Unreal: Max Siegel raises the white flag yet again. US WILL NOT send team to World Half

Gentleman Savage wrote:

runderun wrote:

I feel bad for US athletes.

I don't! Running isn't a real career. It's a hobby that can pay (poorly) for a short timespan.

Well given it lasts for such a "short timespan" then you gotta feel bad when they are forced to miss out on one of their only opportunities to participate in their "hobby" at the highest level.

overly cautious wrote:

Gentleman Savage wrote:

I don't! Running isn't a real career. It's a hobby that can pay (poorly) for a short timespan.

Well given it lasts for such a "short timespan" then you gotta feel bad when they are forced to miss out on one of their only opportunities to participate in their "hobby" at the highest level.

And yet…

overly cautious wrote:

Lolno... that just means Canada is also dumb.

Japan and South Africa, along with the US and Canada, already backed out as well. Let the stupid countries continue to race internationally during the pandemic. Darwinism reigns.

There is a lot of room for reasonable disagreement regarding what measures are appropriate to contain COVID.

This is way outside the realm of reasonable responses.

There are two reasons to implement these restrictions. First, to protect the community at large. Second, to protect the individuals.

The second seems like it should be a non-starter. Nobody is forcing athletes to compete. They should be free to decide whether the risk is worthwhile for them personally. Considering their age and general health, the risk is quite minimal. Lots of people go to more dangerous jobs every day.

As for protecting the community, that's theoretically a stronger rationale, but I don't think it survives any scrutiny, for a number of reasons:

1) Almost every country in the world has significant community spread. It's not as though traveling for a race is going to move the virus to someplace it isn't already circulating.

2) The risks of travel have proven to be minimal. While people were reasonably apprehensive about air travel initially, that data now shows that air travel is quite safe, likely due to a combination of universal mask usage and high quality air filtration that is absent in other types of indoor spaces.

3) Whatever risks there are can be seriously mitigated by taking extra precautions (multiple negative tests, prohibiting athletes from using public transit or going into restaurants, etc.).

4) Every government involved has its own rules and procedures in place to control the spread of COVID, and competing in this race is perfectly compliant. It's irrational and inefficient for every private organization in the world to have its own board of health "experts" (who are certainly less qualified than the actual professionals) second guessing the authorities and imposing their own, separate rules. USATF's job is to promote track and field, not to second-guess the Polish health authorities.

No, leave it up to the medical experts on the USATF working group to decide what’s best, not up to the athletes or Letsrun who are less informed.

truth be told. wrote:

overly cautious wrote:

Lolno... that just means Canada is also dumb.

Japan and South Africa, along with the US and Canada, already backed out as well. Let the stupid countries continue to race internationally during the pandemic. Darwinism reigns.

Pro athletes have been competing in all countries and all sports for months now and haven't had any issues.