Matt Carpenter

"Mitchell Baxter":

You sound uneducated/undereducated. Please stay away.

Matt Carpenter sounds like a stand up guy, great runner and inspirational force. Where does he get the cash for the BMW in his driveway...strange...

BULLoney wrote:

Thats exactly what people said about Tim montgomery and marion jones

Try again.

I doubt anyone ever accused Tim Montgomery of being "principled". Frankly, not too many accused MJ of it either.

He's a whiner who doesn't like what USATF does yet doesn't want to get involved. Remember him complaining about Wells getting the prize money he thought was owed to him? He thinks that the rules that apply to everyone else shouldn't apply to him, somehow he deserves special consideration. I can never respect Carpenter, he's not naive and is too old to be acting like a spoiled brat.

http://www.skyrunner.com/story/vail2006.htm

http://runningtimes.com/Article.aspx?ArticleID=10709

I can never understand how someone can run up those kind of inclines and have the vo2 that he has. not be able to compete at the top level of regular flat distances.

Short legs.

USATF doesn't run the drug testing program. That was the whole point of USADA, which was set up after USATF was keeping positive tests from stars (Jerome Young) from being released. USADA is entirely independent from all national governing bodies of all sports (USATF, USA Swimming, etc).

heart and lungs wrote:

I can never understand how someone can run up those kind of inclines and have the vo2 that he has. not be able to compete at the top level of regular flat distances.

I raced against Matt in road races close to twenty years ago, and he was no slouch. He led the 1990 U.S. Marathon Championships through sixteen miles or so, in an excellent field that included Steve Spence (who won) and Mark Curp (second, I believe), before totally wilting and finishing around 2:30. He made a number of attempts in conventional marathons, but only ducked under 2:20 once. It may simply be that the hard roads beat up his body too much (he did a lot of training on soft trails and his treadmill), but I don't understand why he never seemed to adapt to that, since becoming a world-class marathoner was really his big focus back then. It may be that his running style was too inefficient at the pace of world-class marathoning. I'm really not sure what the problem was. Obviously, the pool of talent in top-level marathoning is much greater than the pool of talent in top-level mountain running and ultramarathoning, but Matt still seemed capable of better performances in the marathon. Of course, when faced with the choice between being the best in one relatively small niche and being just another national-caliber runner in a larger niche, different people will make different choices, and it's hard to fault either choice.

Captain Spalding wrote:

USATF doesn't run the drug testing program. That was the whole point of USADA, which was set up after USATF was keeping positive tests from stars (Jerome Young) from being released. USADA is entirely independent from all national governing bodies of all sports (USATF, USA Swimming, etc).

Yes, I understand that. Maybe I don't understnad the other part of the system well but I believe that USADA relies on the national governing bodies to identify who is in the eligible pool and needing to be tested. Who would tell USADA to test Matt Carpenter if he is not a member of USATF?

Avocados Number wrote:

Thanks. I've known Matt for over twenty years, but I learned a few things about him that I never knew before.

Avocado - any chance you can get me contact info for Matt. I'd love to have him be the subject for a post on my new blog, "Younger Legs For Older Runners."

Thanks if you can.

That I don't know, though it's an interesting question. The USADA website isn't much help.

http://www.usantidoping.org/what/process/selection.html

However, the IAAF website says that

"Rule 30 of the IAAF 2008 Competition Rules says that, “The IAAF shall focus its out‐of‐competition testing primarily on International‐Level athletes. However, it may, at its discretion, conduct out‐of‐competition testing on any athlete at any time. In most cases, testing shall be carried out without notice to the athlete or his athlete support personnel or National Federation."

http://www.iaaf.org/antidoping/athlete/testing/index.html

So that all that for what it's worth. Either way, it seems unlikely that Carpenter's doping, and I thought the remark in the article was a bit unnecessary.

Captain Spalding wrote:

That I don't know, though it's an interesting question. The USADA website isn't much help.

So that all that for what it's worth. Either way, it seems unlikely that Carpenter's doping, and I thought the remark in the article was a bit unnecessary.

Here, I think I found the answer for us: A: USADA has authority to test:

any athlete who is a member of a National Governing Body (NGB)

any athlete participating at a competition sanctioned by the United States Olympic Committee (USOC) or a NGB

any international athlete who is present in the United States

any other athlete who has given his/her consent to testing by USADA or who has submitted a Whereabouts Filing to USADA or an International Federation (IF) within the previous 12 months and has not given his/her NGB or USADA written notice of retirement

any athlete who has been named by the USOC or a NGB to an international team or who is included in the USADA Registered Testing Pool or is competing in a qualifying event to represent the USOC or NGB in international competition

any United States athlete or international athlete present in the United States who is serving a period of ineligibility on account of an anti-doping rules violation and who has not given prior notice of retirement from all sanctioned competitions to the applicable NGB and USADA, or the applicable foreign anti-doping agency or foreign sports association

USADA does testing for International Federations (IFs), other National Anti-Doping Organizations (NADOs) and the World Anti-Doping Agency. Generally, USADA does not test at the Olympic Games. The Local Organizing Committee for the Olympic Games and WADA oversee testing at the Games.

So USADA has no authority to test Carpenter, since he isn't a member of USATF.

I also found the remark in the article unnecessary. It also seemed out of place and interrupted the flow. I'd like to know if something was edited out which might make the remark make more sense.

Nothing Strange about it. His wife works for a large Software Company.

I ran against him 25 years ago when he ran for University of Southern Mississippi (go Favre) and he sucked so bad that if we didn't lap him in a 10K we gave each other major crap. Now, he's featured in NYT kicking & 25 year old trail dudes asses and I'm the sad old man typing a "back in the day" email about him. Can't imagine he'd take PEDs...he's probably just way better the average ultra marathoner and has the times & physiology to back it up.

The thing I see with Matt is that he has a training ethic like no other and can push himself like no other. I think the reason he has kicked such a$$ in the ultra world is that he also trains speed. I don't know if this has changed in the last few years but he used to do weekly track workouts while still putting gobs of time on the hills. I doubt that Jurek and most of the other Ultra guys are doing this (Uli and Simon G. not included). While not world class, he has decent speed. I remember him running a local 5K a few years ago and winning in like 15:04. How fast can Jurek run a 5K? This is why he smashed the record in the Leadville by 90 minutes.

And Yes, I do believe that the top Kenyan Marathoners would break Matt's records if they were to train exclusively for Mountain Running. There is no money in it so they won't though.

my friend you are wrong. matt just won like 10,000 in an ultra. And he doesnt just compete in ultras people. So its a big deal either way if he uses drugs, because then he would be stealing money from others who run clean. You cant base someones drug usage off of incentive because that varies. Maybe one guy says I will use drug to become the best 10k runner, the next guy could be using just to break 15 in a 5k. IT HAPPENS

Yes, he won $10,000 at the North Face Challenge in San Francisco. It's the biggest purse in ultrarunning; most races don't offer any. For winning a USATF championship race you only get $1000. Hardly enough to pay for and justify doping, especially compared to the money in road races.

its a weak sport, who cares?

No he hasn't run 15:04 in the past few years.At least not here in Colorado Springs or Colorado in general. The fastest he has run in the last 8-9 was mabye 15:47 and that was at the now non-existant Manitou Springs Mayors Cup. Look it up before you post bogus times.