Merry Christmas!!!
– Benedict Lupica, a WWII veteran and the father of NY Daily News columnist Mike Lupica, talking about the people who immediately rushed towards the bombs in Boston after they went off. Mike Lupica believes men like Tommy Meagherare the Sportsmen of the Year: “You want to know my Sportsmen of the Year? It is all those who ran into the street after the last runners crossed the finish line of the Boston Marathon.”
Week In Review
LRCTessa Barrett's Amazing Story, Praise For Mary Keitany, Desi Davila And Craig Masback, RIP To A Legend, Ryan Hall Versus Khalid Khannouchi, And Ethiopian Training Secrets Revealed?
This week we start by talking about Tessa Barrett's amazing story, hand out belated praise to former USATF head Craig Masback and give some current praise to Mary Keitany and Desi Davila. Plus Khalid Khannouchi vs. Ryan Hall, RIP to a legend in broadcasting, is Haile G a good dancer, and at last the secrets of the Ethiopians revealed?
Check Out The Boards On A Very Slow Week
Russian Environmentalist Working On Report About Impact Of Sochi Olympic Games Sentenced To 3 Years In A Penal Colony He was charged with causing damage to property, but he claims it is an attempt to scare other activists.
Weekend Round-Up: Desi Davila Races Again
Japan-Based Kenyan Sally Chepyego Wins Sanyo Women’s Half Marathon In 1:08:24 CRDesi Davila competed, finishing 7th in 1:10:51.- The Netherlands’ Sifan Hassan And Kenya’s Alex Kibet Get The Wins At Iris Lotto Crosscup In Brussels Former two-time Euro XC champ Fionnuala Britton was 3rd in the women’s race. Kibet won over Bahrain’s Albert Rop in a sprint finish.
- Olympic Pole Vault Champ Renaud Lavillenie Opens His Indoor Season With 5.93m To Win French Meet
- Yamanashi Gakuin Prep H.S. Wins Four-Way Finishing Sprint For First-Ever National High School Boys Ekiden Title The fastest 10K stage was 29:45.
- Toyokawa Girls Win Record-Setting Fourth Title At National High School Girls Ekiden The fastest 5K stage was 15:29.
- Kenyatta University Wins Kenya University Sports Association National Track Championships The meet sounds like it was a two-woman show as Sheila Kandie won the 3,000, 5,000 and 10,000 and Florence Wasike won all the sprints and the 800m as well as the 400m hurdles, long jump, shot put and the two relay races. Hard to believe but that’s what the article says.
Sunday’s Distance News
Phoebe Wright Blogs: “Meet my boyfriend, Track.” Wright humorously explains the many difficulties of dating as a professional runner. Wright: “Guy: Want to go out for drinks? Me: Yes! Except I don’t really drink. And I have to get in bed by 10 or so for a workout in the morning – so maybe something else instead?”- Ukraine’s 2:23 Woman Tetiana Gamera-Shmyrko Will Defend Her Title At The January 26th Osaka International Women’s Marathon She faces Japan NR holder and 2004 Olympic Champ Mizuki Noguchi as well as two other 2:23 Japanese.
- Japan Running News Quick Weekend Preview: Desi Davilla Racing Sanyo Women’s Half Marathon On Monday
- Some Random Facts You Probably Didn’t Know About Mo Farah He says his secret skill is making animal noises and that his childhood dream was to be a car mechanic.
- RunnersTribe’s List Of Top 10 Most Significant Debut Marathon Performances Of All-TimeJoan Benoit Samuelson gets the most recent entry for her victory in the first women’s Olympic marathon. LRCers have had debates on the “best” marathon every run (here and here) and a strong argument can be made for Sammy Wanjiru‘s 2008 Olympic victory.
Year End Rankings
- SI’s 113 Best / Historic / Unforgettable Sporting Moments Of 2013 Usain Bolt‘s 100m World Championships victory and the Boston Marathon bombing make the list.
- Five Brits, Led By Mo Farah, Make Top Five In 2013 World “Merit” Rankings
Will The IAAF Appeal?
LRCAslı Çakır Alptekin Of Turkey - The 2012 Olympic Women's 1,500 Champ - Is Cleared Of Doping By The Turkish Federation
The Turks apparently don’t believe there was anything wrong with the Biological Passport of the already convicted doper, who dropped from 4:02 to 3:56 last year. The question now becomes – will the IAAF appeal? We wonder – was American Shannon Rowbury really the third-best clean person in the race?
Might Asafa Powell Be Next? Incoming New Head Of WADA Says Asafa Powell Doping Case Needs To Speed Up “He has been under a cloud and if he has broken the rules then sport wants the case finalised, if he hasn’t then he wants the cloud lifted.”
The Most Innovative Product Wejo Saw While at The Running Event 2013
LRC Bia Multi Sport GPS: The Only GPS With A Cellular Modem, SOS Alert And Live Tracking
LRC's Wejo travelled to the annual running specialty conference, The Running Event, in Austin earlier this month and he left being most impressed with a product that officially wasn't part of the conference. It's called Bia and it's the only GPS watch with a cellular modem, SOS Alert, and live tracking. If a loved one wants to know where you are when you're running and you don't want to carry a phone, this is the product for you. Read all about it.
Move Over, Edward Cheserek And Abbey D …
LRC's ChampionsThe Winners Of The LRC NCs XC Prediction Contest Powered By RunFanShop.com
Let us proudly announced the real winners of NCAAs - our prediction contest winners, who highlight the best of LRC. We've got a repeat winner who can really crunch numbers, an Asics Aggie who ran Club Nats with some legends, and a guy who used to train with Bob Kennedy and has a proposal to fix the NCAA XC meet. Read all about them. Thanks to RunFanShop.com for sponsoring the contest.
Nothing’s Going On – Get Off The Computer And Spend Time With Your Family
- Mike Lupica’s Sporting Heroes For 2013 Are Men Like Tommy Meagher – Those Who Ran Into Chaos At The Boston Marathon
- European 800 Champ Lynsey Sharp Is Training On Christmas – Are You? “I like to train on Christmas morning as then I’m hungrier for my Christmas dinner!”
- A Video Merry XMAS/Happy Holidays To Everyone From USATF’s Star Athletes Zero distance runners make the cut.
- Video: BBC Sport’s Coolest Sporting Moments Of 2013 Include Ohuruogu And Isinbayeva
- Boring: Olympic HJ Bronze Medallist Robbie Grabarz Wants Curtains For His New House For Xmas
- 2013 Wasn’t All Bad For Athletics In South Africa Thanks To Johan Cronje And Lusapho April Yes, Athletics South Africa was a mess and Oscar P killed someone but Johan Cronje got a bronze and Lusapho April was third in NY.
- 2013 IAAF End-Of-Year Reviews – Relays
Do You Know What You’re Taking? USA Today Investigation Finds Companies Caught With Drug-Tainted Supplements Are Often Run By Executives With Criminal Backgrounds The supplement industry is largely unregulated, but sometimes when the FDA does test it has found many supposedly “all-natural” pills and powders to have potentially dangerous and illegal drugs.
Former WADA Head Dick Pound Says Doping Jeopardizes The Future Of Sport And The People In Charge Are Ignoring It Pound: “Many of these stakeholders have a plan to deal with it. Unfortunately, their plan is to ignore the problem, pretend it does not exist, pretend to attack it vigorously, and ultimately hope that the public will get tired of hearing about it.”
NCAA News
- Interesting Stat From RW: 20% Of Schools Spending Ridiculous Amounts On College Football Bowls Have Made Cuts To Men’s Running Programs “It is acceptable for up to $118,750 in gifts to be given to a football team for making a postseason game … That max gift amount could cover about 14 percent of the expenses of a typical track and field and cross-country program at one of these institutions.”
- University Iowa Track Coach Lodges Complaint And Threatens Lawsuit Over Gender Discrimination In Hiring Process But wait, it’s not what you think. The coach complaining is a man who says the university repeatedly passed over qualified male candidates and that the head coach even joked he should get a sex change if he wanted a job.
Doping Stuff
London Daily Mail: “Bolt dominates the landscape but a spate of failed drug tests threatens to turn Jamaica into the island of broken dreams.”- Usain Bolt And Mo Farah Are Both Careful To Steer Clear Of Drug Issues In Their Autobiographies
- Aussie Sprinter Matt Davies Gets 2-Year Doping Ban
- Belgian Cyclist Attempts Suicide After Positive Doping Test He was released from the hospital after night of observation.
- Valerie Adams IAAF Online Diary: Says She’s Back Training Again After 3 Months Off For Knee/Ankle Surgery
- Adams Makes Use Of Eccentric-Concentric Machine For Off-Season Lifting It’s a machine that requires more than one person to use and works on muscles when descending for a squat or a press with a weight which is 120 per cent of your capacity and ascends with a weight 80 per cent of capacity.
Doping / Legal News
- Athletics Illustrated Calls On The IAAF And WADA To Act With Force Against Turkey After They Clear Olympic 1,500 Champ Asli Ckir Alptkin Of Doping “It is now time to put a stop to apparent state–endorsed and or state-ignored doping once and for all, otherwise, without a deterrent doping will continue, unabated.”
- Top Kenyan Police Officer Investigated For Taking $10,500 Payment From David Rudisha
MB: Kenyans, help us out: Why would David Rudisha pay another police officer - GB Sprint Star Adam Gemili: “I also had a lot of messages from parents who told me how disappointed they were [in the sport’s doping] and how nice it was to see someone so young and genuine. I thought they shouldn’t need to send me messages like that.” Well said, but it’d be nice if he took a stance on doping bans rather than giving the old, “The IAAF makes the rules, I just run” response.
- Three Sentenced For Involvement In London 2012 Olympic Stadium Spy Scandal They were found guilty of spying on the West Ham soccer team during the stadium deal and fined anywhere from 16,000 to 163,000 dollars.
Ultra News
- Death Valley National Park Has Suspended All Endurance Races For 2014, Including The Badwater Ultramarathon According to the Death Valley National Park website, the reason is for a “safety evaluation of this type of activity,” which they expect to be completed by September 2014 at the earliest.
- Are Death Valley Events Suspended Because Of High Levels Of Dangerous Radioactivity In The Park? EnviroReporter Michael Collins tested the radiation in November and found them to be way over what the California Highway Patrol considers “a hazardous material situation.”
- MB:Badwater 2014 is off… Help bring it back!
- New Zealand Ultra Runner Kim Allan Breaks WR For Running Without Sleep Allan ran for 500K (310 miles) without sleeping and it took her 4 days. Previous record was 486K.
Track / Road News
- Jonathan Maiyo And Nicholas Kipkemboi Will Lead Kenyan Hopes At The Typically Ethiopian-Dominated Dubai Marathon On January 24th Maiyo has a 2:04:56 PR which he set getting 4th place here in 2012 while Kipkemboi ran 2:06:33 in his debut for 6th in last year’s race. The last two winners Ayele Abshero (2:04:23) and Lelisa Desisa (2:04:45) will be in the field as well as some other top Ethiopians making their marathon debuts.
- Cas Loxsom Talks About His Transition To Running Professionally Loxsom was an NCAA runner-up for Penn State and now runs for Brooks Beast, which is a mid-distance group based in Seattle, WA.
- High School Indoor Season Has Started: Freshman Sydney McLaughlin Runs 38.55 For 300m At Bishop Loughlin Games To Break 29-Year-Old NJ State Record She missed the national freshman record by .02 seconds.
- IAAF “Work, Rest And Play” Q&A With GB Hurdler Tiffany Porter
- Ritsumeikan University Wins At Mt. Fuji Women’s Ekiden, Which Served As The National University Women’s Invitational Ekiden Championships
Year-End Reviews / Awards
- Mo Farah Included In BOA’s List Of 35 GB Olympic Athletes Of The Year
- Athletics Illustrated’s Year-End Canadian Review Performance of the year went to Lanni Marchant‘s Canadian marathon record at the 2013 Scotiabank Toronto Waterfront Marathon, where she ran 2:28:00.
- European Athletics Continues Its Year In Review With The Euro Indoor Champs This article focuses on France’s pentathlon victory by Antoinette Nana Djimou.
A Ton Of GB Press After Passing Of Commentating Legend David Coleman
- Legendary British TV Broadcaster David Coleman Dies At 87 Years Old Coleman did his first BBC broadcast in for the BBC in 1954 and covered 11 Olympic Games from Rome in 1960 to Sydney 2000.
- Seb Coe On Coleman: “He was so incomparably better than anyone else who did it.”
Selection Of Coleman’s Famous Verbal Blunders “And the line-up for the final of the women’s 400 metres hurdles includes three Russians, two East Germans, a Pole, a Swede and a Frenchman.”- Brendan Foster: “David Coleman was unique and nobody will ever dominate the airwaves like this great man”
- The Telegraph: “Coleman, a towering figure in an era of sporting giants.”
- David Coleman: A Career In Pictures
- The Guardian Coleman Obituary
Other RIP News
US News
Tim Ritchie And Neely Spence Gracey To Headline New Year’s 35th Annual NYRR Midnight Run Presented By Emerald Nuts
- Lolo Jones Gives Away Free Shoes To School Kids In Iowa She said this was an important event for her because she remembers times when she was a kid and her family couldn’t afford shoes.
- US Legend Edwin Moses Honored By United States Olympic Endowment For Contributions To Olympic Movement
Running Journalism News – Looks Like LetsRun.com Is The Only Independent Voice Still Standing
- Jon Gugala Talks To Kevin Liao About The State (Or Lack Thereof) Of The Running Media And The Demise Of His Website “The Trailer”
*MB:Nick Symmonds Tweets His Support: “It’s time we stop letting bullies run the sport of T&F. Great interview @jongugala!” - February:Jon Gugala Talks To Liam Boylan-Pett On the Sorry State Of Track And Field Media What is your favorite media outlet for track and field? Why? JG: LetsRun.com. Is this really a question? It’s the freedom of speech. Absolutely. And LRC is the only medium that seems to value that. For all its faults, that’s where I’d pick.
- Chicago Tribune‘s Phil Hersh Catches Up With “Sports Gene” Author (And Chicago Native) David Epstein A paperback version is coming out in April with a new chapter and the book has been translated into Russian, Slovak, Portuguese and Japanese (so far).
LRCHow Good Is Grant Fisher, Wow Colorado Really Was Good, Back Handed Praise For Regina Jacobs, And Does Donovan Bailey Read LetsRun?
We also take take a look at a different type of track club that made headlines at the USATF Club Nats, give one last shout out in 2013 to Japanese marathoner Yuki Kawauchi, who ran his second sub 2:10 marathon in 2 weeks, take another look back Mark Wetmore‘s Colorado Buffaloes, and have recommended reads, a video of the week, a song of the week and more.
MB:Brett Larner responds to LetsRun’s criticism of Japanese mid-running: Mid-d running in Japan doesn’t exist
LetsRun.com Founders Named as Two of “The 50 Most Influential People in Running”
Runners World Honors You and the Brojos
We like This Photo So Much We Leave it Up
Want a Better Running Shoe?
Beta Better Running Shoe Site
It’s Time to Change How We Find Running Shoes
American Strong: The Untold Story of How American Teamwork Helped Meb Keflezighi Win Boston
28,000+ Likes on Facebook
A Real Running Hero:
The Flo Groberg Story
Flo Has Now Won the Medal of Honor
