Build up to the 2010 European Championships, Barcelona (Steve Colvert qualifies)

thirtyfoot

woodchopper wrote: »

Tingle wrote: »

woodchopper wrote: »

No athlete bar the Big 5 should just be able to walk onto a team on their word as there is nothing to back it up.

Who are the big five that are immune to such decisions? I would consider putting Fagan in the 'big' five but thats just my humble opinion. Is it Gillick, O Rourke, Hession, Lougnanne and Cragg/ Fagan/Rob. I dont think you fully understand the competitveness of long distance running, its a lot tougher than race walking a European athlete orinentated event. This is not to demean the event but lets have transparency in this discussion, again slightly off topic. In any case no athlete should be treated any differently whether they are a medal favourite or an athlete who just scraped past the qualifying time. Democracy is a key cornerstone to any successfully run organisation something we can all agree upon.

The Big 5 (as I have already pointed out earlier) would be the five who have performed at recent Global champs - Gillick, O' Rourke, Hession, Loughnane and Heffernan. They have all finished top 10 at a global champs in the past two years, either Olympic Games or Worlds, they have walked the walk and we should do all we can to accomodate these. They should be treated differently as they are our medal hopes based on their championship records and not on hunches from people on internet forums. We have scant resources (not just money), maybe we should put more focus and support the top half dozen of athletes (at senior level) instead of spreading too much. Euros could be different as I have said as its a stepping stone so yes maybe send all who qualify to that. But at global champs it could be an idea to have stricter and tighter controls, ie, get the A standard only, get it more than once in events that are frequently contested.

You say treat all athletes the same. Fair enough, on that point Fagan should have to prove his fitness like all the other athletes and we don't know whether he has done that or not or how he was asked to do that. I'm not sure if anyone here knows what he has done to prove that. Is taking his word enough? Maybe it is, I don't know.

thirtyfoot

stmochtas wrote: »

http://www.rmssports.com/results/10crazy8.txt

Is 23:34 for an 8k proof of form or fitness? I'll defer to the experts to confirm;)

ecoli

Tingle wrote: »

woodchopper wrote: »

Tingle wrote: »

The Big 5 (as I have already pointed out earlier) would be the five who have performed at recent Global champs - Gillick, O' Rourke, Hession, Loughnane and Heffernan. They have all finished top 10 at a global champs in the past two years, either Olympic Games or Worlds, they have walked the walk and we should do all we can to accomodate these. They should be treated differently as they are our medal hopes based on their championship records and not on hunches from people on internet forums. We have scant resources (not just money), maybe we should put more focus and support the top half dozen of athletes (at senior level) instead of spreading too much. Euros could be different as I have said as its a stepping stone so yes maybe send all who qualify to that. But at global champs it could be an idea to have stricter and tighter controls, ie, get the A standard only, get it more than once in events that are frequently contested.

You say treat all athletes the same. Fair enough, on that point Fagan should have to prove his fitness like all the other athletes and we don't know whether he has done that or not or how he was asked to do that. I'm not sure if anyone here knows what he has done to prove that. Is taking his word enough? Maybe it is, I don't know.

I think to compare marathon prep with others is not possble as it is a different kettle of fish to say sprints in which races bring your sharpness marathon usually one shot which i feel is why recent fitness for a marathon runner should take into account a few months rather than weeks out performances into consideration. The weekend showed what shape he is in so i suppose now all we can do is wait and see whether that is good enough for the selectors

ecoli

Tingle wrote: »

Is 23:34 for an 8k proof of form or fitness? I'll defer to the experts to confirm;)

Not the greatest performance of his but given short distance little hard to gauge. Would have been enough to be top 2 in the 10k at nationals so surely warrants place esp considering he is in marathon training so not training specific for the shorter distances personally i think he is in the shape to do damage if he gets a chance

3a

runjb wrote: »

Brian Murphy running a 47.24 in the 400m too.

Very impressive run by McCarthy, that's a big PB and show's he's in the form of his life for Barca! I thought Chamney might crack a 1.45 tonight but still a decent enough time for him.

With Kallur gone it certainly opens up things a bit more, Derval should be confident going into these champs now. A decent 12.96 tonight will help her on, something similar to what she ran before berlin last year.

Nytra 12'5, Dekteryeva 12'6, Yanit Nevin 12'7's, Other random Russian 12'7, Vukiceivic 12'7, Eline Berrings 12'8 (barely windy), Derval O'Rourke (Barely windy) 12'8....It's going to be a TIGHT race, which I'm praying Derval wins. Between the Russians and the Turk...there's a lot of cause for concern- and I hope the testers are on the mark. :pac:

thirtyfoot

ecoli wrote: »

Not the greatest performance of his but given short distance little hard to gauge. Would have been enough to be top 2 in the 10k at nationals so surely warrants place esp considering he is in marathon training so not training specific for the shorter distances personally i think he is in the shape to do damage if he gets a chance

So reasonable shape then so worth taking a punt on.

Who are the main guys for the marathon in Barcalona (looking for sneaky tips for my last slot of fantasy draft (or women for that matter)!!)

3a

Rineanna wrote: »

A PB, I think.

I will never understand why McCarthy runs the 800m.

He was the Schools 80m hurdles champion (ahead of Gillick) for 2 years in a row, Junior and Intermediate - I remember because I was 3rd in both

Then he turned to the 400m and was 5th in the world Indoors as did Gillick....

Surely, if you have a Hurdles past and are a strong 400m runner you'd turn to the 400m Hurdles....? An event that has a horrific standard in Europe (1 person sub 49 seconds this year) and presents far less competition than the 800m which on the world stage also throws up a dozen AFricans.


I'd Love Gillick to move to the hurdles too, but in all honesty - he should have started there IMHO.

drrunner

3a wrote: »

Nytra 12'5, Dekteryeva 12'6, Yanit Nevin 12'7's, Other random Russian 12'7, Vukiceivic 12'7, Eline Berrings 12'8 (barely windy), Derval O'Rourke (Barely windy) 12'8....It's going to be a TIGHT race, which I'm praying Derval wins. Between the Russians and the Turk...there's a lot of cause for concern- and I hope the testers are on the mark. :pac:

Nytra and Yanit will be the main opposition I think in Barcelona - Russians typically don't bring fast times in to Championships for whatever reasons (!!!). It promises to be good!!!

woodchopper

Tingle wrote: »

So reasonable shape then so worth taking a punt on.

Who are the main guys for the marathon in Barcalona (looking for sneaky tips for my last slot of fantasy draft (or women for that matter)!!)

Any athlete whose athletic federation treats the marathon with the respect it deserves has a good chance as the heat will make the race a lottery. In other news Paula Radcliffe has been told that in order to run the Olympic marathon in London she must first run a meaningless road race two weeks prior to the event or else she wont be picked for the Games. One would have thought that only AAI would apply such silly criteria.

shels4ever

woodchopper wrote: »

Any athlete whose athletic federation treats the marathon with the respect it deserves has a good chance as the heat will make the race a lottery. In other news Paula Radcliffe has been told that in order to run the Olympic marathon in London she must first run a meaningless road race two weeks prior to the event or else she wont be picked for the Games. One would have thought that only AAI would apply such silly criteria.

I think it should be any federation who has quality marathon runners..... The irish standard is not quite there yet.

woodchopper

I know its a big if but if Fagan is fit he can beat anyone including Baldini.

ecoli

shels4ever wrote: »

I think it should be any federation who has quality marathon runners..... The irish standard is not quite there yet.

In depth know but i do believe that we have some quality runners in terms of individuals with regards to European level i mean after all we do have the top 2 european times of the year in Half marathon in Europe this year.
Tingle:Regarding favs dunno if he is running but if he is i would say Viktor Rothlin but would have to check to see is he listed to run

Clum

Tingle wrote: »

So reasonable shape then so worth taking a punt on.

Who are the main guys for the marathon in Barcalona (looking for sneaky tips for my last slot of fantasy draft (or women for that matter)!!)

Dmytro Baranovskyy from the Ukraine seems to be most people's favorite but that's probably because he's posted the fastest marathon time by a European in the last two years. European Championship marathons are normally handy enough pace wise (no young east Africans running 4.40 miles from the gun) so they suit a good 10,000m runner. I'd say it'll be won somewhere around 2.12 and there are plenty of Europeans capable of that so it's very open. Being Barcelona you can't rule out a Spanish win.

Fagan wasn't happy with his 8k time on the weekend but says he's feeling good (injury wise). He has second fastest half marathon time by a European this year and fastest in Europe from last year so if all went well he'd be in with a shout. He's definitely capable of 2.10 (if he had a perfect day he'd do a 2.08 but that won't happen in Barcelona).

His weakness is that he's a front runner and he'd push the pace. Not something he needs to do when coming back from injury. I like that style of running but it's tough to be successful running like that.

shels4ever

ecoli wrote: »

In depth know but i do believe that we have some quality runners in terms of individuals with regards to European level i mean after all we do have the top 2 european times of the year in Half marathon in Europe this year.
Tingle:Regarding favs dunno if he is running but if he is i would say Viktor Rothlin but would have to check to see is he listed to run

Yep but there is no reason why we shouldnt have more sub 2:15 even sub 2:20 runners. I know there is a group working on that now which is good.

In regards to the half marathon v's marathon times these don't always translate ask Tadese....

Goofy

drrunner wrote: »

Brilliant run by David McCarthy. Puts him 10th on the all time list I believe. Hopefully he can convert this into some kind of championship form (which will in all probability entail him having to be able to sit tight and kick in the heats). However, it still leaves the selection question unanswered - what injury prevented him from competing in Nationals last weekend? And if he was not injured, how come he was selected? I only pursue this given other selection controversies which are raging. If there is to be a policy around participation in Nationals, it should be applied universally. There are some serious questions around this policy which remain unanswered and until they are satisfactorily answered, the system can only be assumed to be non-transparent. But good luck to Mr McCarthy in Barcelona....

His wife was in labour.

Pisco Sour

I received a reply to me email today from the AAI. I'm prepared to let it go now and the below gives a pretty reasonable explanation.

Hi

I deliberately held off on replying to your email re Martin Fagan until after our Selectors meeting last night to finalise team for Barcelona.

Martin Fagan did indeed compete in our National 10 k Championships in April.. A couple of weeks later he was selected by us to compete in the Marathon in Barcelona. However early this month he indicated to us that he no longer wished to run the Marathon in Barcelona but would run the 10,000 mts for which he had the qualifying time.

The selectors unanimously decided not to pick Martin as he had neither competed in the National Track Championships or showed any form on the track this summer over any distance.
Hope this clarifies any concerns you may have had about this.

Kind Regards
Ray Flynn
Chairman High Performance Committee
Athletics Ireland

thirtyfoot

Goofy wrote: »

His wife was in labour.

Pretty valid reason in all fairness!!!! And then he runs a 1:46, nice:cool:

IrishTrackFan1

04072511 wrote: »

I received a reply to me email today from the AAI. I'm prepared to let it go now and the below gives a pretty reasonable explanation.

Hi

I deliberately held off on replying to your email re Martin Fagan until after our Selectors meeting last night to finalise team for Barcelona.

Martin Fagan did indeed compete in our National 10 k Championships in April.. A couple of weeks later he was selected by us to compete in the Marathon in Barcelona. However early this month he indicated to us that he no longer wished to run the Marathon in Barcelona but would run the 10,000 mts for which he had the qualifying time.

The selectors unanimously decided not to pick Martin as he had neither competed in the National Track Championships or showed any form on the track this summer over any distance.
Hope this clarifies any concerns you may have had about this.

Kind Regards
Ray Flynn
Chairman High Performance Committee
Athletics Ireland

Well that's fair enough in my book.

thirtyfoot

04072511 wrote: »

I received a reply to me email today from the AAI. I'm prepared to let it go now and the below gives a pretty reasonable explanation.

Hi

I deliberately held off on replying to your email re Martin Fagan until after our Selectors meeting last night to finalise team for Barcelona.

Martin Fagan did indeed compete in our National 10 k Championships in April.. A couple of weeks later he was selected by us to compete in the Marathon in Barcelona. However early this month he indicated to us that he no longer wished to run the Marathon in Barcelona but would run the 10,000 mts for which he had the qualifying time.

The selectors unanimously decided not to pick Martin as he had neither competed in the National Track Championships or showed any form on the track this summer over any distance.
Hope this clarifies any concerns you may have had about this.

Kind Regards
Ray Flynn
Chairman High Performance Committee
Athletics Ireland

Fair play to you for sending the mail, goes to show it is the best way to get the truth (or one side of it anyway) in these things.

It does clarify things and the fact he was going for the 10,000 surely means he could have come home and raced at Nationals from a preparation perspective (or am I still a pleb sprinter and reading that wrong?). I find it very strange and disappointing that he didn't. He would have been a contender but it looks like he won't be in Barcalona now for definite.

letsbefriends

Tingle wrote: »

Pretty valid reason in all fairness!!!! And then he runs a 1:46, nice:cool:

his wife gave birth on wednesday before nationals in fairness...so she wasnt in labour

Pisco Sour

Just a week to go until the Championships and it doesn't seem to be capturing the imagination of the Irish public.

I'll give a specific example.

The other day when I told somebody I was going to Barcelona for a few days...

Other person: Oh cool, why are you heading to Barcelona?
Me: I'm heading over for the European Athletics Championships
Other person: Oh nice, are you competing?

:eek::eek:

thirtyfoot

letsbefriends wrote: »

his wife gave birth on wednesday before nationals in fairness...so she wasnt in labour

Still, I'd give him the benefit of the doubt and he backed it up at the weekend.

You will see it regularly even in professional sport where fathers are given leave of absence.

Pisco Sour

Will Rob be doing the 20k or 50k walk? He's actually ranked higher in Europe in the 50 than he is in the 20 (3rd as opposed to 7th)

Teej

Did anyone see an announcement of final team today? Thought final team was to be confirmed.

AAI's twitter page has Colin Griffin boarding plane to pre champ training camp so I guess that means he's now competing? (finally I've seen the benefit of tweets)

Fagan decision seems reasonable-I had jumped to assumption he was going for marathon primarily without checking it out

cickimc

04072511 wrote: »

Will Rob be doing the 20k or 50k walk? He's actually ranked higher in Europe in the 50 than he is in the 20 (3rd as opposed to 7th)

I'd assuming hes doing the 20k. The 50k seems to be a more long term look as it takes a long while to develop the endurance needed maybe hes looking at the 50k for London or even double up in them in 2012 if in good health, very possible. To be honest I think he could medal in the 50k in 2012

Anyway for Barca great news on Colin Griffen would be madness leaving him out!

drrunner

Tingle wrote: »

Fair play to you for sending the mail, goes to show it is the best way to get the truth (or one side of it anyway) in these things.

It does clarify things and the fact he was going for the 10,000 surely means he could have come home and raced at Nationals from a preparation perspective (or am I still a pleb sprinter and reading that wrong?). I find it very strange and disappointing that he didn't. He would have been a contender but it looks like he won't be in Barcalona now for definite.

+1 on the sentiments. Also, fair play to Ray Flynn for getting back on the issue (only slightly mitigated by the fact that it will have been somewhat motivated by the public (kind of) knowledge of the enquiry i.e. members of the AAI HP Dept. are watching this forum and in fact in some cases are registered members....:)).

The outstanding unanswered questions on the subject really revolve around the communication process (on both sides) - but in particular, was the decision that Fagan would not be selected made clear to him adequately in advance of his being able to potentially make plans and modify his training in accordance with the requirement to show fitness for his selected event? I don't know what the answer to this is, but do believe it is fundamental to the issue given recent lack of precedent in enforcing the requirement to compete in Nationals.

Re McCarthy, clearly there is validity to his reasons for non-competing in Nationals (although no doubt there will be some difference in opinion in that, but that's just down to personal opinion) - again the question comes down to the communication process. Given the various selection discussions ongoing, a clear communication that he had been unable to compete in Nationals for personal reasons would be common (and in fact given the happy nature of the personal reasons, it could have in fact been explained if he himself was OK with that). The vacuum in information leads to the speculation often (and it is interesting to note that he was defended on the basis of his wife being in labour when it appears that this in itself was not factually correct - repeating myself now, but lack of communication once more leading to ambiguity).

longjump67

drrunner wrote: »

+1 on the sentiments. Also, fair play to Ray Flynn for getting back on the issue (only slightly mitigated by the fact that it will have been somewhat motivated by the public (kind of) knowledge of the enquiry i.e. members of the AAI HP Dept. are watching this forum and in fact in some cases are registered members....:)).

The outstanding unanswered questions on the subject really revolve around the communication process (on both sides) - but in particular, was the decision that Fagan would not be selected made clear to him adequately in advance of his being able to potentially make plans and modify his training in accordance with the requirement to show fitness for his selected event? I don't know what the answer to this is, but do believe it is fundamental to the issue given recent lack of precedent in enforcing the requirement to compete in Nationals.

Re McCarthy, clearly there is validity to his reasons for non-competing in Nationals (although no doubt there will be some difference in opinion in that, but that's just down to personal opinion) - again the question comes down to the communication process. Given the various selection discussions ongoing, a clear communication that he had been unable to compete in Nationals for personal reasons would be common (and in fact given the happy nature of the personal reasons, it could have in fact been explained if he himself was OK with that). The vacuum in information leads to the speculation often (and it is interesting to note that he was defended on the basis of his wife being in labour when it appears that this in itself was not factually correct - repeating myself now, but lack of communication once more leading to ambiguity).

Would totally agree with your sentiments :)
Communiction is vital between federation, athlete and the general public to avoid mistrust

thirtyfoot

drrunner wrote: »

The outstanding unanswered questions on the subject really revolve around the communication process (on both sides) - but in particular, was the decision that Fagan would not be selected made clear to him adequately in advance of his being able to potentially make plans and modify his training in accordance with the requirement to show fitness for his selected event? I don't know what the answer to this is, but do believe it is fundamental to the issue given recent lack of precedent in enforcing the requirement to compete in Nationals..

Ah come on, what more can they do. They select him for an event, he turns it down and wishes to get selected for another event. If he wasn't aware he had to then run in Nationals and somehow justify his selection then he was very irresponsible. Would Gillick or Loughnanr make a mistake like that, not a chance. He should know the rules. The main open questions are why the athlete switched and then didn't come home to confirm his selection. Surely someone in his club or connected to him would have also known the state of play and said hey listen just come home and race even as a training session and you will probably get selected. Maybe he thought he wouldn't need to and would get away with it.

One thing I would do on the annoucement of teams is do what the IRFU do and announce that say Colin Griffin is pending selection on confirmation of his injury or that Eileen wasn't considered due to injury or Fagan declined the marathon slot. Not that the public really give a toss as nobody knows Fagan but it would keep us lot happy.

shels4ever

04072511 wrote: »

I received a reply to me email today from the AAI. I'm prepared to let it go now and the below gives a pretty reasonable explanation.

Hi

I deliberately held off on replying to your email re Martin Fagan until after our Selectors meeting last night to finalise team for Barcelona.

Martin Fagan did indeed compete in our National 10 k Championships in April.. A couple of weeks later he was selected by us to compete in the Marathon in Barcelona. However early this month he indicated to us that he no longer wished to run the Marathon in Barcelona but would run the 10,000 mts for which he had the qualifying time.

The selectors unanimously decided not to pick Martin as he had neither competed in the National Track Championships or showed any form on the track this summer over any distance.
Hope this clarifies any concerns you may have had about this.

Kind Regards
Ray Flynn
Chairman High Performance Committee
Athletics Ireland

Thanks for posting, guess they are not muppets

thirtyfoot

One other thing and it probably compounded the Fagan situation and that is the relationship or lack of between the elite athletes and the HP setup. Our world class athletes try surround themselves with world class support and right now it remains to be seen if that exists in HP, maybe I am harsh and maybe it does.