Masters chair Snyder apologizes for Landover results mess
Complete and accurate results of the Landover masters nationals apparently will never be known. That’s my reading of today’s blog posting by Gary Snyder, USATF masters track national chairman. He promises that the order of finish will be correct — and that these results will be made available for online posting by the end of this week. But for the first time, someone in authority is publicly apologizing for this debacle. Gary writes: “First of all I want to apologize to all the Masters competitors who spent both their time and money to compete in our indoor championship meet with the expectation their efforts would be measured and recorded without an error. As you know I am also a competitor and fully understand how disappointing this has been and I am taking measures to further minimize the possibility of a repeat.”
Penn Relays masters records count, except when they don’t!
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In the wake of the two masters WRs at Penn over the weekend, I had the pleasure of chatting via email with one of the record-setters. He noted, in passing, that Houston Elite’s M55 4×4 team had indeed set a world age-group record Saturday — but that the record it beat was its own. On April 25, 2008, the foursome of Bill Collins, George Haywood, Charles Allie and Horace Grant — all 55 or over — clocked 3:41.90 at Penn. You can look it up. But when the same team (in different order) ran 3:41.07 at Penn over the weekend, the listed WR was 3:43.59 by a British team in 2007. OK. Things move slowly in the Alternate Reality World of Masters Records. Then how do you explain this: In that same 2008 race won by Houston Elite, a W40 team of Charmaine Roberts, Renee Henderson, Jane Brooker and Olympian Jearl Miles-Clark set a world record themselves, going 3:56.27. You can look it up. So you got that? One team gets a WR on the WMA records site. The other gets oblivion. Same exact race!
Happy birthday to Roald Bradstock, spearchucker deluxe!
Last year on the Fourth of July, one-time British Olympian Roald Bradstock lived a Yank’s javelin fantasy. He threw in the U.S. Olympic Trials. At age 46, he was long a U.S. citizen — but not done with the sport. He was the oldest male entrant at Hayward Field. And he made the most of the moment — changing togs and sticks with each of his three prelims throws. Over the weekend, Roald turned 47. My belated birthday present is this photo gallery, which I neglected to post last summer. Roald’s way of anticipating the big four-seven? On April 18, he had his best throw in two years, he says, “a javelin length shy of my (M45) American age-group record (235-4). Man did it feel good. The series: 66.01, 66.07, 68.73, 69.07 and 69.15 (aka 216-7, 216-9, 225-5, 226-7, 226-10.)”
Hours after his Trials competition, Roald was the toast
of Track Town Pizza, signing autographs and posing for pictures.
Berkeley and San Diego also boasted good masters action
Penn didn’t have a monopoly on masters speed. At the Brutus Hamilton Invitational in Berkeley, 44-year-old Aaron Thigpen ran the 100 in 10.93 and deuce in 22.30. (He’s on the far right in this video.) At the UCSD Triton Invitational on Saturday, M45 Kettrell Berry won his 200-meter heat in 24.24 — into a 2.4 mps wind. M45Â McDuffrie Allen ran the 800 in 2:03.88. Â Also at Berkeley, W30 Olympian Grace Upshaw, kid sister of world champ Joy Upshaw-Margerum, had a big long jump — 22-3 3/4, just off her PR of 22-7. Nice interview with Grace on Flocast. She turns 35 in September 2010. Jim Sorensen, our M40 superstar, was listed as DNF in the elite mile at Cal. Hope he’s OK.
Houston Elite team shatters M55 WR in messy finish at Penn
Averaging 55.27 a leg (well under their age), the Houston Elite team of Charles Allie, Bill Collins, Horace Grant and George Haywood today shattered the listed M55 world record in the 4×400 at the Penn Relays. They might have gone faster, since both Houston anchor George Haywood and Central Park’s Anselm LeBourne dodged several women at the finish line. It was a mixed relay, with 22 teams on the track! (Check out this Flotrack video of the NASCAR pileup.) Anselm actually had the lead with yards to go (after making up a 10-meter gap). But with baton raised in victory, he slowed, perhaps misjudging the finish line, and George sped past. Houston Elite clocked 3:41.07 to beat the listed WR of 3:43.59 set by a British team at 2007 Riccione worlds. But Houston cheated, since Charles Allie is 61! (Kidding. Relayists can drop down.)
In a dramatic second leg, M55 Bill Collins held off M50 Val Barnwell.
Landover champ Hartley takes masters mile at Drake Relays
Replicating his Landover nationals double, where he won the 800 and mile, M45 Scott Hartley again turned back John
and won the Drake Relays masters mile today. Scott clocked 4:25.77 to defeat John, who was 6 seconds back. The race was fast, top to bottom, as 59-year-old Nolan Shaheed took last in 4:57.72. The listed M60 world record is 4:54.07 by Joop Ruter of Holland and the listed M60 American record is 4:58.2 by James Sutton in 1991. Hang in there, Nolan! Only five months to go!
Central Park TC crushes M50 world record in 4×100 at Penn
The Central Park TC quartet of Randy Frey, Ben James, Tony Fulton and Val Barnwell wowed the crowd at yesterday’s Penn Relays, beating the listed M50 world record in the 4×100 relay. CPTC clocked 44.47 to take down the 44.99 by Bob Bowen, Ed Gonera, Bill Collins and Jesse Norman at 2003 Puerto Rico worlds. (See the video of the race here.) Val, a world champion, also won the M50 open 100 in 11.66, and his team beat a Houston Elite squad anchored by Bill Collins by more than 2 seconds. More than 39,500 witnessed the masters at Penn, which amounts to a nationals preview in the 100. The CPTC squad would have beaten dozens of high school boys teams!
Earl Fee’s dietary secrets: enzymes, vitamins, fish oil . . .
In yet another wide-ranging superduper interview, blogger Pete Magill gets masters track legend Earl Fee, 80, to detail his dietary supplements. Earl, who has set 50 world age-group records, says: “I take calcium and magnesium in one mixture. I take co-enzyme 10. I take magnesium straight. Vitamin C and E. And grape seed extract, which is a very powerful antioxidant. Zinc. I take arginine, an amino acid. And glutamine — that’s a really good one, I recommend that one.”
Germans giving new Age-Graded Tables some test runs
Stefan Waltermann at Spokane nationals.
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Get ready for a new Age-Graded Tables. As we telegraphed in December, WMA is rolling out a new set of tables that treat some age groups more fairly. The AGT make it possible for multi-eventers to use the IAAF tables to score their events, no matter what their age. The AGT also are widely used to pick winners in road races and whatnot.(Companies like Hy-Tek incorporate the tables into their software.) But because Germans were the biggest force behind the redo, they are starting to use the new tables this year. Lahti will use the “old” tables, but our correspondent Stefan Waltermann says the new tables should be good to go for 2011 worlds in Sacramento. Why update the tables? It’s to make scoring and ranking fairer when comparing apples and oranges (different age groups). Stefan has posted a set of files on his Web site that contain the new AGT data. (Click on Model 2010.)
David Nash claims another masters 800 title at Drake Relays
M40 David Nash won today’s masters 800-meter run at the Drake Relays, defending his 2008 crown and negotiating two laps in Des Moines in a field of 19 runners. Â He won in 2:00.72, a couple seconds off his recent bests. David, now 41, Â was the M35 national champion at 800 and 1500 at both the 2003 Eugene masters nationals and 2004 Decatur masters nationals.
