General

Becca flies over bar

General November 25, 2018

Landslide victory predicted for Willie Banks as USATF’s pick for IAAF Council rep

Becca Gillespy Peter, the PoleVaultPower.com legend who made her masters vault debut at Spokane over the summer, has posted her valued endorsement of Willie Banks, our masters track friend, for IAAF Council. One commenter on Becca’s post said: “Fearless prediction – Banks in a landslide.” Delegates will make their pick this coming Saturday at the USATF annual meeting in Columbus, Ohio, where the favorite daughter (and local resident) is Stephanie Hightower, the incumbent U.S. rep to the IAAF Council. If Willie wins, it will be a ratification of my bit role in his career. In 2009, at the Reno annual…

Charlie Allie anchors America's gold-medal M65 4x100 relay team at Malaga.

General November 21, 2018

Charles Allie, Lesley Hinz named USATF Masters Athletes of Year (with Charlie top overall)

Surprising nobody, Charles Allie has been named USATF Masters Athlete of the Year. In a related decision by the USATF Masters Awards Committee, Charlie and Lesley Hinz were named male and female masters athletes of the year. The committee chaired by W40 combined-eventer Rachel Guest — herself an honoree — also introduced event-group athletes of the year (along with the usual age-group AoYs). Photographer Rob Jerome did a wonderful job of highlighting award winners. Here’s the USATF press release on Charlie as overall AoY: Charles Allie (Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania) is no stranger to accolades. Since entering a new age group this…

Annelies is an accomplished javelin thrower as well as high jumper, who proudly wears Dutch orange.

General November 20, 2018

W70 world champ Annelies Steekelenburg homeless from Malibu fire but not friendless

Lady Gaga fled. So did Miley Cyrus, Neil Young and Robin Thicke. But I’m not worried about their fate from the devastating Woolsey Fire that razed parts of Malibu. I’m stunned how masters royalty has been victimized. Malaga M60 champion Peter Hlavin shares the sad news that his high jump friend — and Malaga W70 gold medalist — Annelies Steekelenburg lost almost all her possessions. She rented a home in Malibu. “Annelies is safe, having evacuated with car, computer, some clothes, a few of her personal paintings and — high jump shoes,” Peter writes. “For the past 18 years, she…

The fountain statue behind Willie isn't crying. It's a lady holding a water container pottery.

General November 16, 2018

M60 Olympian Willie Banks seeks election at Ohio meeting as IAAF rep nominee

Willie Banks may be forgiven if he doesn’t have time to compete in coming years. My M60 jumper friend is leaping into USATF/IAAF politics big time. As I note in my Times of San Diego story, Willie is seeking to replace Stephanie Hightower as the American representative on the powerful IAAF Council. His candidacy is a surprise, and since nobody else had reported this (besides the USATF Document Library), I jumped on it. My first story covers the basics, but notable is something Willie says in his statement of candidacy: “I believe I am uniquely qualified by both experience and…

General November 14, 2018

Help save our memories: Contribute materials to 10-year-old mastershistory.org

I must have been napping. But I failed in February to mark the 10th anniversary of mastershistory.org — our worldwide geezertrack museum. This year’s updates have been slim, however, since we’ve exhausted the Al Sheahen archive. So now we’re launching an effort to crowd-source materials from others. Masters History subcommittee chair Jeff Davison recently visited national masters chair Rex Harvey in Arizona, who is making available some of his papers, including newsletters of the Over The Hill Track Club in Ohio. And yet some basic materials are still missing. For example, USATF Masters T&F Records czar Jeff Brower needs complete…

Roland Heitink of Getty Images took iconic shot of future 49-year-old. But will he look as good at 50?

General November 8, 2018

M65 Dutch gent wants court to make him M45 for sake of sex appeal

Feeling old? Wish you were 20 years younger? Well, you can hit the gym. Or do what Emile Ratelband did in Holland. You can ask a court to change your legal age. Old Emile is 69 and wants to be declared 49. Yeah, I thought it was fake, too. But lots of outlets are covering this — including HuffPost, whose weird-news writer David Moye lives a few minutes from me. NPR’s headline goes straight for the jugular: “69-Year-Old Dutch Man Seeks To Change His Legal Age To 49.” The story begins: Emile Ratelband, a 69-year-old motivational speaker from the Netherlands,…

Tina Bowman (photographer not listed) took silver in the W65 long hurdles at Malaga worlds.

General November 4, 2018

Overcoming misery to excel in Malaga: 3 Americans with medical issues

Three recent profiles of Malaga-goers make my favorite point: Everyone in masters track is competing despite issues. In the case of W65 hurdler Tina Bowman, M75 hammer dude George Mathews and M60 discuser Ralph Fruguglietti, the hurdles are medical. From the Redmond News of Washington: “A year ago, Matthews took a break for hernia surgery at the Cascade Hernia & Surgical Solutions at Meridian Surgery Center in Puyallup. He credits his excellent care for getting him back to training in six weeks and competing a few months later.” From the562.org of California: “Bowman recovered from rotator cuff surgery in April…

General November 2, 2018

60 dash for the 60s will be masters exhibition event at NYC indoor nationals

The USATF Masters Twitter feed informs us that the 60-meter dash for men and women will be the exhibition race contested at USA indoor open nationals on Sunday, Feb. 22, 2019, at the new Ocean Breeze Athletic Complex in New York City. Cool. Even cooler: The ages eligible for this event are 60-69. (Now if only I can compile home addresses for a few hundred guys and hire a discount knee-whacker, then I’m in!) If I can’t, then the likes of Damien Leake, Thomas Jones, Val Barnwell, Sky Webb and Michael Kish are the male favorites, while Amanda Scotti, Loretta…

Damien Leake (in red) and Charles Allie (at right) were truly blurs in the Sierra Gold 100.

General October 31, 2018

Damien Leake, Linda Cohn dominate Huntsman World Senior Games

Damien Leake didn’t run at Malaga, but the M65 sprint star’s marks at the mid-October Huntsman World Senior Games make for interesting comparisons. It isn’t apples to apples since the Utah meet didn’t have heats and semis. And conditions differ. But check out Damien’s times and distances. ( ts are here.) He won the M65 100 in 12.52. Malaga gold went to Britain’s Stephen Peters in 12.56. He won the M65 200 in 26.74. Malaga gold went to Stephen in 24.84 (Damien would have taken bronze.) He won the M65 long jump with 5.09 (16-8 1/4). Malaga gold went to…

Michael Kish (right) leads Malaga heat in the M65 100. He won silver in final but wasn't on the 4x100 relay.

General October 25, 2018

How the fastest American M65 in Malaga fell through the 4×100 relay cracks

At 67, Michael Kish of Nutley, New Jersey, is a relative newbie to masters track. He took up the sport at 59, taking advice to check out the New Jersey Senior Olympics. So when he deciubded to enter Malaga in the 100 and 200, he naturally wondered about running a relay. In late July, Michael wrote USA Team Manager Phil Greenwald, who graciously replied, discussing the difficulty of saying whether he would be on a foursome. Phil concluded his 400-word note: “My advice is always to plan your trip around your individual events; if you are available for the relays…