George Mathews shares this sad news: “One of our founding fathers has passed. He was hoping to go for 100 age group records soon. We celebrated his life last month at a fancy birthday party on the edge of Puget Sound in Seattle.” George refers to Leon Joslin, who died Monday without a chance at breaking M100 records in the throws. His son, Tim, sent email with the subject line “End of an era.” Indeed. A 1997 profile did justice to Leon’s legacy: “There aren’t too many like Leon left in the country,” said Ken Weinbel, former USATF masters national chairman.

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Two-time British Olympian Tony Whiteman turned 40 last November, but his latest 800 meters was that of an elite collegian. Running at the Loughborough International Athletics Meet on Sunday, he burned two laps in an incredible 1:48.28, blasting through the 1:50 barrier and crushing the listed M40 world record of 1:50.34 by Jim Sorensen. (See results here.) I’ve also discovered that he ran an indoor WR 1500 meters in 3:44.12 this season, nipping the listed WR of 3:44.39 by Russia’s Vyacheslav Shabunin. This puts Tony on track to be the first M40 to run a sub-4 outdoor mile (which is his stated goal.) Here’s the 800 WR race:

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World champion Renee Henderson lowered her own W45 American record in the 200 Sunday at the Open & Masters Outdoor Developmental Meet #2 at West Chester University. She’s 47. See complete results here. Meet maven Donna Aylsworth writes from Philly: “It was a small meet but we did have a record broken by Renee Henderson in the 200 (pending until paperwork is complete). We also had a gentleman in the Wounded Warrior Project who threw discus and shot, but he did not meet either of the Standards. Even though several contestants exceeded the American Standards in the throws, none of the results were highlighted as we did not inspect the implements. I did, however, use my LaserLynx EMD for the discus & hammer portions of the meet.” Renee nipped her own listed W45 AR of 25.28 set at Sacramento worlds. At the May 20 meet, Renee clocked 25.19. The WR is 23.82 by Merlene Ottey.

Why should the guys have all the fun in Portland? Joanna Harper, organizer of the masters women’s 3K the same day, reminds me: “On June 9, the Portland track Festival turns five. In addition to some strong open races, there are two races for masters runners. … The women’s 3,000 race will feature Grace Padilla up front, an attempt at the W45-49 American record from Tania Fischer and many other excellent runners such as Mary Thane and Jenny Newton from the Mountain West Track club in Missoula. Former world duathlon champ Liz McCullough (formerly Liz Downing) and Jenny Teppo should duke it out for supremacy in the AARP eligible division (W50). However, the fastest female masters runner at the meet will probably be Kris Paaso. At this point, Kris is considering a run at the open 1500-meter race, where she might be able to earn a qualifying time for the upcoming Olympic trials. She also hasn’t ruled out entering the 3000, and racing Grace, Tania and the rest of the “mature’ women. Either way, there should be some fast times and good races out of these women in Stumptown.”

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Amy Acuff, the four-time Olympian who lowers herself to compete in masters track meets when she needs some work, turned 35 in July 2010. But don’t look now. She’s the top American high jumper outdoors this season at 1.95 meters (6-4 3/4) after clearing that height in March at the Texas Relays. She’s going for her fifth Olympic team, folks. She’s also ranked among the top six in the world at the moment. She never achieved her one-time goal of being the first female 7-footer, but she’s doing all right as a geezer leaper. She topped the listed W35 AR of 1.86 (6-1¼”) way back in 1988 by Jane Frederick. It was the oldest HJ record on the masters books. The listed W35 WR is 2.01 (6-7) by Ukraine’s Inga Babakova . Here’s a good interview with Amy from some years back. If Amy goes to London, she’ll be a long shot at age 37. But she’ll have a ton of fans thinking uplifting thoughts.

Ray Charbonneau, who writes as well as he runs, shares an article on what might have been the first age-group road race in America — back in 1961. The “old-timers” are listed in their 40s, which shows you how far we’ve come, Daddy-O. Ray has other great works, including Chasing the Runner’s High and R is for Running. Among other things, we learn in “The Golden Anniversary of Age Group Running”: “Only a couple years before, eight men 45 and older toed the line on a hot summer day, John Landy was 25 and the world record holder in the mile when his father told him it was time to quit running, saying, “I was in business before I was that old.”

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Track and field, like mother’s work, is an individual activity. But all moms have support teams, and so do we in masters track. So here’s a big hooray for the moms in masters track, and all their backup systems. I’m especially grateful to my wife (mom of Bobby, 23), who joins me at big news events as a primo photographer. Here we are at the Junior Seau Celebration of Life event Friday night at Qualcomm Stadium in San Diego — which resulted in the posting of 150 photos to all Patch sites in San Diego County. Chris held her own against shooters from The Associated Press, Getty Images and the best photogs of U-T San Diego. Check out some of her best shots below. Freelancer Richard Alan Eaton took this picture of us uploading photos before the gates even opened at the Q.

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Pete Magill went on record against our obscene and obtuse record-ratification process eight months ago. He hasn’t softened in his M50 dotage. He writes about his American record 5K: “You know what I did after running my 15:11? I jogged two miles with a friend, stopped by the timer’s tent to get a copy of the FAT photo as a memento, then went to nearby Tommy’s burgers with my girlfriend to scarf chili-cheeseburgers. It may be the first time I’ve enjoyed myself post-record beating race as a masters athlete! My race finished at 11 p.m., and this is what I didn’t do: Spend the next couple hours frantically badgering harried and confused officials for signatures, when all those officials want to do is clean up and go home — and when some of the officials have inevitably already done just that — followed by the joy of trying to get the paperwork actually processed and ratified over the next few months (just ask Tony Young, Nolan Shaheed, Liz Palmer, Kathryn Martin and countless others how that sometimes works out). In other words, I celebrated a great race, instead of beginning to wish I’d never run it. The end.”

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M45 sprinter Kettrell Berry faces 11 years in prison if convicted of the charges against him, but the case has been reduced by the District Attorney’s Office. Originally, his bail was $1.1 million. Now it’s $150,000, which means he might get out if he raises about 10 percent of that. He pleaded not guilty today to 14 felony counts involving one girl. The original charges numbered 25. One story said “about a dozen people stood up in the courtroom during the arraignment to show their support for the defendant. They declined to speak to reporters afterward.” The U-T San Diego report also noted: “The defense attorney submitted a stack of awards, certificates and letters to the court, many of which described Berry as a devoted father and a dedicated and disciplined mentor.”

Not a surprise. Three years after USATF CEO Doug Logan brought him on board as chief operating officer, Mike McNees is exiting USA Track & Field, says this announcement. Until recently, Mike was acting CEO, since Doug got fired by the board. The wording of USATF release is ambiguous. But that means he probably got laid off by Max Siegel, the new CEO. That’s par for the course. The new coach gets to bring in his own assistants. But Mike deserves credit for keeping the organization together after the Logan drama. Hope Mike can resume his masters sprint career!

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