USATF fires back at Nick Symmonds-USATF will spend more than 50% of its budget and $15 million on elite athletes in 2015

Nick said he had proof money was unaccounted for. Is this more hot air. Why not just turn the proof over to the IRS instead of posting images in Instagram complaining .

pop_pop! wrote:Yeah, this actually means almost nothing.

So...are you saying that you know more than USATF's auditors? You've seen some source documents, have you? Where's your proof?

Nothing stops the federation from calling some exec's trip to a conference having nothing to do with "athlete development,"

Actually there is.

USATF always seems to have this one, very bad, band play USATF events. I wonder how that works? Is it reported?

lol...try reading the notes to the financials.

FWIW, It's useful to examine their non-profit tax records as well. Is USATF a 501c(3) at this point?

Yes.

Hey..I have a great idea. Call the IRS tomorrow and fax them all your "evidence". See what happens.

Nick can throw bombs but whines like a baby when others bring up points.

He should disclose the real issue. He isn't defending other athletes or his current sponsors. He simply wants to sell you suckers more caffeinated gum..that's it. The legit sponsors accept and adapt to the Nike Usatf deal (except oiselle who doesn't know a track meet from a mommy blogger convention). Legit sponsors can a will market WC athletes. But simpletons like Nick think a WC is the best/ only way to push their "house" products ( crap gum, terrible misleading nutrition bars).

By the way all of that would be fine in symmonds was honest about it

The Oiselle owner posted that she hoped the next in line for the 800m would turn it down all for the greater cause. She had a reply that the Oiselle athletes going had no problem signing off on the USATF conditions. the thread kind of died after that.

$250k for officials? That's a lot of money for a lot of amateurish officiating and championship meet management. (Tarmoh, ABQ...)

The USATF wasting money is nothing new and has nothing to do with Symmonds.

I would like to see a really independent accounting of funds and not just from the 990. I am not taking either side in the dispute as I want to see actual numbers.

What constitutes "direct athlete aid"? Is the Elite Athlete Insurance Program included? What about high performance programs that pay for experts to work with the teams? Massage therapists, altitude experts (Robert Chapman, Randy Wilber), physical therapists, testing for EIA to meet IOC Games requirements?

Transparency is a good thing.

If someone wants to argue that supporting grass roots or coaching education should not be a function of USATF, please make that argument.

I do agree to some extent that the time to resolve this issue was months and months ago. I do not buy that USATF could not make an executive decision on what constitutes an official team even even if the by laws are written that way.

Also, I am suspicious of this bullying allegation at indoors. Maybe someone came by and was poking a little fun at him. He is active on twitter, seems like he would have tweeted it if something serious had happened. (Maybe he did and I missed it).

luv2run wrote:

I do not buy that USATF could not make an executive decision on what constitutes an official team even even if the by laws are written that way.

.

Perhaps they could make a clarifying statement but that cannot make wholesale changes.

Especially when you consider the changes would be ONLY for 1 athlete. Despite what he thinks of himself, nick was only asking for nick. he is in no position to represent all athletes.

The reality is the USATF has done more for my personal running than Nick. Yes I support athletes but I'm just doing them a favor.

Athletes share the blame. wrote:

Marketing, broadcasting grow the sport. Investing in other activities does. Usatf covers more than track. Throwing $$ at the few elite track athletes to train does not.

I'd be fine spending more on athletes if they agreed to race more and not dodge competition. If they agree to promote the races they are running. If they agreed to not jump fences to avoid the media after races.

Nick Symmonds wants more of the pie but less of thd work.

A lot of these discussion points are horsehit. Nike doesn't pay USATF for marketing or organizing events. They pay to put the athletes in their gear. Predictably, the athletes want a cut of this licensing revenue. USATF responds with figures showing that they spend on marketing and event expense. Half the posters at Letsrun can't differentiate between what it means to run for a high school or collegiate team as opposed to being a professional. Being a pro means you're in the business of running and marketing for sport/health industry companies. Money talks and bullhsit walks.

Other points of discussion - What do people think a financial audit would show? The scope of a general audit is for material misstatements and internal controls not for the accuracy of expense categories and descriptions. The stuff they're spewing in defense is all fungible. The critical thinking skills on this site are considerably lower than I'd pegged it a week ago which isn't saying a lot.

you want to audit them.you want to see where each check went. creative writing is rampant in accounting.... under areas like "programs" and "research" and "consulting" the money can go anywhere, to your buddies or whatever.ignore the label of the category and look at the ledger the USTAF really blew it again with their arrogant behavior. Now they've got to deal with a lot of scrutiny as opposed to going to Nick off the record and say, sure you can wear your gear in the hotel, but on the track you need to do such and such,OK. ? .

LetsRun.com wrote:

We just received the following press release from USATF.

http://www.letsrun.com/news/2015/08/usatf-statement-and-data-on-elite-athlete-spending-usatf-will-spend-more-than-15-million-on-elite-athletes-in-2015-more-than-50-of-budget/

Alan Abrahamson portrays himself as some kind of Hemingway of sports writing.

quote:

"every single person associated with American track and field, or even just interested in it, ought to get down on their hands and knees and give thanks to Nike for its support of the sport. Without Nike, there is no U.S. track and field scene capable of competing at a world-class level. It’s that simple."

what brown-nosing Alan-dog means, is that everyone should kiss nike's ass like him.

This guy is a corporate shill. I hope Nick and company can rout out this rat

The guy needs an editor first off. (as I do)

If you look at who he's worked for as in the past you soon see this guy is a

SHILL

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shill

A shill, also called a plant or a stooge, is a person who publicly helps a person or .... Corporate-owned media outlets of radio and television are often accused of

just liars wrote:

Geer should be ashamed to lie so baldly to the public and to the athletes she's supposed to be supporting.

Geer isn't called "Baghdad Bobbi" for nothing.

1 Find an independent auditing firm not affiliated with USATF big shots

2 Sum up the checks USATF writes to atheles

3 Determine if the percentage shows that this is a scandal or not

It's not 'athlete support' when USATF pays the airfare, hotel, car, and food for Pinkowski and Wittenberg to hold a stopwatch at the US Marathon Trials. It's a 'boondoogle'.

We all are. It is a team sport, Nike is giving money for the entire team, the best he could do is wear the kit. Or, if he wants wear Brooks and expect nothing from Nike.

sanchobaile wrote:

I'm so sick of Nick Symmonds

If they are going to define "money spent in athletes" to include expenditures related to hosting/televising events and any other expense that provides a tangential benefit, shouldn't they be spending WAY more than 50% of their budget on athletes?

I work for a nonprofit that provides low-cost housing for seniors who can't afford market rate rents. If our CFO showed up at work today and informed me that our company spends just over half of our budget on seniors, I would find that number to be shockingly low.

USATF's entire purpose is to further the sport. The sport is the athletes, therefore supporting athletes is their whole mission. Spending half of your budget on the one thing you're supposed to be doing isn't impressive. Some overhead expenses are necessary, but I'm guessing that most nonprofits spend more than half of their budget on their mission.

Not horsefit Hulky. You are wrong. If Nike could just use usatf as a proxy they would never need to sign individual athletes.

Which do you think is more effective give Nick $70k a year or having Nike on TV for all the days of the usatf?

The USATF mission isn't to funnel $$ to the very few elites. Prople like you and nick forget that. They forget it actually cover 5 niche sports.

The runners run & market for the shoe companies individually. Without the USATF no one cares who they are. Without elites the USATF would still exist - in a much lesser form.

Look at the list of championships and other events.

Comparison to the nfl and nba are crap.

I have no problem with an audit. I think you'd & nick would come away very disappointed.

As much as athletes want to blame usatf for the lack of growth in their sport. Athletes share much of that blame.

Everyone is forgetting that the main problem Nick had that ultimately kept him off the worlds team was the lack of clarification on what a "team function" was and when he would be allowed to wear his Brooks gear. THIS was the main point he brought up. None of y'all are talking about that. USATF needs to address their document all athletes have to sign.

Explain.

At one point Track & Field was big. NHL, NFL are all start ups at one point.

What can't track & field have a circuit (like golf, tennis, etc) and let the athletes have their sponsors but have prize purses as well.

Diamond league with an exception... Contracted athletes who have to compete.

Novel idea right, top athletes competing weekly. Hockey, baseball compete all the time why not track?

And the thought you can't even get track & field on tv over the crap out there is sad. American Ninja over nationals? Speed up the meet. Get it done in 2.5 hours with nonstop action except for commercial breaks.

All this has been said before. USATF lacks vision and is a bunch of old fools.

Nick is a joke and didn't really do anything of value here. But USATF is even a bigger joke.