Leor Pantilat and Joelle Vaught Both Win Their Second Way Too Cool 50k
Written by: Bryon Powell
The American ultrarunning season kicked off in earnest this past weekend with the Way Too Cool 50k (WTC) in Cool, California. This race
is the most competitive trail 50k in North America, if not the world.
The start list for this year’s WTC showed a world-class field. Among those toeing the line were Ultrarunning Magazine’s 2009 Ultrarunners of the year Kami Semick and Geoff Roes; a multiple-time American representative at the IAAF Cross Country World Championships, Max King; past Way Too Cool champions, including Leor Pantilat (2009) and Joelle Vaught (2006); and many other laudable trail runners.
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Gender challenge offers $100,000 bonus to winner.
Written by: Sean McKeon
Kenyan Wesley Korir will look to defend his Los Angeles Marathon title this weekend on the all-new “stadium-to-the-sea” course. Korir set a personal best 2:08:24 winning last year, and in the process took home $188,705 for winning both the men’s race and the “gender challenge.
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A fascinating study by exercise physiologist Samuele Marcora has proven that fatigue in endurance is nothing more and nothing less than quitting.
Interview by: Matt Fitzgerald
The design was simple, but the results were profound. Samuele Marcora, an Italian-born exercise physiologist at England’s Bangor University, and his colleague Walter Staiano brought 10 male athletes into their lab and had them perform a simple exercise protocol. Each pedaled on a cycle ergometer as hard as he could for 5 seconds (a test of maximal voluntary cycling power, or MVCP), and his power output was recorded. Then the subjects rode the same bikes as long as they could at a fixed power output level that corresponded to 90 percent of their individual VO2max. Immediately after completing this ride to exhaustion, which ended when the required wattage simply could not be sustained any longer (or approximately 12 minutes, on average), each subject then repeated the 5-second maximum power test.
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Michael Johnson’s world record will be in jeopardy.
Jamaican superstar Usain Bolt has confirmed he will race the seldom contested 300m distance at the Golden Spike meeting in Ostrava this May. Bolt has never raced over that distance but says he does workout over 300m often.
Bolt will certainly have his eyes on the world record of 30.85 set by American Michael Johnson in 2000. Bolt proved he could run over 200m succesfully this Spring when he anchored a 4X400m relay team in a blistering 43.58 at the Gibson Relays in Kingston, Jamaica.
For More: IAAF.org
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Defar set the standing world record at the 2006 Carlsbad 5000. Photo: PhotoRun.net
2009 champions will return to defend their crowns.
Written by: Sean McKeon
Ethiopian great Meseret Defar will look to lower her world record at the 2010 Carlsbad 5000 on April 11th in Carlsbad, Cali. The recently crowned world indoor 3000m champion set her current world record of 14:46 at the 2006 Carlsbad 5000. Defar will square off against 2009 champion Aheza Kiros of Ethiopia. Kiros defeated American Shannon Rowbury 15:38 to 15:41 in 2009.
When asked about racing in Carlsbad again Defar said, “”I have so many great memories of Carlsbad. It will be very special to run there for the 25th anniversary of the race. Everyone knows how fast the course is and if we get a good day it would be great to try and challenge my world record.”
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Why lift weights when you can run against gravity?
Written by: Brad Hudson
One of the signature training methods I use with my runners in the Marathon Performance Training Group are steep hill sprints. These short, maximum-intensity efforts against gravity provide two key benefits. First, they strengthen all of the running muscles, making the runner much less injury-prone. They also increase the power and efficiency of the stride, enabling the runner to cover more ground with each stride with less energy in race circumstances. These are significant benefits from a training method that takes very little time and is fun to do.
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This is the first episode of our new running news show called RunCenter! Each episode will feature the latest in running news, race results, training tips and more! This pilot episode features news from the Rock ‘n’ Roll Mardi Gras Marathon and Half Marathon and interviews with American distance running stars Dathan Ritzenhein and Kara Goucher!
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The short answer is late afternoon—unless you normally run at some other time.
By Mario Fraioli
A couple weeks ago I rolled out of bed on an uneventful Thursday morning and went for an easy 6-mile run from home. I covered my usual out-and-back route in 45 minutes, which seems to be par for the course when I lace up the sneaks before noontime on a weekday. Four days later, in the early evening on Monday, I ran the exact same route at an equally easy effort and the watch read a few ticks over 42 minutes.
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Check out all the best shots from a fun and exciting day in Big D.
Click here to see our photos!
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A big weekend of track and field and running wraps up with impressive an unexpected results.
Written by: Matt Fitzgerald
If any indoor track and field world records were going to be set this weekend, surely they would be set at the IAAF Indoor World Championships in Doha, Qatar, right? Nope. The University of Oregon’s Ashton Eaton set a new world record in the heptathlon Saturday at the NCAA Division I Indoor Track and Field Championships in Fayetteville, Ark. His total of 6,499 points surpassed American Bryan Clay’s previous mark of 6,476 points. It also would have put him well ahead of Clay and another American, Trey Hardee, who captured the gold and silver medals, respectively, in the heptathlon in Doha.
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