WORLD 400H CHAMP Femke Bol says of her in-process switch to the 800, “I’m not afraid of failing on the track. I’m not living in a fairytale. It’s an illusion that I can immediately compete with the best in the 800 and win. That will take time; I just have to see if I get there. The unknown is something very exciting, but also something very fun.” She is training up to 55K (34M) a week…
Sinclaire Johnson has signed with HOKA…
German halfmiler Smilla Kolbe has left North Florida for a pro career with On…
Heather MacLean has left New Balance after 7 years and signed with adidas…
Canada’s Lucia Stafford has joined the M11 club in Britain, where she will be training with Keely Hodgkinson, Georgia Hunter-Bell and American Elise Cranny…
Neeraj Chopra has ended his coaching arrangement with Czech javelin legend Jan Železný; the two reportedly parted on good terms…
Chris Solinsky, a 5-time NCAA champion for Wisconsin, has been hired as the executive director of the school’s W Club, an organization of past Badger past letterwinners…
Jamaican discus Olympian Chad Wright is hoping to compete in both the platter and the weightlifting events at this year’s Commonwealth Games…
Ireland’s Ciara Mageean is releasing a book, My Greatest Race. It will cover not only her racing career and her ’24 Euro gold medal at 1500, but also her battle with cancer…
With her 2:36:24 at the Houston Marathon, Dot McMahon, age 49, has now qualified for 6 Olympic Trials Marathons…
Eliud Kipchoge was named as one of the Olympic flagbearers for the Winter Olympics Opening Ceremony…
Faith Kipyegon has announced she is leading a project to build a maternity ward in her hometown of Keringet, with help from Nike. Kenya has one of the worst maternal death rates in the world, as over 20 times more women die during childbirth than in the U.S…
The president of the Russian federation for 24 years, Valentin Balakhnichev has died at age 76. Once WA’s treasurer, in 2016 the international federation banned him for life for his involvement in the doping coverup scandal of the 2010s. He also received, in absentia, a 3-year prison sentence…
WA is teaming with Siemens Healthineers to provide better medical testing and diagnostic imaging for athletes at major events. Key to the effort will be the use of a blood analysis system and ultrasound…
On an official visit to Jamaica, WA head Seb Coe pledged financial support of $100,000 to help athletes impacted by Hurricane Melissa to continue training and competing…
Billionaire Ross Stevens has announced that he will be giving each American Olympian and Paralympian (all sports) a $200,000 nest egg to build their retirement savings around…
Saudi Arabia’s Yousef Mohammed Al-Asiri, just a 13:48.19 runner, somehow offended the testing gods so much that he landed a 10-year ban, testing positive for both EPO and darbepoetin…
The AIU busted three athletes for violating the WA Integrity Code regarding betting. German throwers Henrik Janssen and Steven Richter got 3-month bans, while France’s Aurore Fleury got 6-months for placing a $2300 bet that her friend Alice Finot would win at the ’24 Euro Championships. While Finot did win the steeple, an additional $3500 fine from WA wiped out Fleury’s celebration.…
Jacob Kiplimo’s 56:42 at the Barcelona Half-Marathon last year has been denied WR recognition. It reportedly violated several regulations, the prime one being that the lead car was often just a few meters ahead, providing a wind break. The WR will remain the 57:30 that Yomif Kejelcha ran in ’24 in Valencia…
Skyler Franklin missed ’25 while Jamaican authorities processed her apparent positive test for GW1516, the same drug that ended the career of Montverde Academy teammate Issam Asinga. Franklin got a public reprimand and is currently free to represent LSU. However, WADA feels she needs a bigger penalty and her case is now before CAS…
Ban, schman. Kenya’s Alice Koigi isn’t letting a 2-year AIU suspension keep her down. In the weeks since it was finalized, according to journalist Christopher Kelsall, she has won prize money at two races in Malaysia, for a total of $1700…
The ’28 World Ultimate Championships are up for grabs, and Barcelona is considering a bid. “The budgets are demanding and we have to find economic viability,” cautioned the federation president…
Jamaica’s Racers GP meet has been canceled for this season because of funding challenges…
Russian athletes were less than thrilled over the decision to hold their indoor championships in Sakhalin, on the country’s Pacific coast. Said one, “The entire team is in a frenzy over this news today. Honestly, I don’t even know how to comment on it. It’s an 8-hour flight from Moscow… It’s not hard to imagine what condition the athletes will be in after such a flight; it will take time to recover.”…
“Unavoidable circumstances” have led Athletics Kenya to cancel its planned World Indoor team trials set for the first weekend of February. Instead, athletes will be selected by times and merit in a committee process…
The renovation of the national stadium in Nassau, Bahamas, should be done by June, a multi-million dollar project funded by China. The new Mondo surface will again be host to the World Relays in ’28…
Both Phoenix and St. Louis are bidding to host the ’28 Olympic Marathon Trials…
BBC has reported that Great Britain is preparing bids to host multiple international cross country events in the coming years. The last big one on the Isles was the ’08 Worlds…
Ohio has now named its prep state finals for the legendary Jesse Owens, while expanding the meet to a 4-day affair. ◻︎
