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Juicy Scandals...
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Friday, 07 March 2014 00:10
By Devon Palmer (palmertri.wordpress.com)
The track and field world was up in arms this weekend over an absurd scandal. Remember our scandal at Ironman Florida where the champion was nearly disqualified over a helmet sticker issue? THIS SCANDAL IS WAY JUICIER!
One of Minnesota’s ass-kicking pro runners, Gabe Grunewald, demolished the women’s 3k. She just jetted away from the field at the finish. Race won by a healthy margin. She was a national champion and headed to the indoor world championships. Cool stuff for us Minnesotans. Another reminder of how great we are relative to Wisconsin and Iowa. You heard me.
Well as you can imagine, when running at high speed on a tight little indoor track there may be jostling. And if you’ve seen the movie Days of Thunder, you know that RUBBING IS RACING (if you’re unfamiliar, take thirty seconds to get familiar by...
watching this). Anyways Alberto Salazar who coaches the fourth place finisher has not seen Days of Thunder and got himself all hot and bothered over some ‘rubbing’. He wanted Gabe disqualified. He filed a protest against her and was shot down by the USATF officials. He then appealed and was thoroughly rebuffed a second time. According to USATF rules that should really have been the end of it. Alberto, apparently off his meds, was still flustered and with a posse of Nike goons he managed to bully the officials into agreeing with him. His third appeal, which should not have happened, got Gabe disqualified. It was a travesty that seemed to fly in the face of USATF’s own protocol. The issue went viral online and the public outcry was heard and it seems Gabe has now been reinstated. You can read a full account here. READ MORE