The Weekend’s Best Matchups
This weekend has two kinds of big matchups: college meets and road races. Here are the ones to watch.
Mo Farah vs Martin Lel
Sunday’s Rock ‘n’ Roll New Orleans Half Marathon has a lot of star power. Farah is the reigning Olympic champ in the 5k and 10k and just won a high-profile 3000 meter race, but also holds the UK record for the half marathon (1:00:23). Lel is a three-time London Marathon champion and a former winner of the IAAF World Half Marathon Championships. While doubt that either one of these two runners have made this race an ‘A’ priority in their training and racing schedules, it should still be a ding-dong battle. Gebre Gebremariam and Markos Geneti are also running and are good enough to upset the two stars.
The women’s race is expected to go to Meseret Defar, the reigning Olympic 5k champion. There are a lot of other big names in the race, though: Americans Shalane Flanagan and Kara Goucher (prepping for the Boston Marathon) and Berhane Adere, a former IAAF World Half Marathon Champion.
Kenyans vs the clock
The Tokyo Marathon has now become part of the World Marathon Majors circuit, and with it comes a significantly improved elite field. Four men with PRs of under 2:05 are in the field, making this by far the best field ever assembled in Japan.
College Conference Championship Weekend
This is the weekend when most conferences have their championship meets, and it’s great. Many are webcast and the Big Ten Championships will be shown on the BTN (tape-delayed, unfortunately). There’s so much good action that I’m not even going to try to break it down for you. Instead, I’ll let the coaches’ association do it.
Everything you need to know is available at the USTFCCCA’s Conference Championship Central page.
The USTFCCCA’s weekly preview highlights the SEC Championships.
I’ll be covering the MAC Championships for HustleBelt.com. Check out my meet preview.
The Big Ten Championships are at a neutral site, the massive indoor complex at the Spire Academy in Geneva, Ohio. Some of the Ohio all-comers’ records (best marks ever made within the state) could tumble. The toughest of those records were set at the long-defunct Cleveland Kinghts of Columbus meets (many of which were held in the old Richfield Coliseum).
Note that no distinction is made between standard (200m) tracks and the state’s four oversized (300m) tracks.
With that caveat, the records:
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