Archive for September, 2007
The plagues visit Italy: gales, strike, Pavarotti death
Italy must be reeling. First huge winds strike the coast (including Riccione), then their beloved opera tenor dies. And now I hear that air traffic controllers are on strike! Great timing for folks flying in for the 17th World Masters Athletics Championships. One athlete, stuck in London, just wrote me: “I was scheduled to leave […]
September 6, 2007
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Visa problems keeping nine Indians from Riccione
So the knock on a USA-hosted world masters meet is that folks from some countries would encounter visa problems, right? Well, look out. Italy has its own demons. This story tells how nine Indian masters athletes may miss worlds because of visa issues. The story says: “Madhavan Nair, secretary of State Masters Association, said everything […]
September 6, 2007
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Italian site listed 79 masters athletes entered at Osaka
Man, those Italians. While I was cherry-picking masters at Osaka, this Italian site was listing all the over-35 athletes entered at IAAF worlds. One thing I noticed: some possible world age-group records that WMA has overlooked. How many did they find? I count 37 men and 42 women — a total of 79 geezers at […]
September 5, 2007
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Americans fare well as Germans dominate the multis
Americans captured four world titles in the decathlon or heptathlon today in Riccione, holding their own against the 900-strong German juggernaut. Team USA gold medalists were M50 Jim Russ, many-time world champ M65 Emil Pawlik, W60 Phil Raschker (who fell short of her June world record by about 120 points) and W70 world record holder […]
September 5, 2007
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Riccione video shares delights of WMA Open Ceremonies
You gotta see this! A file-sharing site called blip.tv has posted a well-edited video of athletes and speeches (all in Italian), marching band and music at Riccione worlds. And fireworks, circus peformers and dance troupes! Athletes are having a blast — singing and dancing. Click right here to access this 8 1/2-minute video. As well, […]
September 5, 2007
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Results posted as Riccione deals with major storm
The Puerto Rico 2003 world meet featured a tropical storm. But nobody expected Riccione 2007 to suffer high winds. Yet that’s apparently what delayed events (including the decathlon and heptathlon Day 1) yesterday at worlds. Some cross country races were postponed as well. In any case, results are now percolating online (and in a nice […]
September 5, 2007
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Results from Riccione? Let’s all hold hands and pray
The 17th World Masters Athletics Championships began today in Riccione, Italy, but results of the first day’s events (including Day 1 of the decathlon and cross country) aren’t online. Not that I can find, anyway. Sigh. This page appears to be the results page. But no links are live yet. Last night, I wrote to […]
September 4, 2007
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Swede claims M70 high jump world record held by Held
Tom Langenfield of Minnesota, the M70 Orono HJ champion, reports an impressive world record in his age group by a Swede. Tom writes: “One of the many reasons I wanted very much to go to Italy for the world meet this year was to have a chance to jump against Sweden’s Carl-Erik Sarndal in the […]
September 4, 2007
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Masters rankings get even better! All U.S. marks online
On this Labor Day holiday (in the USA), I’d like to salute a labor of love. USATF Masters Rankings Chairman John Seto shares details on the improvements he’s made in mastersrankings.com — the database-driven Web site that he created for USATF Masters. Up until two or three weeks ago, only the top 25 performers were […]
September 3, 2007
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Ready for Riccione? Savor previews from near, far
Stan Perkins, the masters official who lost the last WMA prez race, offered some wisdom to fellow Aussies traveling to Riccione for this week’s World Masters Athletics Championships. These notes came after scoping out the place in March. He concludes happily: “Cost are reasonable and standards of accommodation, food and transport are acceptable. It is […]
September 3, 2007
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