Perkins on Barnwell case: Relay teammates can keep medals
Stan Perkins
Expanding on day-old news, WMA President Stan Perkins wrote me this evening: “Athlete Val Barnwell has been suspended by USADA for two years, dating from 11 December 2009 for a positive doping test that was taken during the WMA World Stadia Championships held in Lahti, Finland in 2009. The athlete’s results will be annulled and new placings awarded. A new medal allocation will also take place in each event where he was awarded a medal. The athlete will be requested to return his medals; however, we will not pursue the return of the medals from the other members of the relay teams in which this athlete competed. The status of the test selection of athletes in Lahti is confidential. A full statement in regard to this matter is posted on the USADA website.”
Drug-testing under way at Kamloops; WMA prez bemoans Barnwell
WMA President Stan Perkins of Australia has reacted to the Val Barnwell drug suspension officially, or at least publicly: “My reaction is disappointment more than anything else,” said Perkins, who also served on the WMA anti-doping committee for 10 years. “People want to be the best. Sometimes they do the wrong thing.” But the “random tests” mentioned by Stan remain an issue. They may not all be random, in fact, but possibly target specific athletes. If 50 tests were done at Lahti, as was reported, I’d think half that many are being done at Kamloops. USADA, meanwhile, has released its “interim order” on Val’s case, which says he’ll be assessed $1,000 for expenses incurred in the case (correction to my earlier phrasing.) See it here.
Orville Rogers pops M90 American record for 3000 at Kamloops
Running essentially by himself, Orville Rogers of Dallas set an American indoor record for 3,000 meters yesterday at Kamloops worlds. At 92, Orville is the oldest member of Team USA. But he showed kids how it’s done with his 22:57.41, which beat the listed U.S. M90 record of 23:12.34 by Frank Levine in 2005. Two years ago, USATF made Orville its oldest Athlete of the Week after he set a couple of world records at Boston indoor nationals. Other world records at Kamloops are detailed by the LOC media office.
Orville Rogers, shown at 2008 Spokane nationals, runs everything from the sprints on up. (Photo by Ken Stone)
Bernie Portenski’s answer to Kamloops: two milestone WRs
Kamloops can’t hog all the glory. Down in New Zealand, a 60-year-old lady known as Bernie instead of Bernardine has informed us of two stunning world outdoor records. As we noted two months ago, Bernie Portenski is in record shape. How good? On January 22, she ran an outdoor 3000 in 11:21.47, only 15 seconds off the listed WR. Just warming up, folks. On February 21, she ran a track 5K in 18:51.13 at Newtown Park at the Wellington Masters 2-day meeting to smash one of the oldest records on the books: 19:14.8 by Sister Marion Irvine in 1989. Then on February 28, in windy conditions, she ran the 10K in 39:04.23 to demolish the listed WR of 39:21.1 by Australia’s Theresia Baird in 2001. So there. “Bernie is now aiming to break world records in the Christchurch Half Marathon in June, then crossing to Australia aiming to break the world record (3:14:50) in the Gold Coast Marathon in July,” writes Peter Horan from Down Under.
Phototimer shot shows Bernie (center) at end of 10K world record.
Read the rest of this post »
Medal-count shocker at Kamloops: Canada and USA leading!
Medal counts at world meets are bogus, since they compare Half Moon Bay pumpkins to Australian Wolffia angustas . But for those who can’t help themselves, tallies are being told here. Please take them with a megagrain of salt. Kamloops is a Canada-USA dual meet with 60 other countries thrown in for spice. (About 60 percent of Kamloops’ 1,400 entrants are North Americans.) But since we’re all addicted to this nonsense from the Vancouver Games, organizers are offering up the counts to prove — what, they can count? (Canada and USA are tied at 71.) Anyway, kudos to American gold medalists on Day 2, including Bill Collins, who at 59 may be the oldest in his age group but won the 60 at worlds again. His 7.47 winning time would have taken second in the M50 race, won by fellow Yank Michael Waller in 7.34.
Brenda Matthews, shown at Oshkosh nationals, pulled off an upset by beating Phil Raschker in the W60 60 -- 9.04 to 9.25. Brenda took gold and Phil silver. (Photo by Ken Stone)
M80 vaulter’s funky jump becomes humor fodder for ‘The Soup’
“The Soup” is a reliably funny, sarcastic and iconoclastic show on the cable network E! Thus it was inevitable that we got caught in their cross hairs. This report includes a video of how an 84-year-old pole vaulter was depicted by Los Angeles station KTLA. I couldn’t quite catch the gent’s name. Sounded like Benny Sullivan, but I can’t find any results for him. “So it’s not at all surprising that after KTLA highlighted an 84-year-old pole vaulter who struggled to make his way down the runway (and forget about clearing the bar), The Soup’s Joel McHale promptly pointed out the ridiculousness of it all,” said Ryan Wilson of AOL’s FanHouse site. Thanks go to Peter Hlavin for bringing this to our attention. Meanwhile, anyone know the vaulter?
Hartshorne masters miles of 2010 now showing as YouTube clips
See Nolan Shaheed’s M60 world record. See Nick Berra’s coming out party as the next great M40 runner. See elite victories by Aeron Arlin Genet, Cheryl Bellaire and Anselm LeBourne. Tonight I uploaded all nine races (five men’s and four women’s) from the 43rd annual Hartshorne Memorial miles January 23, 2010, at Cornell University in Ithaca, New York. Thanks to great video work by Ithaca’s own Jorge Cuevas and a DVD sent me by meet director Tom Hartshorne, the races are now preserved for posterity as YouTube videos. Really cool stuff, with race calls by Peter Taylor.
40-plus masters stars in running for USATF Athlete of 2009 awards
Rita Hanscom, Nadine O’Connor, Phil Raschker, Bill Murray and Mike Waller are among close to four dozen USATF masters standouts nominated for age-group and top yearly honors. Athlete of the Year voting is done by the 25-member USATF Masters Awards Committee. I’m a voting member, and I’m open to bribes. (Kidding, maybe.) In any case, the voting period ends March 15, so if you want to argue for your favorites feel free to post a comment here. The winners are feted at indoor and outdoor nationals (mainly outdoor). Thanks go to Jeff Brower for posting links to this and other news on usatfmasters.org, including the minutes of the mid-January executive committee, which teleconferenced efforts to coordinate stuff with the National Senior Games Association.
Ossmann, Brown win shot, vault exhibitions at Albuquerque meet
Sunday’s masters vault and shot exhibitions went off well at the USA Indoor Track & Field Championships in Albuquerque, report event organizers Brad Winter and Jamie Koch. Shot results are here, and vault results are here. M50 Paul Ossmann tossed the 6-kilo ball to win with 15.58 (51-1 1/2), and Charles Brown, 54, needed only five jumps to win at 4.20 (13-9 1/4). Jamie, the M70 shot-put maven, wrote me: “The meet was a lot of fun. . . . I thought the exhibition was very well organized and ran very smoothly. We were fortunate to have top-notch officials. . . . We ended up with eight shot putters. Mike Shiaras hurt his knee, so Steve Ross filled in for him. The meet attracted approximately 3000 spectators, about 1000 of whom watched the shot put exhibition and who reacted enthusiastically to good throws.”
The Albuquerque 8: (Back row, left to right) Tim Muller, Paul Ossmann, Paul Economides and Dennis Diaz. (Front row, left to right) Gerry Vaughn, Jamie Koch, Bob Ward and Steve Ross. (Photo courtesy Jamie Koch)
W75 Christel Donley sets world record for 60m hurdles in Kamloops
Competing in the pentathlon today at Kamloops worlds, Christel Donley of Colorado broke the listed W75 world record for the 60 hurdles, clocking 14.22. The old record was 14.68 by Sweden’s Asta Larsson in 2008. Aaron Thigpen didn’t cruise his prelims at Kamloops.В The American record holder for 100 at M40 is now 45, and his 7.05 for 60 meters is close to the listed American record of 7.02 by Stan Whitley in 1991. Aaron also is in striking distance of Mario Longo’s world record of 6.97, set earlier this season. Complete results from Kamloops are being posted here. Phil Raschker won the W60 pentathlon with 4532 points, but fell short of her WR of 4844. Rita Hanscom is running away with the W55 pentathlon. Aussie legend Marie Kay set a W50 world record in the pentathlon, scoring 4906 points in her age-group debut at worlds to smash the listed WR of 4616 by Switzerland’s Christine Mueller in 2009.
