What Vernon really meant was he was the top finishing white guy. WHITE = EUROPEAN
What Vernon really meant was he was the top finishing white guy. WHITE = EUROPEAN
What Mo really said was, once his running career is over he will live in another country. He may retain his Brit citizenship, but he will mostly stay away from the Isle.
Coach Li wrote:
Jingo Unchained wrote:One more thing, Lagat needs some better/custom gear. I think he's earned the right not to have to wear the 2012-era neon Volt garbage 90% of the fields are wearing these days.
I am surprised that Nike hasn't established Coach Li's group as some sort of team by now the same way they have for OTC Elite/BTC/NOP. I mean, they have Lagat, Sambu, Lalang, Abdi, and now Chelanga. I think it's about time they get their own team gear.
If this "surprises" you, then you are hopelessly naive.
Yeah, sure, I have no problem with any of that. I understand that there are all sorts of refugees moving to more hospitable countries and taking citizenship there, and other people moving all over the place for a different/better life. That's fine with me. I'm a Brit ex-pat myself, and I have no issue with non-Anglo-Saxon people representing the UK. It's just that, if you're going to claim to represent a county, there has to be SOME kind of connection. If you weren't born there, OK, but do you live there? train there? If the answers are no and no, and you file an application to not have to pay taxes to your "home" country since you don't actually live there, WTF connection do you have to the country?
Come on! Even if you don't completely agree, you can at least admit that what Andy Vernon said, assuming it was in a joking tone as he claims, is not really all that preposterous. It was the European Championships, where Europeans compete against other Europeans to see who is the top European in their event. Andy Vernon is obviously European by any reasonable standard. Mo Farah wasn't born in Europe and hasn't really lived in Europe for quite a while. What is so difficult to understand? It doesn't have to be a racist or xenophobic angle - just common sense.
LetsJoy.com wrote:
Andy Vernon is obviously European by any reasonable standard. Mo Farah wasn't born in Europe and hasn't really lived in Europe for quite a while.
Sound reasoning. I have a twin, He went to UCLA, I studies abroad in Italy. Is he more American than I am? Also, we have Hispanic names? Does that makes us both less American. Having lived in Italy, what percentage European am I?
um I wonder why wrote:
Coach Li wrote:I am surprised that Nike hasn't established Coach Li's group as some sort of team by now the same way they have for OTC Elite/BTC/NOP. I mean, they have Lagat, Sambu, Lalang, Abdi, and now Chelanga. I think it's about time they get their own team gear.
If this "surprises" you, then you are hopelessly naive.
Wait what? I don't get your response at all...
thank you for this, i needed a good laugh tonight.
GOML wrote:
Retardalert.. wrote:Only f'tards say discus instead of discuss
You must be new here.
Yada, because "Retardalert.." would cry: "That dude threw the discuss over 220-feet!"
loopy bananas. wrote:
thank you for this, i needed a good laugh tonight.
GOML wrote:You must be new here.
He's Somalian
He grew up in Great Britian
He lives/trains in Portland, Oregon
He does altitude stints in Kenya and Ethiopia
Quite frankly, I don't know where you put this guy
Clever Cleavage wrote:
Quite frankly, I don't know where you put this guy
Do you know how I know you're white? It's the way you think you have the authority to "put this guy."
The real question is, how far can we discus this? nearly as far as we could shot or hammer it?
pretzel logic wrote:
LetsJoy.com wrote:Andy Vernon is obviously European by any reasonable standard. Mo Farah wasn't born in Europe and hasn't really lived in Europe for quite a while.
Sound reasoning. I have a twin, He went to UCLA, I studies abroad in Italy. Is he more American than I am? Also, we have Hispanic names? Does that makes us both less American. Having lived in Italy, what percentage European am I?
Half Latino, half American, half European
Wonderer Of Things wrote:
But how did he get that British accent?
(PS: Vernon is a dick. He will be remembered for this, while Mo is remembered for awesome running.)
+1, Vernon looks like a real ass after this one. To insult a double Olympic gold medalist for racing a watered down field days before he smashes a world record... just pathetic. And saying that Mo is not European? Sure he wasn't born in Great Britain but he was raised there and surely loves his country as he wore the GB kit during his world record. I'm sure he'd like to live there but its no secret that for NOP training purposes he has to live in Oregon. Honestly what has Mo done to get all this hate from random people on the internet? Does being great automatically come with constant disrespect? Vernon should be ashamed of himself, insulting his own national teammate.
Mop is a UK Tax Exile. He loves the UK that much.
“Mo Farah, who won Olympic 5000- and 10,000-meter titles in front of hometown crowds at the 2012 London Games, has applied to be a tax exile from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.
“Farah now lists Portland, Oregon as his main place of residence; it’s where he’s been part of the Oregon Project, coached by Alberto Salazar, since 2011. He also spends part of each winter training in Kenya.”
http://leftfootforward.org/2014/01/mo-farah-from-lefty-hero-to-tax-exile-in-10-short-months/
kod3200 wrote:
And saying that Mo is not European? Sure he wasn't born in Great Britain but he was raised there and surely loves his country as he wore the GB kit during his world record. I'm sure he'd like to live there but its no secret that for NOP training purposes he has to live in Oregon. Honestly what has Mo done to get all this hate from random people on the internet? Does being great automatically come with constant disrespect? Vernon should be ashamed of himself, insulting his own national teammate.
Honestly, can you get any more gullible? All someone has to do is put on a national singlet (probably under instruction from the federation they run under) and you think that automatically means they "love their country"?
And if he has to live in Oregon for NOP reasons, why does he seem to be in Kenya or Ethiopia so much of the time?
No
Clever Cleavage wrote:
He's Somalian
He grew up in Great Britian
He lives/trains in Portland, Oregon
He does altitude stints in Kenya and Ethiopia
Quite frankly, I don't know where you put this guy
Put him in Ethiopia training with dopers.
" It's just that, if you're going to claim to represent a county, there has to be SOME kind of connection. If you weren't born there, OK, but do you live there? train there? If the answers are no and no, and you file an application to not have to pay taxes to your "home" country since you don't actually live there, WTF connection do you have to the country?"
-very well stated. In addition, Vernon only stated what the rest of us were thinking. That was even further on the tips of our tongue after the most recent Great North run.
Speak for yourself. Seems like mostly the xenophobes are up in arms about Farah representing Great Britain. Before his relationship with Salazar, where did he train most of the time? England.
Farah lives in Portland and spends time in Africa for his job. Maybe he stays in the U.S. after his career, but I'm guessing he moves back to England.
Do you discredit anyone's nationality if they spend a significant amount of time training/living in another country? Or just black people?
Should Nick Willis not represent New Zealand since he spends most of his time in Ann Arbor? Or are you ok with it since he's white?
yuiop wrote:
Speak for yourself. Seems like mostly the xenophobes are up in arms about Farah representing Great Britain. Before his relationship with Salazar, where did he train most of the time? England.
Farah lives in Portland and spends time in Africa for his job. Maybe he stays in the U.S. after his career, but I'm guessing he moves back to England.
Do you discredit anyone's nationality if they spend a significant amount of time training/living in another country? Or just black people?
Should Nick Willis not represent New Zealand since he spends most of his time in Ann Arbor? Or are you ok with it since he's white?
This is exactly right. If Farah were white no one would raise a peep. Where are the complaints about Kate Avery competing for Britain, but training and going to school in the US? Or Kim Smith competing for New Zealand? Or Cam Levins running for Canada?
The point that he trains part of the year in Oregon is a ruse. He was a European champion in cross country and in track before he ever joined NOP. He is a British national, therefore he is European. There is nothing much more too it. He's not even a particularly controversial case since his father was a British citizen, born and raised in London ,and Farah lived there since he was 8, and was developed through British running programs. He is not someone (like Lagat) who made a name for himself and then became a British citizen. The entire basis for Vernon's comment was race. It may have been funny to him. It (understandably) was not funny to Farah.