Amby Burfoot says: do away with the Olympic Marathon Trials

Any thoughts on your moderator telling Boston Marathon Winner Amby Burfoot to "STFU" because he felt insulted by Amby's opinion piece and because Amby dared to try to spark a discussion?

I would ban malmo for life.

Instead you'll probably delete this post.

From the article:
"The men’s team should be Conner Mantz, Clayton Young, and Galen Rupp.
All three proved their fitness as recently as last October."

I stopped reading there. FAIL.

I'm so glad that some others feel the same way as me. I still have some faith in humanity.

The bottom line is you will never be able to create a perfect system that will put the best on the line on that particular day.

So what method will create the most favorable outcome? Our sport from youth levels up has always been decided by racing. It’s the only way. The only woman that would have been chosen this year would have been Sisson if USATF had to guess.

Does anyone think that is fair now to leave out our number one from this past weekend after the trials record was broken by an unknown by three minutes? Nobody would agree to that.

Do we open it up to USATF to choose? Are we all going to wonder whether someone was paid off or a coach that has some pull with the director, etc? We don’t have to because it is decided in a race. That is what our unique sport is founded on.

Wejo: Thanks for noticing. Yes, 2 + 1 is a very good alternative. So sorry I left "launching new web sites" off the list of main purposes of Trials selection. :)

Who would you pick to replace Lindwurm?

as you retitled it as Amby deserves mention as he started the thread as Amby real good runner.

Hey what about the fact that Malmo told Amby to STFU and called him stupid?

Ambi, perhaps STFU was over the top and I apologize for that, but you're the one who called our perfect system STUPID AND MISGUIDED. It is not. Your idea is contrary to the fundamental essence of athletics: that results are to be determined on the playing field, not in smoke filled backroom tribunals. If you were in charge then 'the names Knight, Capriotti, Lananna, Masback, Siegle will have destroyed the sport.

You keep invoking your halcyon days of 1968. Have you not forgotten what Bill Bowerman did to Dave Patrick? Thats what happens when you allow abusive subjectivity into the equation.

Dave Patrick. Please repeat that name everytime you come up with another cockamamie idea.

Quit saying the current system is wrong, or imperfect, or (your words) stupid and misguided. Its none of those.

GM

"STFU" was more than over the top and I'm not sure why it hasn't been deleted yet.