TheFinalSprint.com - Track & Field, Marathons, Racing News, Training Advice, Elite Athlete Blogs, Interviews, Podcasts, Videos and More! - TheFinalSprint.com is the Premier Destination for Track & Field, Marathon, Cross Country, Olympic and Road Racing Enthusiasts.

Lead Stories: Tuesday, December 2, 2008

Dysfunction Run Amuck
Part III: USOC Mandates and
A Question of Authority

Posted November 25th, 2008 at 4:00 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, Olympics

This is the third article in a seven-part series titled “Dysfunction Run Amuck: USA Track & Field and the Need for Change”.
In case you missed them, make sure to go back and read part one & part two, as well. To view a publication timeline for the entire series, please scroll to the bottom of this article.

From 2003 to 2005, under pressure from the U.S. Congress to clean up its act, the scandal-ridden United States Olympic Committee (USOC) took a number of drastic steps to address its own dysfunction. Among other measures, USOC reduced its board of directors from 123 members to 11.

USA Track & Field CEO Doug Logan told Track & Field News (November, 2008), “the USOC itself went through a very uncomfortable internal restructuring process.” He added, “The Congress required USOC to modify the way they did things, and to restructure [itself] and to modernize into a body that can do the business of sports in the 21st century. They went through huge changes on the governance and management sides, and they have required other governing bodies to follow suit.”

Former USOC General Counsel and sports law expert Mark Muedeking contends that the USOC, “recognized that there needed to be reform and that USOC needed to lead the way … to franchise that reform to the national governing bodies that they regulated.”

But why was reform necessary?

Muedeking, now a partner at the global law firm DLA Piper, added that if money is being wasted, if there are ethics issues, or if there is mismanagement or dysfunction at the national governing body (NGB) for a particular sport, “Then it gives everyone in the Olympic movement a black eye.”
Read the rest of this entry »

One comment, add yours | Permalink

Dysfunction Run Amuck
Part II: How Did We Get Here?

Posted November 21st, 2008 at 5:03 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, Olympics

This is the second article in a seven-part series titled “Dysfunction Run Amuck: USA Track & Field and the Need for Change”.
Click here to read part one and to view a publication timeline for the entire series.

Before plunging headlong into the tenuous situation facing USA Track & Field and the areas of dysfunction that threaten its future, it is important to take a step back and put everything into context by examining the relevant history of the organization, track & field, and the amateur sports movement.

One-hundred-and-fourteen years ago a French nobleman named Pierre Frédy, Baron de Coubertin, had a notion that moral and social fibers of young people would be fortified if they competed in amateur sports. That vision led him to found the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which of course, resulted in the founding of the Modern Olympic Games.

The sport of track & field has been the premier Olympic event ever since the first Olympic Games, which were held in 1896 in Athens, Greece. As such, it exemplified de Coubertin’s ideal of amateurism, and was jealously guarded for decades by the IOC. For example, Olympic champion Jim Thorpe was famously stripped of his 1912 Stockholm Olympic medals once the IOC discovered that he had been paid for competing in professional baseball earlier that year.
Read the rest of this entry »

2 comments, add yours | Permalink

Dysfunction Run Amuck
Part I: USA Track & Field and the Need for Change

Posted November 20th, 2008 at 2:00 PM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, Olympics

The upcoming presidential election for the sport’s national governing body, U.S.A. Track & Field (USATF), comes at a critical juncture in the history of the organization. Recently appointed CEO Doug Logan has shown both a strong commitment to continue reforming the anti-doping measures that were begun by his predecessor Craig Masback as well as a passion for challenging the status quo. His success in tackling these issues as well as the tough marketing challenges that lie ahead will need to be complimented by a streamlined board of directors in order to ensure the future of the American track federation.

The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) has levied demands for change at USATF, including serious threats of reduced funding or even de-certification if they fail to comply. Although the restructuring process has already begun for USATF, the process itself faces some tough challenges of its own. USATF national secretary Lynn Cannon has leveled some strong accusations of financial mismanagement that have already reverberated throughout the United States track & field and running community. They have resulted in denials and/or finger pointing from within the board.

TheFinalSprint.com’s investigation into this matter uncovered disturbing accusations and issues of dysfunction, including infighting, power struggles, racial tension, lack of oversight, and conflicts of interest within the board of directors. While the allegations may not rise to the level of criminality, they do threaten to undermine the organization at a time that it desperately needs cohesiveness and efficiency.

With the belief that sunlight is the best disinfectant, TheFinalSprint.com will provide an inside look at USATF and its current situation over the next six installments to be published between now and USATF’s annual meeting in Reno, NV. The topics to be covered in each segment and the date that it will be available can be found below:

• 11/20 - Introduction
• 11/21 - How Did We Get Here?
• 11/25 - USOC Mandates / A Question of Authority
• 11/28 - Cannon’s Allegations / Financial Mismanagement
• 11/29 - ‘Jets vs. Sharks’ Dynamic / Racial Tensions
• 12/01 - Overstepping / Conflicts of Interest
• 12/02 - USATF Pres. Election / Reasons For Hope

Read the rest of this entry »

6 comments, add yours | Permalink

Lomong To Be U.S. Flag Bearer at Opening Ceremony

Posted August 7th, 2008 at 2:14 PM by David Monti

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, Olympics

USA Track and Field announced here yesterday that 1500m runner Lopez Lomong, one of the Lost Boys of Sudan, would be the flag bearer at tomorrow night’s Opening Ceremony at the 29th Olympic Games. Lomong, 23, who was raised by adoptive parents in Tully, N.Y., was informed of the decision by telephone in Dalian, the Chinese coastal city where the American athletics team has its training base.

“This is the most exciting day ever in my life,” Lomong said in a statement released by USATF to the media. “It’s a great honor for me that my teammates chose to vote for me. The Opening Ceremony is the best day and the best moment of Olympic life. I’m here as an ambassador of my country and I will do everything I can to represent my country well.”

Lomong made his first Olympic team by finishing third at the U.S. Trials, just 1/10th of a second behind second place finisher eonel
Manzano, the former University of Texas star. The Trials race was won by two-time Olympic medalist, Bernard Lagat, completing a full three-man team in that event, all of whom were born outside of the United States. Lomong had also competed in the 800m at the Trials, finishing fifth, one week earlier.
Read the rest of this entry »

One comment, add yours | Permalink

SoundOFF: NBC, Track & Beijing

Posted August 7th, 2008 at 9:00 AM by Jesse Squire

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, SoundOFF, Columns, Olympics, Drugs In Sports

The Associated Press published an article a few weeks ago headlined No longer exalted, track slouches toward Beijing:

Track and field is slouching toward Beijing. To climb back on its pedestal, the sport needs the world to pay attention to the compelling story lines at these Summer Games, highlighted by what could be the greatest men’s 100-meter race in history and a Chinese megastar named Liu Xiang.

The story touches on a number of issues that have been discussed recently. Most telling is NBC’s treatment of track compared to other sports.

With the recent U.S. track trials and the swimming trials running concurrently, NBC chose to place Bob Costas, the face of its Olympics coverage, by the pool in Omaha, Neb., rather than trackside in Eugene, Ore.

That pecking order will be evident in China, too. During the Aug. 8-24 Olympics, swimming and gymnastics will be broadcast as they happen in prime time in the United States, even though that meant switching the start times to morning in Beijing. Track and field will be shown in the evening, but on tape — the suspense of the results gone in this wired world.

The trials in those three sports were illustrative. The overnight ratings on NBC averaged 3.9 for swimming, 3.3 for gymnastics and 3.2 for track and field.

It is a major reworking of priorities on US television that swimming and gymnastics are being made the top draw over track & field. NBC is of course tight-lipped about their reasons, leaving the rest of us to speculate, and inevitably the reason most often cited is the abundance of doping scandals in track. I’m not sure I buy it.
Read the rest of this entry »

2 comments, add yours | Permalink

Doug Logan Named CEO of USA Track & Field

Posted July 18th, 2008 at 9:00 AM by Adam Jacobs

Section: News & Results, Track & Field

The USA Track & Field Board of Directors on Thursday approved top sports executive Doug Logan, the former Commissioner, President and CEO of Major League Soccer, as its next CEO. A bilingual sports and entertainment leader with a proven track record of generating long-term sponsor partnerships, television outreach and high fan attendance, Logan and MLS in 1996 were named Sports Industrialist of the Year by Sports Business Daily.

Logan led MLS during its enormously successful 1995 start-up through 1999. He orchestrated the launch of the league’s inaugural season, averaging attendances of over 17,000 per game, highlighted by two single-game attendance figures over 85,000. With an annual budget of $90 million, MLS under Logan’s leadership generated $120 million in multiple-year sponsorship commitments from Nike, AT&T, adidas, Puma, Umbro, Honda, MasterCard, PepsiCo, Anheuser-Busch and Bic.

Considered the country’s highest-ranking Hispanic-American in sports management, Logan transformed MLS television contracts from a time-buy to co-ventures, negotiating five-year broadcasting agreements with ABC, ESPN and Univision that more than doubled the number of national MLS games on the air. He also directed the expansion of the league in 1998, increasing the asset value of the league from $5 million per team to $20 million per team.
Read the rest of this entry »

Comment on this post | Permalink

Deena Kastor Pre-Olympic Trials Teleconference Excerpts

Posted April 18th, 2008 at 3:00 PM by Hariz Siddiqui

Section: News & Results, Marathons, Olympics

The United States Olympic Committee and USA Track & Field on Friday hosted a media teleconference with 2008 U.S. Olympic Team hopeful Deena Kastor (Mammoth Lakes, Calif.) to preview the upcoming 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Trials-Marathon in Boston, Mass., April 20.

Kastor has had a storied career as an American distance runner. In 2006, she became the first American woman to run under two hours and 20 minutes which won her the Flora London Marathon. Her time of 2:19:36 smashed her own American Record of 2:21:16, which she set in London in 2003. Kastor’s time made her the fourth fastest woman ever in the marathon. A year earlier, she barely missed her own American record in the Chicago Marathon with a time of 2:21:25. With the win, she became the first American to win a major marathon since Kristy Johnson 1994.
Read the rest of this entry »

Comment on this post | Permalink

USOC Displays Bad Form in Media Summit

Posted April 18th, 2008 at 10:30 AM by Jimmie R. Markham

Section: News & Results, Track & Field, SoundOFF, Columns, Olympics

I spotted an interview titled “U.S. Olympic Team Media Summit Press Conference” that featured Brian Clay, Walter Davis, Lashinda Demus, Allyson Felix, Reese Hoffa, Carmelita Jeter, LaShawn Merritt and Terrence Trammell and it left me scratching my head for a minute. Since the US Olympic Track & Field team has yet to be determined, I thought this might be an error.

I dug a little further and discovered that the USOC’s media machine is acting a bit presumptuously, billing their 2008 U.S. Olympic Team Media Summit as “a preview of the 2008 U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Teams that will be competing in China.” The USOC member who wrote the article does go on to call the athletes who attended the conference “hopefuls” but, still, it is a bit misleading, to say the least. Sure, all of the athletes who were interviewed are indeed favorites to make the team, but they haven’t made the team yet.
Read the rest of this entry »

One comment, add yours | Permalink

Running USA Taps Susan Weeks as New CEO

Posted March 11th, 2008 at 3:15 PM by David Monti

Section: News & Results

Going outside the running industry for their new chief executive officer, Running USA has hired Susan Weeks, a former assistant executive director of USA Field Hockey. Weeks, 57, lives in Colorado Springs.

Running USA, the trade association which represents the broad scope of businesses which make up the U.S. running industry, began looking for a new executive director last December after previous boss Basil Honikman had announced his retirement. Weeks will be only the second executive director in the organization’s eight-year history.
Read the rest of this entry »

Comment on this post | Permalink

TFS News Briefs: 2/11/08

Posted February 11th, 2008 at 12:00 PM by Jimmie R. Markham

Section: News & Results, Olympics, Drugs In Sports, TFS News Briefs

Shocker! Big Brother Backs Gag Order
Who would have thought it? The Beijing Olympic organizing committee agrees with the British Olympic Committee’s zero-tolerance gag order on political protests. Free speech bad. Big Brother good.
Read more at: [Citizen, South Africa]

Dwain Chambers Controversy Intensifies
British sprinter Dwain Chambers, banned for 2 years for doping but now trying for a comeback, is at the center of a controversy that is forcing UK Athletics (the British governing body for track and field) to make some tough decisions. Should he be allowed back on Team Britain?
Read more at: [Google News]

Team USA Bringing Their Own Food To Beijing
The US Olympic Team, trying to avoid tainted and steroid-laden food frequently found in China, is brining its own caterer with it to Beijing.
Read more at: [NY Times]
Read the rest of this entry »

Comment on this post | Permalink