Graeme Shirley of San Diego is a walking Wikipedia of track rules, an incredible resource with vast institutional knowledge of USATF. But this week in Reno, he jumped the gun. For many years, as the Masters T&F Committee’s rules coordinator, Graeme has been the guy who represented our niche on the USATF Rules Committee, the place where new track rules are born or die. His job is to inform our folks on what’s coming down the pike and take notes on what should be spiked. Two days ago, he stunned our clan by announcing that USATF was considering a rule mandating drug-testing for all national records, including masters age-groups records. Today he went before the group to announce: Um, not to worry. Masters aren’t affected by the rule proposal. Say what? We spun wheels for a half-hour for nothing?

Graeme denies it was for naught. He told me the debate was needed — just in case USATF really had masters dope-testing in mind for record-setters. (In which case, he’d have ammo to fight the rule in the mother committee.) But he can be faulted for not checking this out ahead of time. Could have spared us a few heart attacks.
Here’s what Graeme told me after we slipped outside the meeting for a brief chat:
When he first informed the MT&F Committee of infamous Item 73, Graeme said a technical interpretation suggested that masters tracksters had to be drug-tested after setting a national record (or forfeit ratification of said record).
“I needed guidance (from the committee),” Graeme told me. If the rule really was meant to apply to masters, he needed marching orders on how to deal with it. (At the MT&F meeting, the cost of doing 20 drug tests at the site of a competition was put at $10,000 a day — a bit dear for a committee with an annual budget of $80,000.)
“My sense of that (Thursday) discussion was that everybody was opposed to drugs in the sport” but that drug-testing record-setters wasn’t the way to keep us clean. “If we want to get drugs out of the sport, do random testing,” Graeme said.
So how did Graeme get mixed up on what Item 73 meant?
He told me that Bob Hersh, the American rep at IAAF, inadvertently inserted the phrase “national record” when he should have used “American record.” Hersh had failed to translate “IAAF-speak to USATF-speak,” Graeme told me.
He learned this in a brief chat with Bob at the beginning of the meeting, where items involving masters track were graciously moved to the front of the agenda, Graeme said.
USATF takes “national records” to mean the whole kit-and-kaboodle: Midget and Bantam age-group records to geezer records.
The phrase “American records,” however, applies only to records in IAAF-recognized track and field events and a few others. So the rule really was intended for a few categories of U.S. records, including Open, Junior and whatnot. Not masters.
Here’s how the new rule amendment reads:

Each athlete who achieves an American Record or American Junior Record in any event recognized for a World Record by the IAAF. . . . shall submit to a doping control at the end of the event. . . . If such testing results in a doping violation, or if such testing is not conducted, USATF will not ratify this record.

Since the IAAF doesn’t handle masters records, the rule wouldn’t apply to masters and other age-groupers.
So what did the Rules Committee decide on the reworded rule?
It was OK’d — “accepted as amended,” in USATF-speak.
Now it goes for final approval Sunday morning at the USATF Closing Session. Most recommendations get rubber-stamped at this point.
Masters drug-testing? It was fun while it lasted.