If director Steve Miller has his way, USATF will kiss masters goodbye
Steve Miller
Nick is channeling Pre as anti-authoritarian.
Meanwhile, on another front, Olympian Nick Symmonds has launched a Facebook page (topping 6,000 members) that takes up where Steve Prefontaine left off — blasting the IAAF for doing what it does best: enriching itself at the expense of elite athletes.
Nick originally wrote:
“This group is dedicated to changing the antiquated rules that govern the type of advertisements track and field athletes are allowed to wear when they compete. Currently, the USATF and IAAF are damaging our sport by making it next to impossible for athletes to gain corporate sponsors because of their regulations on where and how a logo can be displayed. Its time for these damaging rules to be changed so that badly needed dollars can once again flow into our sport!”
In his latest update Sunday, Nick wrote:
Thanks everyone for continuing the discussion on here! Obviously, we have gotten the attention of the governing bodies, media, shoe companies, etc. A little update, I have done several interviews over the last few days with tv, newspaper, on-line reporters, etc. There have been a lot of great questions and I have done my best to voice our concerns.
I have been informed by the AAC that there will be some time set aside at this years USATF annual convention where we will be able to have a discussion with execs from USATF and the major shoe companies regarding these regulations. This meeting will take place the first week of December. Until then I will do my best to continue to spread the message via various media outlets.
If you all would do the same and continue to invite your friends to this group it will help keep the momentum going. My next big move is to work with the AAC on drafting up a new set of rules to present and have a motion on at this years annual convention. I will create a new document outlining the changes we want voted on as soon as I am able to.
Thanks again to everyone that is on board and wants to see our sport GROW and to all those eligible to come to this years USATF annual meeting, PLEASE DO as we will need all the support we can get.
38 Responses
An exodus from USATF is certainly worth some real thought and discussion. One should never make rash decisions in anger, but carefully consider what we’d be giving up and how it weighs against what we would be gaining.
Hong Kong has a separate veterans association, and it serves us well, but we do find it impossible to conduct veterans’ track meets as the national body controls all the officials and, in Hong Kong, effectively controls access to the tracks too.
Our body is financially well off, but that comes from organizing profitable road races. Veterans are not required to join to benefit from the services of our veterans’ organization, a bit like the Red Cross.
Quick Silver
Hong Kong
This is a bit of the same old same old song that has been sung, howled, whispered, etc for years.
IF we could set up a separate organization for masters without losing the ability to obtain USATF officials etc – ok – maybe – but it will be harder and more expensive than you think. It would require full time leadership from more than one person. Where is the money going to come from for that? Who is going to do this?
And please those who want to jump on the bandwagon to break away from USATF – DO NOT THINK ABOUT JOINING UP WITH SENIOR GAMES ORGANIZATION. You will be substituting one badly managed organization for another that is even worse.
NSG is about running a big party every two years for multiple sports – each one of which has its own organizing group. They are not about to take up organizing a separate track/field/road racing/ trail running/mountain running organization for masters.
We are likely to end up like India with two competing masters organization at war with each other and both managing to do nothing well at all including letting masters compete internationally in WMA meets.
Are there really as many as 100,000 of us? Or is that a low estimate? According to USATF’s 2010 Annual Report, total membership (not just masters) was about 100,000. But the same report said, in its profile of Neni Lewis, “Millions of Americans take part in masters long-distance running and track & field.” See http://www.usatf.org/usatf/files/7c/7c78fa27-ceea-469b-8cb7-458b785c3149.pdf.
I don’t think it would be a good idea to break away from USATF. Our problems with that organization are relatively minor compared to the kinds of issues that we might face as an independent organization. It would be best to stay with UASTF and to continue to try to make them more aware of our needs and wants. We might want to get more organized and focused in the way that we communicate with them.
Don’t even think of it! The British Masters Athletics Federation (BMAF) is such a separate masters federation, without grievance or disciplinary procedures and not under the jurisdiction of the British national governing body UK Athletics. Consequently BMAF is a law until itself and a British masters athlete has no right of hearing or appeal.
if massters breaks away from usatf, then there will be no more drug testing. very bad thing!!!
I am not necessarily in favor of a separate Masters Organization but what if the USATF does drop the masters programs? I think that our options should be discussed – both what can be done within the existing USATF system and what to do should they drop Masters.
To Anthony Treacher, after reading your rants and whines for the past several years, it’s truly no wonder you’ve been banned. A post by you is like finger nails on a black board.
Honestly, a more annoying twit I can’t imagine.
thanks Don Bailey – well said – and I agree.
Washington Post once quoted USATF Masters Chairman Gary Snyder as saying 8,500 do masters track and field. But I’ve heard big numbers for those involved in masters LDR and road running. I might be low with estimate of 100,000.
What’s our beef with the USATF again? We get nationals and association meets in great venues, in my opinion. Only been doing this a few years, but I love it.
From what is quoted and attributed to Steve Miller, we masters may not have the choice of staying with USATF. With that as a possibility, it would seem prudent to think of, and investigate alternatives. Better to be ready and then not choose to change than not be ready and find ourselves out in the cold.
It would seem prudent to have a dialog with Steve Miller to find out why he made his comment. Perhaps he and fellow USATF board member Willie Banks should sit down together and discuss the masters’ program. In my opinion, if properly engaged, the masters’ program could be a real asset to USATF, providing much more than just added finances. rck
To Don and Mary. Delighted you noticed. Come around for tea some day.
USATF officials are not limited to working for USATF meets: look at the NCAA, Senior Olympics or just independent meets. In some cases the meet (unfortunately for people trying to set records) don’t need to be sanctioned.
Note also that USATF Officials are, with precious few exceptions, our age. I have been one of the youngest USATF officials for four decades. They are us.
USATF does not get the great venues that host our events. Very few of these decisions get any scrutiny from USATF though Nationals go through a bidding process. And under that scrutiny we’ve done so well . . . Landover . . . Albuguerque.
For other meets, the venue is the responsibility of the meet director and their ability to run the gauntlet and negotiate with the authorities who control those venues. Unfortunately most of the great venues are controlled by people who could care less about a small track meet. So essentially it takes an inside job to get a good venue. You gotta know somebody, knowwhatimean?
Separated from USATF, the power of the organization will rely on the volunteers who make it work. Most of the people who will step forward will be the same ones who are stepping forward now to administer to the masters division of USATF. With a little money, we might hire a small staff for a central office and to try to “sell” our sport. Our success will depend on the success those people have. And we will need some oversight. We will have to hire lawyers. So the barriers we currently find ourselves fighting with USATF over, we will create by ourselves with our own administration. The difference will be that we have our own people who prevent good things from happening.
If I had been a USATF Masters athlete – instead of a British masters athlete – my ban simply would not have happened. Impossible. A USATF masters team leader would not have broken the IAAF rules and verbally abused me. I would not then have complained (or if I had USATF would have responded promptly and adequately). Above all, USATF would not consequently have banned me for one year, without hearing and appeal. All that is for sure. 100%.
In this respect, the incorporated USATF Masters are light years ahead of the independent British Masters Athletics Federation (BMAF).
The reason is simple and something you have touched on – resources. As I understand it USATF Masters uses the USATF infrastructure and has its own resources – it has the critical mass to administer its affairs in a just manner. By comparison, the volunteer, short-staffed BMAF does not.
So why overturn an internationally enviable set-up such as USATF Masters when you have it all?
The gist of the interview in T&F News centered around how to re-build track and field in the USA. Mr. Miller is correct when he says the emphasis should be on youth programs and the elite athletes. He also talked about stream lining the current organization by making it smaller in scope, but with more attention paid to the key areas. I believe his vision for masters track will be for it to be an independent organization under the umbrella of USATF, similar to the NCAA. On one hand this will free us to run the sport the way we as masters prefer (new rules for record setting, etc.), but as Andrew Heckler pointed out, we’ll also need to set up an administrative side of our organization. If the number of registered masters athletes is about 8,500, and we all paid $60 per year membership fee’s, we’d have $510,000 in the till to start. The USATF will want a fee to keep us under the umbrella, does anyone have any idea of what the NCAA pays to be part/sanctioned by the USATF?
While there might be a million masters road racers, I doubt many are actual USATF members. In any local road race where I live, the only card carrying USATF members are track & field folks like myself. The average older runner doesn’t know squat about the USATF, and certainly isn’t going to pay $30 to join if they don’t have to.
I believe the indoor and outdoor championship meets could be revenue sources if 100% of the control was taken over by USAMTF (USA Masters track and field-a mythical organization to run the program outside of the USATF). Hopefully the meets will be better run than the bid process meets are now.
If the USATF does jettison the masters program from their direct supervision can we organize ourselves to become a more efficient organization? Personally I think we probably can.
Does NCAA pay a fee to USATF? Generally, what I see, is two autonomous organizations that work somewhat cooperatively in the overlap (NCAA athletes participating in USATF meets, USATF officials supervising NCAA meets–under NCAA rules).
The road running question is the million dollar question.
For track runners, we can explain that meets won’t happen without the insurance that comes with a sanction (though there are other organizations like NSGA who have solved that for themselves–to the detriment of athletes setting records). We have more leverage to make track people join as a mandatory element of the much more enclosed and officiated environment of a track meet.
On the roads, as USATF, perhaps even as the name change to USATF occurred, we let that slip through our hands. RRCA and other insurance companies make road races possible without USATF. Membership is not required. And, while I don’t understand it, there is a huge culture out there who will resist USATF’s $30 annual fee but will plop down $30+ per weekend to run the local 5K and get another Tshirt with a deadly disease boldly written on the front. Some of those folks are good runners, but its so hard to get them off the pavement and into the boring idea of running laps around a track.
i think pre high school club programs are a big mistake. they were popular when i was that age and they were just basically a way for some parents to brag about their kids and for a select few to make money. Every single one of those kids in junior high who was a “star” on a club program turned out to be a phony. I raced them and it was apparent the times had been fudged. One kid supposedly ran every club meet quarter between 51-53, i raced him at school and he could not come close to those times.At least ten seconds difference. When he was a freshman in HS the best he could manage was a 57 and could not make the team. This was repeated over & over by dozens of kids i knew.
These clubs set up races out of town much like little league and consequently the cost become very prohibitive which is kind of the idea, only the kids who have money can win. I have also seen so many kids quit the sport when they found they were not nearly as good as they were told.
Money would be better spent to keep the sport fun for younger kids, and expanding all comers meets at the high school level.
Pre ninth grade organized running i have found to be counter productive.
As far as masters better the devil we know than the devil we dont know
and to number 19, there is a world of difference between road running & track. running cross country & the roads versus laps is not even the same sport to me, on the road you get fluctuations in speed and it is easier to maintain momentum once established.
trying to lure runners to cross over to track is not something to count on.
i am proud to be a member of usatf, before that the athletics congress…the aau and so on. ken and i are close in age and i remember competing as teens in aau summer series meets in the late 60’s and early 70’s throughout ny and nj. those meets were well attended and sometimes had olympians compete. i also remember the “old guys ” tearing it up and thinking that that would be me some day… it is. and given what i’ve seen as a masters for 27 years( actually a submasters starting in 1984 ) there are many that could run ,as ken says a “mythical” association…
Remember that many in our athletics organisations do not approve of masters athletes. They think old people having athletics is as pathetic as old people having sex, or old people complaining. And the anti-masters can be quite nasty, particularly middle-aged coaches and club officers who, having given up on their own waistlines, whine that we masters should help the collective instead of competing as free individuals. So there is one big advantage of your own separate masters organisation – you are with like-minded and you can do your own masters thing in peace. The other advantage of a separate US masters organisation would be of course that you could elect a whole new set of officers. But from my admittedly foreign vantage point I do not see the point with that, at all. Actually, the present lot seem to serve you and the international masters community quite well.
Before any move such as this,there should be a shadow organization to learn the in and outs of what USATF does so that ‘all’ the I’s are dotted and the T’s are crossed. I would like to believe that USATF would work with the organization before dropping masters from their plate.
It may be a glitch on the USATF website, but today 11/12/2011 4:30 MST) I found it interesting that if you go to “Groups” at the bottom of the USATF main page where there are 10 seperate areas you can click on (Elite, Youth, Masters, Clubs, etc.) the only one that wouldn’t come up was the Masters site. Could be a technical glitch, or update of the page, but maybe this is a sign of the beginning of the end…
I seriously doubt USATF would take a preemptive unilateral action like that without a public announcement. No, based on previous USATF history, if they are going to make a bombshell announcement like that, they will drop it at the National Meeting at the end of November. And the options we will be given at that time are: take it or go ahead, just try to fight it.
Ken, a good example of the very model you reference is masters swimming here in the U.S. USMS is a separate non-profit entity being very successfully run by Rob Butcher and his staff. USMS has over 60,000 dues paying members, over 700 clubs, a great monthly, magazine, stages two national championships every year, has programs to help train officials, develop world class coaches and a great relationship with USA Swimming and FINA. For example, the masters summer nationals in 2012 are in the same pool as the U.S. Olympic trials and begin as soon as the trials end. A great opportunity for both organizations to gain audience and exposure.
1. Do not count road runners into Master Athletes. Most of them have absolutely no interest in joining us.
2. If Master Athletes insist on no drug restriction policy and keep getting negative press, USATF will drop us.
3. in my mind the current system works pretty good, do not alienate USATF unless you are really sure you van do better.
corr.:
3. in my mind the current system works pretty good, do not alienate USATF unless you are really sure you can do better.
Here in Canada, we are actually entering a closer relationship with the national ‘open’ association – Athletics Canada. We are still running the Masters show and we both taking advantage of the arrangement.
I agree with Doug that in Canada our relationship with Athletics Canada (and especially with our provincial Athletics Ontario group as well) is mutually beneficial. We share officials, get entry to certain meets for masters looking for additional competitions, share the year end awards banquet, share news and events calendars, etc. Publicity on their websites is helping attract more participants to our events – yes, even road racers. Some have tried track or cross-country events. There’s nothing like an awards banquet in which athletes, in groups of sprinters, throwers, distance runners, etc. from young teens to masters share the spotlight. When you see the young runners wanting to get their picture taken with Ed Whitlock, it really shows what we are all about — life through athletics, athletics for life. So why shouldn’t we all work together?
From my own experience, I am very interested in this topic. I got the impression from this blog back in 7 September 2010 that CMAA were trying for more – for full integration within AC. If so what happened? Does AC now have any jurisdiction over CMAA?
AC does not have jurisdiction, but we have membership integration. This newsletter item from our Ontario Masters site might help. http://www.ontariomastersathletics.ca/?p=1279
If Mr. Matthews perceived that a move to a separate organization was appropriate to service the needs of the master community, and if USATF is currently entertaining the idea of dropping Masters Division we need to set our contingency plan together.
Understood that starting a new organization will have its trails, but many people I have met at events can bring energy to a movement if there is willingness to try and understanding. First we need to start with developing that contingency incase.
USATF is the designated National Governing Body of Track and Field for youth, elite, and masters.
Who gives this designation through regulation?
If they drop Masters, does USATF forfeit this right of governance?
Work through World Masters Athletics to be recognized by filing an affiliation form.
You cannot become what you want to be tomorrow by staying what you are today.
Regards,
Troy A. Nelson
Just another opinion here.
The merger of Athletics Canada and the CMA was an Athletics Canada agenda item that was going to happen sooner rather than later. The list of important shortcomings with the merger affecting masters roadrunners was unfortunately somewhat glossed over in order to facilitate a speedy agreement and meet the time frame of the agenda. With the governance of national road running turned over to what is basically an Ontario T&F group there are some concerns by masters roadrunners in terms of the concessions made to the CMA to facilitate this agreement.
There is not a lot of excitement in some parts of the country about having T&F folks with little interest in road-running suggesting to the athletes we don’t necessarily care what your concerns are, we know what’s good for you.
We just had the Provincial Marathon Championships here last weekend. Interestingly the 53rd place athlete in the 55-year age group got the governing association’s 2nd place award and the 112th place finisher in the 55-year group also got the 2nd place award. There is a long way to go before AC and CMA have a lot of creditability in the ability to govern road running I would think.
As long as road running is a satellite sport in setting priorities of governance, there will continue to be problems. More important, in actual fact as far as participation goes it’s T&F that is the much smaller segment of athletics. There is a lot to be learned by truly embracing road running and the very successful methods that they have developed to grow road running to become one of the largest participation sports in the world. Over 50% of the athletes in road races are masters. Hello Athletics Canada and hello Canadian Masters Athletics it’s time to look out the window! You may be great at T&F but….
Given, we are second or third class citizens in USATF. Miller confirms what we already know. With more participants during the next few years, we may acquire more clout. Regrettably, the alternatives do not impress me as promising.
Regretably the athlete is not necessarily that first class citizen in any athletics body anyway. We exist on sufferance. It will not necessarily feel better in a separate masters organisation.
And if you are to be a second class citizen somewhere anyway, in my life experience it actually feels better as a second class citizen in a large, respected, proud organisation – like your USATF. I personally, and perhaps quite unrelated to my dispute, would prefer to be administered by a masters committee of my well-known British national governing body UK Athletics, instead of BMAF. And upstairs I would prefer to have a masters committee of the respected and well-known IAAF, instead of WMA.
Other members of the USATF board need to be interviewed by Ken Stone and others with vested interests in Masters track and field. Hopefully other board members are willing to oppose the anti-Masters comments stated so eloquently by Mr. Miller.
If the attitudes Steve Miller express are representative of the whole USATF board, masters really do need to begin preparations for a separate organization. Mr. Miller suggests spending every penny on professional level athletes. How far we have come from amateur athletics which existed when I began competing in masters track 40 years ago!
Here is my devil’s advocate view of Steve’s comments. Masters could be very successful if they devoted dues, time and loyalty only to masters track and field rather that to USATF. No more USATF dues. No more helping day and night as officials, volunteers, coaches and baby sitters for Junior Olympics, grade, high school, college and open athletes. No more bowing down to egotists who disrespect lifetime physical fitness and fellowship through masters track competition. Who wants to be a second or third class citizen in any organization? Forget about the road runners. They have their own organization. Thank Senior Olympics for all do with their track meets. Let masters track and field superstars with ego trips continue to compete as guests in USATF sanctioned meets. Forget about drug testing of amateur masters track and field athletes. Begin discussions with masters swimming on how to develop a separate, successful program for masters.
I went to Bradley with Steve Miller. Congrats on a great career, Steve. When is the last time you put on the spikes? Now let’s hear from other USATF board members. If Steve’s attitudes have prevailed in recent years, no wonder George Mathews went through such purgatory and recommended a separate organization for masters. Let us hear from George, Gary, Randy and other masters leaders who are willing to challenge Steve’s lack of support for amateur masters track and field athletes.
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