I'll agree to disagree.
LRC does have it's moments. The Gabby Grunewald, USATF insights were a plus, but for the most part, I find their reporting to be more self gratifying than hard hitting.
I agree they take a stand, but they take a stand the same way a tabloid does. The find a niche on a story, over report it, then act as if they blew the doors wide open on a story that doesn't really have any weight or isn't news to begin with. I.E. the Ryan Hall story. It should have been a really cool addition to a story on Meb's win, but when you read it, it reads as if it wasn't for LRC, the people wouldn't have known that Ryan Hall and Co were a monsterous part of the win... that's not indispensable journalism, that's making a mountain out of a mole hill for facebook likes and traction.
It's great to ask Galen Rupp about innovation vs cheating. But why not do a full story on it. Not just Rupps reaction, but followup with technology people, other people in the industry, other athletes. Why not actually write a story on it? This isn't what Let's run does, so it's hard for me to call them independent and brave when they're really just asking questions at opportune moments and getting zero answers because the setting isn't right for an athlete to honestly or thoughtfully answer a question like that. That's not journalism.
So, it is what it is, and as much as I hate the op-ed pieces, I still read them, so the joke's on me, but for everything LRC does well, there's a litany of things they do that has more similarities with celebrity magazines than News outlets.