does Rupp train with Oregon or Salazar?

It's really not as simple as like him or dislike him. It's not as simple as patriotism toward homegrown runners. Would you rather have foregin domination (Chelanga) or a conspiratorial corporate dickhead to the sport (Rupp)? Would you really be happy with either choice? That's why many people can't support Rupp. They want to see someone ELSE dominate the competition.

haah wrote:

It's really not as simple as like him or dislike him. It's not as simple as patriotism toward homegrown runners. Would you rather have foregin domination (Chelanga) or a conspiratorial corporate dickhead to the sport (Rupp)? Would you really be happy with either choice? That's why many people can't support Rupp. They want to see someone ELSE dominate the competition.

"conspiratorial corporate dickhead"

that's a new one. I still prefer "supreme faggy doofus"

I would support Rupp (as much as you can support such a dweeb) if he would just give up the charade and be the pro he already is.

haah wrote:

It's really not as simple as like him or dislike him. It's not as simple as patriotism toward homegrown runners. Would you rather have foregin domination (Chelanga) or a conspiratorial corporate dickhead to the sport (Rupp)? Would you really be happy with either choice? That's why many people can't support Rupp. They want to see someone ELSE dominate the competition.

Bill Gates' kids have unfair advantages. Chelsea Clinton gets unfair advantages. Guess what: it pays to have Alberto Salazar, one of the best runners in American history and the former sports marketing director of track and field, as your coach. Jesus Christ -- does it hurt your feelings that much? Should we kick out BYU, CU and NAU because not everyone can get home based altitude training?

I typically think runners are a very tough group. But with regards to Rupp, many of you guys sound like a bunch of crybaby losers.

You want to take him down a notch? Line up next to him and show him how to run.

Otherwise, stop embarrassing the rest of us. Seriously.

Someone said that Nike has twice rearranged the coaching staff at Oregon for Rupp only for Rupp to use Salazar anyway. Please explain. I know Martin Smith was fired, and while it was controversial, the fact is Oregon is a distance school and Smith never got it done in cross country. I acknowledge I might be in the dark about something, but what else happened? Didn't Pat Tyson coach there for a minute? Was that "for Rupp"? Did Rupp tell Phil Knight at one of their many clandestine meetings that he wanted to be coached by Tyson only to change his mind later? Enlighten me. [quote]:

Heres the deal, Oregon under Martin Smith did get the job done in cross country, initially. There was the 6th place finish while Dillinger was still there but all of his guys ran like sh*t at Nationals, and there was a fifth place finish a couple of years later. There was also a top five individual finish with Steve Fein (3rd in 1999?). Anyway, Smith and the nike people apparently never really got along all that well, but it wasn't a big problem until Alberto wanted Rupp to run at Oregon but also wanted to continue coaching him. This was the battle Smith should never have fought. What happened is Alberto and Nike began pushing for his removal, they poisoned the recruiting waters by spreading lies to local coaches and athletes and publicly criticizing Smiths coaching methods on a national level. Way to support your alma mater huh?

What happened was that the athletes already at Oregon continued to run well because Smith is a very fine collegiate coach, (this included two top ten alltime 5ks, and two top ten all time 10ks in a total of 6 years, more than Dellinger had coached since 1980) but recruiting stalled and no new talent came in. Also, the track team continued to do well with several top ten national finishes and two team conference titles, (of only 5 or 6 total in school history). However, you can't do well in cross country with only two or three runners, and cross country stalled. This became more ammo for Salazar, and the money eventually got it's way.

Pat Tyson was in interim coach, he held stop watches for the veterans who continued to do the same thing they had done in the past, Rupp continued to be coached by salazar. Tyson was not there for Rupp, he was there so that Oregon had a distance coach before they could get the guy the really wanted. Also, Tyson always wanted to be the Oregon coach, it worked out well for all, except the athletes who got screwed.

So, this was the big deal with the firing of Coach Martin Smith at Oregon.

Also, it ought to be noted that while a lot of this was done because of galen, it was not done BY galen. It's not his fault unless you want to hold an 18 year old accountable for the actions of a coach he hero worships.

As far as his eligibility goes, knowing nike and the way they operate I tend to be skeptical about the way everything worked out, but I have no evidence of wrong doing, only suspicion. Everything else I know for a fact, because I witnessed it.

yeah i'm the one that mentioned the double switch before. I was unaware that Pat Tyson was an interim coach. For some reason I thought they fired him too because things were not working.

Anyway I share the same sentiments as Mr. Know it All in regards to the athlete. You can't blame Galen Rupp for all the things that has happened on his behalf. He is just a talented kid that Nike and friends chose to give the world. I doubt Rupp even had much say in what has been going on the past few years. Is it fair to blame Phil Knight and Alberto Salazar for cheating the rest of the NCAA athletes...who knows, it was probably quite a number of cooks in the kitchen, not just them.

Those of you that like to bash Rupp for being doofy or gay or whatever need to grow up. There are plenty of people around that are doofier or gayer or whatever word you want that don't catch a fraction of the stuff he gets on here. If you want to criticize his advantage then fine, but his character is irrelevant and I bet nobody on here has actually met him anyway.

I've talked to some with knowledge of the situation, but I didn't witness it, so my opinions might not be as accurately reflective of what happened as yours.

From my observations, I'd put a little more of the blame on Smith, as regardless of Rupp's situation, Smith alienated a lot of the oldtimbers in Eugene. I'm not saying he was hired to spend all day catering to the oldtimers, but I don't think he understood the role of community relations he was going to have, or was too stuborn to work with the community. I think Smith is a good coach, but I don't think long-term he was the right coach at Oregon.

That being said, I don't think a lot of Oregon fans gave Smith enough of a chance. As you point out he did do a good job developing the guys he had with more additions to the top 10 lists than Dellinger had had recently. I think Smith is unfairly criticized by some that have an over-inflated view of the shape of the program Dellinger left. Dellinger was a great coach, but his recruiting had died off. He had a good group right when he left, but the cupboard was essentially bare right after that. The top-10 lists hadn't been cracked for 20 years in some cases. In some sense, I think Smith did the best with the cards he had been dealt. The rise of Stanford, Wisconsin (helped by Martin), Colorado etc. happend during Dellinger's tenure. It's not like Oregon was winning every year prior to Smith arriving. Vin has been a great addition, but I think it is unfortunate the Smith leaving went down.

After nearly a hundred posts, no one has answered the OP's question. I know someone who runs for Oregon. She told me that Rupp trains with the OR team (same time & location), but mostly does his own workouts rather than doing workouts with other OR teammates. One reason for this is that Rupp's tough workouts could not be handled by the other OR runners -- possibly Shadrack Kiptoo could do some of Rupp's workouts.

Rupp does not travel on a daily basis to Beaverton (105 miles away) to be coached by Salazar. He might travel to see Salazar on some weekends, but that's it. He talks frequently by phone with Salazar to tell Salazar how his workouts went and to get new workouts for the comming days. Salazar does not come to Eugene to watch Rupp's workouts.

While Rupp gets his workouts from Salazar by phone, he also gets occasional input from Lananna during/after his Eugene workouts. Lananna and Salazar appear to get along fine. My friend does not know if they talk regularly about Rupp's training.

i too am awaiting an answer to my original questions.

obviously the answers with be of a negative connatation, but id like to know the actual feeling of why the teammates do/dont like him, the actual portion of training time spent with the team vs salazar, and the rest of the teams and the nations potential hath they had similar training. thanx.

Rupp does NOT train with the team!!! You obviously don't know anyone on the team. I am very good friends with a staff member and you would be surprised how many people are upset at the Rupp/ Nike situation. The problem is "bye bye job" if they say anything.

I wouldn't really disagree with anything you said, I was just addressing someone else's question with what I said.

So, to address your points, (first I don't want anyone to think I was disparaging Dellinger, he's a great man and a great coach, I have a tremendous amount of respect for him.) there was definitely a feeling of alienation among some of the old timers. This, as with most things is a little bit the fault of people on both sides. There is an insane sense of entitlement amongst many in the Eugene track crowd, I don't know how they could be pleased and wouldn't want to try. However, it certainly seems like Coach Smith's efforts to reach out were inadequate at best. So, neither side made an attempt to reach out and compromise as far as I know.

Anyway, part of my point in my earlier post was that none of this was a huge problem until Rupp came along. Again, not his fault, he was just the catalyst that sent existing problems into an explosion of sorts.

That's all I got for now

I coached Consiglio once.

OrIsJustWrong wrote:

Rupp does NOT train with the team!!! You obviously don't know anyone on the team. I am very good friends with a staff member and you would be surprised how many people are upset at the Rupp/ Nike situation. The problem is "bye bye job" if they say anything.

This has been shown to be false on several occasions, why do you insist on perpetuating the lies? A "staff member's" opinion doesn't really matter that much to me. They are paid to do a job, not to like it. I am much more concerned with how the athletes feel, and I have heard nothing but positive things from the handful that I have had a chance to talk to.

Jeremy Bloom was a freestyle skier, not a snowboarder.

And it\'s Ore-gun, not Ore-GON. That\'s why I always say Ore-GON in my office; there\'s a Duck who gets really pissed.

jizzmo wrote:

Do you think the same for HS kids? I know at least one FL national champ that is not coached by the school's coach. She has her work outs made done by a former Olympian.

What's the big deal. As long as Rupp peforms well, then he is representing UO just fine. Don't worry about how he does it, just as long as the end result is positive.

You are DUMB, she just emails the coach occasionally to add input to her own training plan (she comes up with them herself). It is not a "HIRED" coach either, and she always lets her high school coach know what's up.

I'm happy to correct you as you are wrong. Rupp lives in Eugene. He goes to class at Oregon. Yes, he has taken some online courses at UofO - much like many other University of Oregon students - but he does also take "regular" courses as well. And he's a two time Academic All American, but, heck, anyone can do that taking online courses.

He does train in Portland at times but more often Alberto travels to Eugene to superivise his workouts. Alberto and Vin work closely with regard to Galen, but there is no doubt that Alberto writes his program.

As for his skipping the Mike Hodges Meet due to the "ruts", very few of Oregon's top runners ran that meet. Of course, had Galen run that day and come up lame, he'd have been vilified on this board for taking an unnecessary risk.

As for his not "listening to the school's coach", you can certainly find fault with that situation. The powers that be at Oregon - notably Lananna [one of the NCAA's most successful coaches over the past 25 years] - don't appear to have an issue with it. Of course, your opinion means more than theirs (Oregon administration, NCAA, etc..), so we certainly should listen to what you have to say.

And I'll agree with you that his situation is not normal. Why shouldn't it be accepted? This kid is doing everything in his power to be GREAT; rather than find every opportunity to tear him down (mediocre folks often feel that if they can bring great ones down to their level it will make them equal; true champions try and elevate themselves to a higher level), I choose to support and applaud him.

frankie

schiefer wrote:

I coached Consiglio once.

I lived with Consiglio.

It wasn't pretty.

Wow, so many threads about me.

TO answer the OP's question, no I don't train with the team. I am too fast for them. I need to train with guys on my level. This winter I plan to train with Webb in Virginia, then maybe Ritz in the spring.

Thanks for all of the interest in me.

Galen

where at a bar in fayetteville?And you and John Capriotti of nike are good friends too.

schiefer wrote:

I coached Consiglio once.