight Ethiopian Pre-Olympic Trials Meet In Addis Ababa Other highlights were Selemon Barega in the 10,000m (27:58.48) and Diribe Welteji in the 800m (2:00.50). All of this at 7,700ft elevation.
MB:Parker Stinson Wins Naples Half Marathon In 63:33 Lindsay Flanagan won the women’s race in 70:23. *Results
*MB: footage : 2021 Naples Half Marathon : Parker Stinson
16-Year-Old Sato Runs 8:00.09 Japan U18 3000m NR in Kyoto Post-race he tweeted, “One step away from 7 minutes! So disappointing. I don’t know when the next time I can race is but 7 minutes is definitely coming!”
RRW:Calum Neff Gets Canadian 50-K Record in Houston Neff ran 2:51:27 on a looped course.
AW Weekly Round-Up

Training Group News

Alexa Efraimson Makes Training Move, Joins Pete Julian’s Group Efraimson has been training with the group since the fall and says “the transition has been really smooth” and that she wanted “a group of teammates that were going to push me every single day.”
*MB: EFRAIMSON joins Pete Julian’s group!!!
Olympic Marathon Trials 10th Placer Matt McDonald Joins Team B.A.A. The former Ivy League 10,000m champ has a 2:11:10 marathon PB.

Congrats To Ken Goe!

Ken Goe Named Oregon Sportswriter Of The Year For 2020 Goe recently retired after a 43-year career with The Oregonian. Listen to his interview from November on the LRC podcast here.

Give The Gift Of LetsRun.com This Holiday Season

What A Weekend!

Recap Track Is Back, Baby! Athing Mu 2:01, Selemon Barega 27:58 At 7,700 Feet, & Recapping Track’s First Big Weekend Of 2021 With limited competition opportunities in 2020, many athletes are desperate to get back on the track in 2021 and we saw a ton of top performances last weekend, from a triple jump WR to an NCAA pole vault record, some crazy-fast high school races, the return of Conner Mantz and …Tom Brady (?!?) running 7:58 for Michigan.

Assorted Distance News

Double Olympic Champ Kelly Holmes Discusses Her Battle Against Depression, Self-harm And Hormonal Problems Holmes says she once cut herself with scissors for every day she’d been injured, adding, “And that had been quite a few days.”
Athletics Weekly Looks Back At The Top 30 Races Of GB Distance Great Ian Stewart’s Career Stewart had success in many areas with an Olympic medal, World XC title and multiple indoor and outdoor European titles.
National Olympic Committee of Kenya Gives $3600 Checks To Six Distance Runners Included Olympic steeple champ Conseslus Kipruto and world 1500m champ Timothy Cheruiyot.
Turkish Distance Runners Set To Train In Ethiopia Before Tokyo 2020 A team leader said they may go there as long as five months.

Doping News

Good Read:The Guardian’s Sean Ingle Gives Props To Track For Handing Out 196 Doping Bans Since 2017 And Says Other Sports Could Learn A Lesson “The high numbers should be celebrated, shouted from the rooftops. Because they indicate that track and field doesn’t pay lip service to catching cheats but is actively going after its biggest stars.”
UK Anti-Doping Retrospectively Cut Recreational Drug Bans In Wake Of New Anti-Doping Code British XC runner Luke Traynor was one of six athletes to have their bans reduced (he is eligible to compete now rather than when his original ban ended in May).
German Doctor Mark Schmidt Convicted And Sentenced To 4 Years And 10 Months In Prison For His Role In International Doping Ring Schmidt treated winter sports athletes and cyclists with blood doping for years and in one case, administered a drug that was not approved for human use. *2nd Article

NCAA Weekend Left-Overs

Congratulations Aliphine!

Olympic Marathon Trials Champ Aliphine Tuliamuk Gives Birth She posted, “Our daughter Zoe Cherotich Gannon arrived on 1/13/2021 and she is absolutely perfect. Her dad and I are just so overwhelmed with joy, love and gratitude, and we can’t stop staring at her.”
*MB: Aliphine Tuliamuk’s daughter is freakin adorable

International Action – New Triple Jump WR!

World Bronze Medalist Hugues Fabrice Zango Breaks Indoor TJ Record With 18.07m He crushed the previous record by 15cm which was set by his coach Teddy Tamgho 10 years ago.

Renaude Lavillenie Soars Over 5.92m PV In Bordeaux
World Champs 10,000m 4th Placer Rosemary Wanjiru Wins Kenyan Prisons Cross-Country Champs She dominated the race, winning by 34 seconds over 2017 world XC bronze medalist Lilian Kasait Rengeruk with 3-time Berlin Marathon champ Gladys Cherono third and 2016 African XC champ Alice Aprot 4th in her first race in 17 months. 5,000m Olympian Charles Muneria won the men’s race.
MB:15-year old Aussie Imogen Stewart runs 4:38 mile
Australia’s Rohan Browning Runs Wind-Assisted 9.96 To Win The 100m At The Illawarra Track Challenge He ran this aided by a 3.3m/s wind, doubling back from winning his 60m heat two hours earlier (he went on to win the 60m final in 6.55).