In line with that is the notion that each National Olympic Committee has the right to be represented at each Olympic Games. Thus, the universality clauses. As expressed in the World Athletics explainer to the qualification system for Paris: “An NOC with no male or female qualified athlete or relay team will be allowed to enter their best ranked male athlete or best ranked female athlete” . . . so far, so not so bad. But then, “in either the 100 metres, 800 metres or marathon.”
Bring back the mile – has it ever gone away? A Column By Len Johnson
In outlining his vision to make athletics more appealing to a younger audience, Sebastian Coe recently observed: “The average age of those watching track and field is 55 years old. This is not sustainable.”
How does...
The women’s race had barely sunk in – a sub-30 from Ethiopia’s world cross-country silver medallist Tsigie Gebreselama, 30:35.66 from Lauren Ryan in third place, breaking Benita Willis’s Australian record set way back in the 2003 world championships – when eight men came in under 27 minutes in the men’s with another five, including Jack Rayner in another AR 27:09.57, between 27:07 and 27:10.
Indeed, the medals came from start to finish on Wednesday, 8 August in Paris. Bronze for Rhydian Cowley and Jemima Montag in the mixed relay marathon road walk in the morning, bronze for Matt Denny in the discus and then Kennedy’s gold in the dying moments of the day’s program at the Stade de France.
How to solve a big problem? Create up to six more problems almost as difficult as the one you were trying to solve in the first place.
A Column by Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
Cross-country: something for everybody. Just step outside and run.
Invented by cave-dwellers fleeing mastodons, cross-country simply involves running as fast as you can – faster than a pre-historic predator, in any case – for as long as you can, over whatever terrain confronts...
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Oslo – the Melbourne of the north | A column by Len Johnson
A long time ago when we were all good young distance athletes, someone – Chris Wardlaw, I think – dubbed Melbourne the Oslo of the South....
The runaway train that is the Change Express continues to cut a swathe through the athletics world.
Having shunted race walking into a siding last time out, the train careered on in the direction of the Diamond League. Perhaps not surprisingly given the locomotive’s near-warp speed, the major casualty on...
A Column By Len Johnson
The one flaw in Ron Clarke’s career was the lack of a championship gold medal. Long before his passing earlier this year, however, it was pretty well universally acknowledged that the manner in which he re-imagined and re-shaped track distance running more than made up...
A Column By Len Johnson - Runner's Tribe
Being a selector is often a thankless task – literally, in the sense that not many of those selected ever think to say ‘thank you’, and, figuratively, in the sense that it is bloody hard work.
So perhaps it is fitting that the...
