The ultimate holiday weekend news dump: USATF DQ report has been released

Men’s 3,000m

The report of the on-field official incorrectly identified the athlete who appeared to

have possibly interfered with Galen Rupp, identifying Andrew Bumbalough.

A meet official told Salazar that Bumbalough had interfered with Rupp. Salazar then filed a

protest, identifying Bumbalough.

The head referee, reading the official’s report and protest, viewed the video and

disqualified Bumbalough, relying for identification on the reports.

By the time Bumbalough or his coach realized he had been disqualified, the window of

opportunity for filing an appeal had passed, and no appeal was ever filed. The results

therefore stood.

If a meet official knew of interference why did Salazar need to file a protest? Do they not call a foul unless a protest is made?

Don't they tell the athlete that he/she has been dq'd? How could the deadline for filing an appeal pass without the athlete knowing?

I don't see where this is addressed in the recommendations.

There are some very practical recommendations in the report, but I think the final recommendation of creating a method by which the runners and their agents will have the ability to resolve disputes opens a big can of worms. The less "powerful" the athlete, the more likely they are to get screwed. Rules should ideally be applied to all athletes in the same way. Even if in practice this doesn't happen, this just pushes us further from that ideal.

I also think they're looking for something that doesn't exist in order to remove "ambiguity". There is necessarily judgement on the part of officials in calling an interference violation regarding intent, severity, and impact. I don't think they will ever be able to accurately define what deserves a call and what doesn't that is going to satisfy everyone. We need to accept that we aren't going to agree with every refs call. As in every other sport, if a ref has a history of making calls most people disagree with, then we shouldn't hire them in the future. Thinking we can codify things and eliminate "bad" calls is foolish.

The call on Andrew was an administrative/clerical error. There should be a clear process created for preventing such errors and for correcting them. This can and should be done quickly by USATF.

The other issue is an on field judgement call by an official. I think we need to accept that officials are going to make calls that we aren't always going to agree with. The "solution" could be far worse than the problem if they follow some of the ideas in this report.

I am curious if there were any recommendations to not treat incidental as a disqualifying foul, especially in a crowded indoor track meet? Rubbin' is racin', right?

What a perfect report.

-It's presented on July 3rd, so no one will read it.

-It blames absolutely no one.

-Its recommendations are to do what others (IAAF) seem to be doing.

I love reports that leave you with no insight/judgement into what just transpired. The most hilarious section was where the report said, "... the Referee, assuming that Salazar knew the athletes involved, had no reason to question whether he was disqualifying the right athlete." That's just laugh out loud funny.

Why is the umpire approaching Salazar to tell him of a foul that Salazar admits he didn't see himself? It appears Salazar based his protest on the referee's info. Isn't that like a line judge in tennis telling a player to challenge a call or a referee telling a football coach to throw a red flag?

If these USATF referees and umpires are to be independent, they shouldn't be running up to coaches and squealing on the runners. What a joke.

"The head referee, reading the official’s report and protest, viewed the video and disqualified Bumbalough, relying for identification on the reports."

The head referee should be decertified, suspended or made to totally recertify for qualification as a head referee if he/she was so derelict in performance of his/her duties as to "rely for identification on the report." Step #1 for a referee should be to identify the athlete involved. Isn't that what they make us where those annoying, sticky hip numbers for? What kind of lazy incompetent referee doesn't carefully identify the athlete, if they're not just being a stooge for Nike?

HAHAHAHA

"When the Jury first viewed the various videos, they were not clear. For one thing, they were

shown to the Jury on what was described as a “bed sheet” and not a high-definition video

screen. Despite repeated viewings, the Jury concluded that the images were “too fuzzy and not

detailed enough to change the Referee’s decision.” Accordingly, they upheld the Referee and

ruled that Grunewald should not be disqualified."

This just gives off stupidity. They couldn't have waited to see better footage before giving off a verdict?

How could it possibly a level playing fiekd if the officials are approaching Salazar telling him he should get an athlete DQ'd? That official should be fired and so should the head referee. With video footage available and to just DQ someone based on the recommendation of Salazar who didn't even see the incident it crazy.

Also shows how classless Salazar is to move forward with a DQ after nothing even happened. Congrats AlSal your a piece of shit..

This report seems quite all-encompassing, they summarized the problems and their recommendations for change.

LINK:

https://usatf.org/usatf/files/7f/7f0869d8-e192-42cf-8e23-6172d19231e9.pdf

For example in the Women's 3000m they brought up that:

The Jury of Appeal used sub-standard technology, which included projecting race footage on a bed sheet, to reach their initial decision.

This was also said: (some think this is doubtful)

While the Jury deliberated, representatives of both Jordan Hasay and Gabe Grunewald directly interacted with the Jury. However, there is no evidence that there was any improper influence on the decision.

It continues to discuss the problem issues with Bumbaloughs DQ (see link) as well as suggested changes.

The Rules Committee should consider amending the Rules of Competition to provide for the possibility of correcting administrative errors that are discovered after the end of the competition. NCAA Rule 4.9 might serve as a model

Sounds like the officials made an ASSout of U and ME!

If they can reach a "settlement" for Hasay/Grunewald, then why can't they do the same thing for Bumbalough? It seems to me that all parties involved would be happy if Bumbalough were reinstated. No impact on Salazar's athletes since Bumby was 8th, and Bumbalough gets back in the results.

so this should have been resolved within a day of the meet, and instead it took several months. isn't USATF awesome!

Seems to me USATF is claiming that the rules are holding them hostage from making the right decision in the case of Bumbalough.

If the rules are that inflexible, surely they need to be changed.

All agree Bumbalough was not the one interfering and that he was selected in error. So why the big issue of not being able to correct the mistake? Doesn't matter how long after the meet this is done, just get it corrected.

Stupid is as stupid does.

Another Option wrote:

There are some very practical recommendations in the report, but I think the final recommendation of creating a method by which the runners and their agents will have the ability to resolve disputes opens a big can of worms. The less "powerful" the athlete, the more likely they are to get screwed. Rules should ideally be applied to all athletes in the same way. Even if in practice this doesn't happen, this just pushes us further from that ideal.

This. If they make a decision about a disqualification, wouldn't it be fair to let the athlete know in the appropriate time frame that they were DQ'd? Make an announcement and give them 10 minutes to come to the official's tent.

DKCCC wrote:

This. If they make a decision about a disqualification, wouldn't it be fair to let the athlete know in the appropriate time frame that they were DQ'd? Make an announcement and give them 10 minutes to come to the official's tent.

According to the report, the official result with the DQ was posted as normal but Schumacher left the building without checking the results.

If Schumacher was gone from the building he wouldn't have heard an announcement. Even if he was in the building, there might be a lot of reasons he wouldn't hear the PA system.

So is this incident really a basis to require officials to have the text numbers of every coach of every athlete? And where does that lead: somebody says they didn't get a text; somebody texts the wrong number, etc.

And I don't completely buy the facts as stated. It's consistent with the "blame no one" approach of the report. Schumacher had a number of athletes in the race not just Bumbalough. With everything going on I don't see him leaving without checking the official results as posted.

I'd wager that Schumacher and Bumbalough knew about the DQ that night but didn't think it worth challenging. To my recollection, Bumbalough actually said as much.

joho wrote:

A meet official told Salazar that Bumbalough had interfered with Rupp.

Yeah, right...

fighting the wrong battle wrote:

According to the report, the official result with the DQ was posted as normal but Schumacher left the building without checking the results.

There was a delay in posting the hard copy of the results. They didn't go up for, I believe, 20-25 minutes after the end of the competition. Now that everything is online, most athletes don't stick around for the hard copy results since they already know their time, and certainly there was no reason for Bumbalough or his coach to believe they needed to check them.

justthefacts wrote:

Seems to me USATF is claiming that the rules are holding them hostage from making the right decision in the case of Bumbalough.

It is not hyperbole to say that rules have never kept USATF leadership from doing whatever the f**k they want. Exhibit A: John Chaplin. I will say that admitting that maybe they might think about doing something different at some time in the future, possibly, is new ground.