Maurice Doogan
Many were mystified by this announcement on the
British masters site: “For the time being
Maurice Doogan will not be acting as Track and Field Secretary or Team Manager at international championships. He has been suspended by World Masters Athletics and has lodged an appeal. The next fixtures that Maurice intended to organise will be covered by other officers, the Road Relays in May by
Mel James and the Pentathlon in June by
Bruce Charles. We will keep you informed of future developments.” Whoa! What’s up? I wrote 76-year-old Maurice (raising a rumor), and he graciously replied: “It is certainly not about financial wrongdoings. It is only about the British Team in the W35 4x100m Relay at the World Championships in Lyon, and I have appealed against all the charges that I have been found guilty of.” You may recall that an
illegal substitution was made on that relay, which led to a DQ and the Americans getting a bronze medal. So Maurice is being blamed for that debacle. We’ll see how this gets sorted out.
3 Responses
This was posted on the British Masters Athletics Facebook page:
This is not an accusation because I don’t know the facts – whether a legal reserve ran or whether someone ran wearing Maurice’s bib numbers. At the 2007 European indoor championships in Helsinki Maurice Doogan was sitting next to me in the stand watching the relays. I was therefore surprised when the results were published that he was listed along with Barry Ferguson, John Garber & Bryan Shearsmith as winning a bronze medal in the M65 4 x 200m relay. When a reserve replaces an original team member whose name appears in the results?
Ken, more precisely that Facebook group is:
‘BMA British Masters Athletics’
It has nothing to do with the British Masters Athletics Federation (BMAF)
In Lyon, the management of result was a pity… Impossible to get some before a long time just because organisation didn’t use the SIGMA system used for European championship.
Regarding relay, even if a lot of team used reserve instead of original team member, no change have been taken into account in results… I personaly ask for a change (with the correct paper filled in and signed) but official results are with original team. Some national record have been validated …. with not the correct runners!
Remark: if 4×100 relay have been scheduled just after individual sprint races (first week-end) probably, it could be easier to build team than 10 days after end of 100m races…
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