Always! Haha - you and Connor have a great dynamic! Always impressed with your calm demeanor and ability to build confidence by doing your own thing. Personally, I’d strangle a one-stepper 😂 - but you two make it work. Rooting for both of you in Paris. Keep crushing the work and thanks for the great content. 👊
I have a show topic idea but I'm not sure if it's too sensitive to discuss. I would love to know how the dynamics of different pro running teams differ and how and why some disband? For instance, what the heck happened to the Bowerman Track Club? As a fan of the sport but probably not someone in the "know" it's challenging to invest in a t team for so long only to see them disband without any real explanation. I feel like fans are owed more than the cursory "we decided to go in different directions". To the extent you feel comfortable, can you discuss teams with really exciting models ahead of Olympic Trials, the difference in approaches, etc. I think this can be done without being disparaging to any one team?
I am an attorney. How about having each person provided prize money post a bond that would require the bonding company to pay if there is a disqualification? This would assure those who are entitled to more funds get them. The bonding company would take the risk. The athlete would have to post security to get the bond.
Yeah for small schools. I appreciate that in Oregon, small schools run against small schools at state. I coach high school cross country and track for a D3 (the smallest) school and we race against D1 and 2 at championships. 88% of medals go to D1 athletes. It’s so frustrating we don’t have our own meets or at least heats. At our school, track and CC athletes are basketball players, wrestlers, and cheerleaders in the winter. More people need to give a shit! And request, the pod misses the uncontrolled laughing intro 😂
So I work in HR and for every signing bonus, yearly bonus, etc. we have clauses that say that you have to pay it back (the whole amount before taxes) if you quit before a certain time period. If you don't, lawyers call you, you go to collections.
I would be very surprised if they dont have protective language in the contracts about having to repay the award money if you are found to have been doping when you earned prize money. It’s probably not holes in the contract, more the actual collection of the money 10 years later. Most of these athletes probably dont have millions in net worth so if they get taken to collections there is actual money to collect
On paying athletes who end up being “owed” prize money: since drug cheating is essentially likely to happen with enough frequency, races that pay prize money could do a few things so that they can make retroactive payments. 1. Create a reserve. Banks do this knowing people will default on loans, so races can also do this. Allocate a portion of prize money to a reserve fund, or pay less in appearance fees, or hold a bake sale, or charge more for entries. 2. Find some company that will insure the race for this situation and take on the risk of retro payouts. 3. I had a third idea but i already forget what it is lol so i’m sure there are other ways to solve this problem
Somehow I didn’t hear that Korir is out. I’m so bummed for him. Watching him run to that finish line at the trials with windmill arms-he was so happy. 😭
The fields are now limited. Some events, very. And the 10k has cross country qualifiers which is dumb as it is. I don’t know an era we’ve sent an entirely full track team. If we have, we barely. So events have always had some teams decided before the trials. We’re complaining that the fields are smaller so fewer will have the qualification to go in the US, and that’s where we are.
In the line of thinking about a cap on being "Top American".... Back in my day Grete Waitz was head and shoulders about the rest of the world in the marathon. Patti Catalano was head and shoulders above other Americans. I heard her tell a story about NYC one year. She came up on Waitz's shoulder, Grete looked at her and asked "Patti, what are you doing?" Short of breadth she responded "I'm trying to beat you." And Waitz was gone, but she went for it. DAN
"Super" shoes vs. doping, the doping part will never go away so let's embrace it. "Super"shoes will just get crazier and crazier which advances the ability of the runner but we are cool with them. I don't like how the "super" shoes have allowed companies to increase their prices more because the price difference compared to "super" shoes is so much.
How about the races pay winners half their prize after a successful test a day after the race and the other half after a successful test 6 months later. Then if they fail the second test their prize money would get passed down to the other finishers.
I was going to suggest a five year payout so the cheaters would get at most 20% of the money they don't deserve but I was concerned that some people (certainly including cheaters, but maybe not only cheaters) would object. Your suggestion may be more palatable to some.
D3 does not have the marathon🤔NAIA does though but went on a few year hiatus because of issues with it being too hot and runners collapsing. This past year they ran their marathon national championship at CIM, and it seemed to work out alright since medical, on course fueling and everything else was already taken care of. I agree that American runners tend to stay on the track longer than other countries. I believe part of that is due to the fact that we have so many shoe deals here. In other countries athletes might not be as likely to get a shoe deal, so they move up in hopes of getting bigger prize money from marathons.
Love hearing your takes! Also seems like the super shoes havent had as much of an impact on the top end of US distance running... Ryan Hall set the American record way before super shoes! What's up with that?!
A great discussion about drug cheats and money. A very honest analysis of the issue. Keep it going! Related to the 84 marathon reunion. It frustrates me that when records like Mary Decker's (a short-time CU runner) mile record is broken and no one acknowledges that her freaking mark stood unbroken for 40 years, and no one appreciates what a phenomenal runner she was. Lynn Jennings was astounding So was Vicki Huber. They deserve some live. One day Des' and Kara's records will be broken and all the 20 year olds will go "ho hum"
No reunions for me either Des. As a fan, I don't know how any of this works. I follow someone, in other sports too, and I don't know why my athlete isn't involved. We want to watch people we know...otherwise there's no connection, no feeling that we have someone to root for. Watching 30k people run the marathon sounds like fun! we watch because it's a spectacle and a celebration and there are USA bibs in there to cheer.
There are 195 countries in the world. three runners from each gets you less than 600 runners. There are territories that go too. So what would that be 1000? You can put on a World class marathon on city streets with 20,000 people. Why not just get rid of standards in the marathon? it would be a great developmental thing for small countries. Dan
It's not exactly the same though, since we do the trials (not all countries do that). It's having the two systems on top of each other that makes it so frustrating. Plus it kind of changing on the fly with the Universality places (I don't pretend to really understand what's going on with that).
