When Krishna Stanton burst onto the international scene in early-1987, it seemed she could be anything. Fourth in the 3000 metres at the world indoor championships, eighth in a world cross-country run over what was reported as the “freezing muddy wastes of Sluzewiac Racecourse,” the world seemed at her...
A column by Len Johnson
Few runners kept up with Emil Zatopek during his brilliant career. Even fewer got past the Czechoslovakian champion. And of those who did, hardly any stayed ahead of ‘Zato’ all the way to the line.
If it was hard enough catching up with Zatopek through his...
Did ye get healed?
A Column By Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
Nitro Athletics has been and gone. It seems to have had an overwhelmingly positive reception – 1.4-million viewers Australia-wide on the first of three nights on free-to-air television, Melbourne’s boutique lakeside Stadium jammed to its 9000-ish capacity for the...
A column by Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
Only one event has had its Gold Coast 2018 trial and already selectors and athletes are in a quandary.
Actually, make that two quandaries if we count the news that Australia may be restricted to a quota of 73 athletes in the able-bodied...
It’s not often you find yourself writing about the same athlete two weeks in a row, but who else do you talk about this week other than Catriona Bisset?
Last week’s column on Bisset was both good and bad timing. Good timing, in the sense that she has been the...
In writing last time about the Melbourne-Echuca marathon relay and the toughness of the distance runners of that era I wondered about the training they used to do.
I made the observation: “These men may not have done the high training mileages of today, but they certainly were tough when...
If Victoria has a home of cross-country, it would have to be Bundoora Park, in Melbourne’s northern suburbs, across the road from LaTrobe University.
They’ve been racing there almost 50 years. For most of that period Victoria has been the powerhouse of Australian distance running, which gives Bundoora Park strong...
One of the stranger things about the world championships is waiting for them to start. There is a hell of a build up and then, two weeks or so out from opening day, we go into a state of suspended animation.
A Column By Len Johnson
In announcing her retirement this week, Alana Boyd got the timing just right.
Timing is everything in Boyd’s event, the pole vault. It is no good having the height before the crossbar, no good having it after. For a clearance, you must have the height at...
David McNeill’s athletics career could have been over almost before it began. On Tuesday night in Perth, he may have run his way into a third Olympic team.
It was in 2005 that McNeill, along with Liam Adams and Toby Rayner, was a controversial non-selection for the junior team to...
