W40 Sara Davis named coach at Texas A&M-Commerce
We love to see masters athletes promoted at work, especially when they’re track coaches. (Gives them more opportunities to train!) So we’re delighted to pass along the news that Sara Davis, a national-class sprinter who competed at 2006 and 2007 masters nationals, is the new women’s track coach at Texas A&M University’s Commerce campus. She has no marks listed for 2008, but we hope that changes in the world champs year of 2009.
Who’s the top masters athlete in the world? Hint: Geb
Roger Ruth ranked the track 10K in his latest review of masters-age (over-35) athletes on the 2008 seasonal world lists. And he notes: “Wow! (Haile) Gebrselassie ranks even higher than Derek Miles did in the pole vault. Can any master-age athlete rank higher on this year’s world lists than Haile’s #3? What do you think?” Geb qualifies. He turned 35 last April — well before taking sixth in the Beijing 10,000. And you might think that Geb’s season best of 26:51.20 is a masters world age-group record? Hahahahaha. Think again. The listed WMA M35 record remains as always: 27:17.48 by Portugal’s Carlos Lopes in 1984.
September 24, 2008
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Not just Ottey, Gault: Many masters on 100m world lists
Here’s more proof that when you seek, you shall find. Roger Ruth has identified two dozen men and women over 35 on the open world lists at 100 meters. “As I wrote in the initial post of this series,” Roger says, “the procedure is to sort Mirko Jalava’s World Deep Lists for each event by age of birth, from 1973 and backward from there, to identify all athletes on the list of masters age levels (35 and older).”
September 23, 2008
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Ultraweight but late, masters pentathlon results online
Only men’s marks have been posted so far, but the USATF site now lists these results from the Sept. 6 USATF National Masters Ultraweight Pentathlon Championships in Seattle. Only three women were entered, so results for them shouldn’t be too far behind. Thanks go to Andy Martin of USATF for reformatting the results and getting them posted just hours after receiving the results from George Mathews, who won the M65 age group with 5179 points.
September 22, 2008
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Roger Ruth digging deep in open lists for masters marks
Roger Ruth of Victoria, Canada, was the pioneer masters vaulter — setting world age-group records in his 40s back in the early 1970s. He went 4.60 (15-1) at age 44 in an era when the world open record was about 18-2. He’s now 80, and retired from jumping. But he’s still a force to be reckoned with — as one of the world’s best vault statisticians and historians. In recent years, he’s maintained extensive women’s record lists by country. And yesterday he announced a major new project: Checking for masters (35 and over) on existing open track lists. This is long overdue. Roger may reveal buried treasure — and marks that deserve WR recognition by World Masters Athletics.
September 22, 2008
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O’Meara notches 20th sub-5 mile of the summer at 45
The guy did it. Took him two more races than the 20 he first envisioned, but on the last day of summer David O’Meara of Sarasota ran his 20th mile in under 5 minutes. Results of this morning’s Fifth Avenue Mile in New York show that David ran 4:51. (Here’s the results page.) But David’s feat was overshadowed by a couple gents more that twice David’s 45 years. “In the most talked-about race of the day,” the site reported, “teammates and fellow age-group runners Bob Matteson, 92, of the Greater New York Racing Team and Abe Weintraub, 98, amazed the spectators on Fifth Avenue once again. Matteson finished in 12:21 and Weintraub, the most senior runner in the race, broke the tape in 22:10.”
September 21, 2008
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Reports from hurricane survivors trickle in from Texas
Hurricane Ike left the house a week ago, but many residents of Houston and parts north are just getting their power back and lives in order. Our masters track friends there are totaling up their losses, but keeping their sense of humor. One is Doug “Bubba” Sparks, an M55 pole vaulter from The Woodlands, north of Houston. Bubba wrote several days ago: “Our vault facility took a hit . . . even though the coaches did one heck of a job strapping down the pits. One front bun got the case ripped right off of it though the pit never moved. The rollout runway we got from Ron Morris at OnTrack was twisted like a red vine licorice piece. Both pits looked like swimming pools.”
Thrower’s U.S. record noted by local paper, not USATF
Brian Sumpter of the Lake County Record-Bee south of Sacramento knows something that USATF doesn’t — that local thrower Mike Curry tied a national record a couple weekends ago. Brian’s story reports: “Competing in the age 40-44 division of the ultraweight pentathlon, Curry threw the 56-pound weight (also known as the superweight) 8.86 meters (29-1), tying the national record he set earlier this season. The ultraweight pentathlon includes weight throws of 35, 56, 100, 200 and 300 pounds.” Meanwhile, results of the meet Sept. 6 at West Seattle Stadium in Seattle are still AWOL. That’s 13 days and counting. Sheesh. But you know me. I always give Indy a break. I won’t complain until it’s been a month. Then I’ll say: “Pretty please, with a cherry on top?”
San Diego USATF unanimously adopts do-or-die bylaw
Faced with the possible loss of all 15 of its delegate votes at the USATF national convention in Reno, the San Diego-Imperial USATF Association voted unanimously last night to adopt an amendment to its bylaws. The amendment sets up a grievance procedure that all 57 associations have to approve by October 15. About two dozen San Diego-area members showed up for the association’s annual elections meeting, held at Road Runner Sports. Unopposed for office were Jay Beltz, elected president after 14 months as acting president in the wake of Mike Rouse’s resignation; incumbent Vice President Arnie Robinson, the 1976 Olympic long jump champ; incumbent Treasurer Lolitia “Lish” Bache; and her son, Tom, as secretary.
September 18, 2008
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Fifth Avenue Mile is finale for 20-under-5 miler O’Meara
One mile to go for David O’Meara of Sarasota, Fla.
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David O’Meara, who set a goal of running 20 straight sub-5 miles at age 45 last spring, has fallen short — thanks to miserable weather. According to his stats page and latest race report Monday, he clocked sub-5s on road miles 17 consecutive times before running a 5:01 on Sept. 7 in Duluth and a 5:04 on Sept. 14 in Falmouth, Massachusetts. So he’s revised his goal to running 20 sub-5s overall in summer 2008. He added the Sprint with Judy Mile this past Sunday in Woodstock, Connecticut, and the Fifth Avenue Mile this Sunday in New York City. Here’s my original interview with David.
September 17, 2008
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