December 2019

Obituaries December 27, 2019

Iowa services set Feb. 1 for Rex Harvey in his old hometown

Jerry Bookin-Weiner shares news about Rex Harvey services: There is now a link for the official obituary and place to leave condolence messages for Rex Harvey. On the website there is a place to leave condolence messages for the family, who have asked that their personal email addresses not be shared. The funeral will be held on Saturday, February 1, at 10 a.m. Central Time in his hometown of Redfield, Iowa, about 45 minutes from the Des Moines (DSM) Airport. There will be a visitation the previous evening. Full details are in the obituary. A Rex Harvey Memorial Track &…

General December 25, 2019

Kay Glynn is our Christmas elf, but will never put her athletic career on the shelf

Kay Glynn sent me her 13th annual Christmas greeting photo more than a week ago, writing: “I don’t even know what this picture means — but it was challenging and fun.” I know exactly what it means. Kay in her mid-60s has made a terrific comeback from hip replacement and resurfacing surgeries. She is showing how track is the fountain of youth and her flexibility and blond hair signal you can recapture past glories. In fact, masters tracksters likely sense holiday themes in our pursuits. Like Christmas, we see our sport as an athletic savior. Like Hanukkah, we see our…

Obituaries December 22, 2019

Rex Harvey dies at 73; decathlete-turned-official was a beloved leader in masters track

If masters track had a Mount Rushmore, it would includes David Pain, Al Sheahen and Rex Harvey. On Sunday — two weeks after enduring the flu many caught at the USATF annual meeting in Reno — Rex died of a heart attack in Prescott, Arizona, where he was recovering from appendix cancer. He was 73. I don’t know if the flu weakened Rex, but on Dec. 12 he wrote me: “Today I ate for the first time in 5 days but still feeling woozy around the edges.” When I learned of Rex’s passing via Facebook, my heart sank 1,000 miles….

Carroll DeWeese, shown at 2009 Lahti worlds, is our treasurer and newly minted WMA delegate.

General December 8, 2019

New USATF Officials Hall of Famer Carroll DeWeese: ‘Thank you for supporting masters’.

USATF Masters Committee Treasurer Carroll DeWeese is rich in friends and fans, including me. He battled cancer a decade back but seems fine now. This weekend, the Michigan city commissioner joined Doug Allen, Roger Burbage, John Shirey as inductees Saturday into the USATF Officials Hall of Fame — celebrated at the USATF Annual Meeting at the Grand Sierra Resort, Reno, Nevada. “Many people asked to get a text copy of my acceptance talk,” he wrote friends of his 940-word remarks. “I spoke from the heart and did not have a text.” Not surprisingly, he talks of love. That’s the kind…

Doping December 7, 2019

Sandris Linbergs, javelin world champion at Toruń, gets 4-year suspension for doping

Last March, Latvian athletes won 11 gold medals at Toruń indoors worlds in Poland, including an M35 thrower (nearing 39) named Sandris Linbergs. In 2018, he was listed on the World Athletics (formerly IAAF) site as the 1040th best discus thrower in the world. At Torun, however, he tested positive for “a prohibited substance, its metabolites or markers.” And this week World Masters Athletics announced he was given a four-year suspension through March 23, 2023. “As the result of this suspension, there will be a reallocation of the results shot put M35 and the results and medal places in the…