Coe announces for IAAF presidency

Sebastian Coe, the two-time Olympic 1980s middle-distance champion who oversaw the hugely successful 2012 London Summer Games and has been an IAAF vice president for the past seven years, early Thursday announced he intends to run for the IAAF presidency. Coe, 58, is widely believed to be the front-runner in what is expected to be a two-man race with Ukraine’s Sergey Bubka, the former pole vault star who is also an IAAF vice president and, as well, a member of the International Olympic Committee’s policy-making executive board.

"As I speak to friends and colleagues around our great sport I appreciate that we are entering a very important time for athletics," the term for track and field in wide use everywhere but the United States, "and that it is the right time to open up a discussion about the future," Coe said in a statement issued from London.

It went on: "That discussion needs to focus on how we build on the many achievements of recent years, recognize that we have new challenges in a new era and how we can tackle those challenges with vision and ambition. I believe I have something to offer to that debate and it is why I am today officially announcing my candidacy for the presidency of the IAAF."

Bubka, who has spent months quietly traveling the world, has yet to formally declare for the presidency. He is expected to do so in the coming weeks. Those close to Bubka say he connects to potential voters on a personal level and insist the race — with many months yet to go — is far from a done deal.

The election to succeed Lamine Diack of Senegal, IAAF president since 1999, is due to take place next Aug. 19 in Beijing.

Track and field sees more than 210 nations participating; its every-other-year world championships are the third-biggest spectacle in world sports, after the Summer Games and FIFA’s World Cup; when track is on at the Olympics, it is, Diack declared last week at the IAAF gala in Monaco, the “soul” and the “heart” of the Games.

Diack, 81, also said, “I soon will be transmitting my stick to somebody who will be able to carry it even better than me.”

Bubka, who will turn 51 in early December, is the 1988 gold medalist in the pole vault; he set 35 world records in the event. He has been active in sports politics for years, with the IOC for instance as a member of the athletes’ commission since 2000; he has been president of the Ukraine national Olympic committee since 2005.

Last year, Bubka ran unsuccessfully for IOC president, making it through to a second round reduced to five candidates but there coming in with the fewest number of votes, four, that saw Germany’s Thomas Bach get 49, enough to get elected.

Coe won the 1500 meters in both the 1980 Moscow and 1984 Los Angeles Games; he took silver in the 800 at both Olympics. He was a member of the British Parliament for five years; private secretary to William Hague, leader of the opposition, from 1997-2001; and in 2004 took over from businesswoman Barbara Cassani the London 2012 bid, seeing it in 2005 to victory over Paris.

In Monaco last week, Coe wrapped up service as head of the IAAF evaluation commission that saw Doha elected site of the 2019 world championships, over Eugene, Oregon, and Barcelona. In a first round of voting, Barcelona was eliminated; in the second round, Doha prevailed over Eugene, 15-12.

Next week, back in Monaco, the IOC meets to vote on Bach’s wide-ranging Agenda 2020 review and potential reform package.

It was far from clear that either Coe or Bubka was willing to seize the time this week — between the IAAF’s meeting in Monaco and the IOC’s assembly there in just a few days — to go public with a presidential declaration.

Tactically, Coe has thrown in, and now it seems obvious why: he is seeking not only to carry forward the momentum from the IAAF’s -- exceedingly positive -- time in Monaco but is bidding at the outset to set the agenda in the presidential campaign.

Beyond the statement, Coe also gave an interview published Thursday in the leading French daily L'Equipe.

In his statement, Coe also said, “Throughout all my sporting roles I have always put the interest of athletics first and been independent enough to do the right thing for our sport. This will be my approach in the campaign and, in full partnership with the member federations, it will be the cornerstone of my presidency if granted the great honor of being elected IAAF president.

“I will set out my detailed proposals for athletics and the IAAF when I publish my manifesto,” giving no indication when that might be.

“It will highlight the importance of our sport embracing innovation and change as we move forward. I want us to have a renewed focus on engagement with young people and a real understanding of the global landscape that is shaping the next generation of athletes and fans.

"If we are guided by these principles as we review and reform our sport then I am convinced that athletics can enter a new era with confidence and ensure a bright and exciting future."

Track and field: 'soul' and 'heart' of the Games

MONACO — It was 15 years ago Wednesday that Senegal’s Lamine Diack took over as president of the IAAF, the international track and field federation, just 12 days after the death of Italy’s Primo Nebiolo. Diack is now 81, and here Friday he grew reflective looking both back and out at the last few months of his presidency, due to end next August. “We must never relax, be relaxed,” he said, “about our place in the world of sport.”

In a speech immediately preceding the announcement to the press of the IAAF’s athlete of the year awards, won by New Zealand shot-putter Valerie Adams and French pole-vaulter Renaud Lavillenie, Diack said it was a “pleasure” to celebrate both so that they, and like-minded others, “can continue to fight for our values.”

Track and field, he said, is “helping to shape” the International Olympic Committee’s “Agenda 2020” potential reform project. At the same time, he made clear, track “is the soul” of the Games and while new sports “may be coming and so on, athletics,” using the word in wide use outside the United States for track and field, is not just the soul but also “the heart” of the Games.

In all, Diack's remarks marked the sort of valedictory one might have expected come next August in Beijing, upon the occasion of both the 2015 world championships, when the vote to succeed him will take place. The vote is Aug. 19; the meet itself runs Aug. 22-30.

Britain’s Sebastian Coe and Ukraine’s Sergey Bubka are expected to vie for the presidency. Neither has publicly declared.

Diack’s comments Friday turned into a reminder of how track and field’s leaders see the sport as the undisputed No. 1 Olympic event, combined with a pointed political rejoinder — conflated with the selection of both Adams and Lavillenie — of the import not just of track but of field as well, and of two marquee athletes widely believed to be doping-free.

In a year in which the U.S. sprinter Justin Gatlin — who has been busted twice for doping — dominated the sprints and was included in the initial nominations for athlete of the year, which caused considerable controversy within track circles, Adams and Lavillenie stand, for many, as portraits of The Anti-Gatlin.

Adams becomes the first female thrower to win athlete of the year, Lavillenie the first male pole vaulter.

Not even Bubka won the award, which was established in 1988.

Beyond the drama sparked by someone like Gatlin, a year like 2014 makes for an intriguing set piece for end-of-year awards. Usain Bolt did not run, or at least much. There were no outdoor world championships and no Olympic Games. Different athletes, from wherever in the world, can find themselves working on different things — witness decathlon champion Ashton Eaton’s foray into the 400-meter hurdles.

Lavillenie, in mid-February, jumping in Donetsk, Ukraine, before an audience that included Bubka, broke Bubka’s 21-year-old world-record in the vault. The old mark: 6.15 meters, 20 feet-2 1/4 inches. The new: 6.16, 20-2 1/2.

“Everything came faster than I planned,” he said of breaking Bubka’s record, explaining that he “was more for maybe breaking it in 2015 or ’16.”

He went on, “This is the beauty of sport. You can’t plan everything. It was really amazing for me.”

Lavillenie is of course the 2012 Olympic champion. He had only one blemish on his 2014 season — he no-heighted at the Diamond League meet in Stockholm, meaning he lost in but one of 22 outings. "This," he said, "is not bad."

Adams is, right now, like the U.S. baseball star Joe DiMaggio. She has not lost in 56 straight meets.

Over the past two years, she has undergone four surgeries. She came to Monaco nursing the effects of work on a shoulder and an elbow, looking out not just toward 2015 but to Rio and the 2016 Olympics and the 2018 Commonwealth Games in Australia.

“It takes lots of guts, four operations, lots of pain, lots of suffering, but if you have the passion firing, it makes the difference,” she said, adding, “When you want to do something, it becomes easier for you.”

Adams is now 30. She also said, “I’m not 21 anymore. I have to manage these things. I have that fighting fire within me. I’m mentally strong and my pain threshold is high.”

Adams has long been an outspoken advocate for competing clean, and in an event marked by notorious episodes of doping. She has two Olympic golds, in 2008 and 2012; four outdoor world titles; and three world indoor golds.

“The only drugs I’m on is some kiwi fruit, some lamb from New Zealand and some cows,” she quipped. “And good genes.”

As an example: one of her many brothers, Steven, was a 2013 first-round draft pick by the Oklahoma City Thunder; he is currently averaging 8.1 points and 6.8 rebounds per game.

She also is an extraordinarily proud New Zealander, saying Friday, “We have four million people and 16 million sheep. Go Kiwis!”

Make no mistake: a focus of the IOC’s Agenda 2020 plan is a shift in the Olympic program from sports to events. The idea is to try to get new events in such as surfing, skateboarding, climbing. To do that, though, while keeping within the IOC’s self-proclaimed cap of 10,500 athletes is going to mean that cuts are going to have to come from somewhere, and that means track and field is going to be approached.

Race walking? For all those who consider it goofy: look at the diverse range of countries that have won medals or competed for real in just the past few editions of the Games, especially in the women's events; isn't the IOC purportedly big on universality? Was it mere coincidence that among the IAAF's Hall of Fame inductees Friday was the Polish race-walking star Robert Korzeniowski, winner of four Olympic gold medals and, at the world championships, three golds and a bronze?

Hammer throw? What about tradition and history? In the Summer Games since 1900? What about IOC activist Koji Murofushi of Japan, the 2004 Athens gold medalist?

Shot put? Especially the women’s shot? Adams is in every regard a deserving IAAF athlete of the year winner in 2014. She was nominated for the same award in 2013, when the Jamaican sprinter Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce prevailed.

Again, looking toward the IOC’s vote on Agenda 2020 back here in Monaco in just two weeks, what  -- if anything -- is to be read into the selection of Valerie Adams as your 2014 IAAF female athlete of the year?

“It’s always difficult to compete against the glamor events on the track,” Adams said, adding of the throwers, “We train just as hard as everyone else,” and, “It’s not just a track event, it’s a track and field event.”

Diack may be 81 but many over the years have foundered in underestimating his political skill and resolve. Just moments before, he had said, “I always knew there were many challenges and many things to do.

“I am happy to say that I still have nine months to go. In the past I was counting years. Now I am even counting days. I soon will be transmitting my stick to somebody who will be able to carry it even better than me. This evening’s gala,” referring to the formal announcement of the winners, “must be beautiful for all those who love our sport.

“…This,” he said, “is what I wanted to say.”

When a two-vote loss is reason for optimism

MONACO — No, Eugene did not win the 2019 track and field world championships. That it came within a swing of two votes, however — losing in the second round of voting to Doha, 15-12 — has to be seen as an encouraging sign on multiple fronts for U.S. interests, and in particular for USA Track & Field and the U.S. Olympic Committee.

For years, U.S. bids have been the undisputed losers in international campaigns. In 2005, New York went down hard for the 2012 Summer Olympic Games campaign, won by London. In 2009, Chicago went out in the first round for the 2016 Summer Games, won by Rio de Janeiro.

Since 2010, the USOC, headed by chairman Larry Probst and chief executive Scott Blackmun, has assiduously worked at relationship building.

To be clear, there have since been some wins — for instance, the world weightlifting championships next year will be in Houston.

Even so, the question on the table here Tuesday, clear, plain, unequivocal, front and center was whether the IAAF, track and field’s international governing body, would become the first of the major sports federation to embrace anew the United States.

The answer: no.

But, unlike the Chicago or New York votes, the IAAF outcome is no cause for downer cows to start moaning across the United States sports scene.

Or for critics outside the U.S. to regard the Americans, yet again, as losers or arrogant imperialists who got deserved comeuppance.

Instead, it is reason — genuinely — for optimism for those seeking to see the U.S., which has long supported the Olympic movement financially, assume a more leading role politically and institutionally as well.

First: inevitably, Doha’s victory for 2019 will fuel speculation about a Qatar bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics.

Reality check: the laundry list of so-called “20+20” Agenda 20 reforms championed by International Olympic Committee president Thomas Bach and made public Tuesday includes a commitment to non-discrimination on sexual orientation. Homosexuality is illegal in Qatar.

The USOC is strongly considering a 2024 Summer Games bid. Los Angeles, San Francisco, Washington and Boston are under consideration.

In the meantime, that Eugene, a city of 157,000 in the faraway Pacific Northwest, could come within two votes, and on its first campaign … should not be underestimated.

Given that result, 2024 for the United States has to be looking even more tantalizing.

How could Eugene-minus-two have happened?

When just the week before the smart money was that Eugene was looking at maybe as few as five votes in the first round and Barcelona, which also was in the mix for 2019, might have a better chance with track’s Europe-centric voters, anyway?

In the first round of voting Tuesday, Doha got 12 votes, Eugene nine, Barcelona six.

Again, how?

The Eugene bid had a powerful message: now was the time and we are together.

This could only have resonated so powerfully for one reason: it was true.

The USOC and USATF, along with local organizers in Eugene, led by the passionate Vin Lananna, worked together in support of the Oregon bid. It was clear the University of Oregon foundation was in for the big dollars. The state government, too, was fully on board.

Both the 2005 and 2009 U.S. Olympic bids were marked by considerable friction at any number of levels — local, state, national, public, private.

How did Doha overcome this concerted effort by the Americans?

It is abundantly obvious that Doha has both resource and ambition. It is the case in journalism school that they teach you to follow the money, and that aspect of the Doha bid is not to be underestimated.

Even so, there has been no hint of corruption in its bid. It should be noted that Sebastian Coe, the London 2012 Summer Games organizing chairman, oversaw the formal IAAF evaluation of all three bids. Does it seem likely that Coe would permit this 2019 process to be pervaded by corruption?

Now, did Doha promise five-star hotels? Yes. Are there at issue sponsorship millions? Absolutely. Is all that legitimate? Certainly.

Three years ago, Doha lost — to London — for the 2017 IAAF worlds, by a 16-10 vote. It refined its bid and came back for a second try, promising, among other things, a 100-meter video board at the stadium, night marathons and a late September-early October schedule.

In some circles, there is concern that the late-season 2019 schedule will run afoul of European soccer as well as NFL viewing, and interfere with athlete training for the Tokyo 2020 Games.

Then again, the new IAAF president — whoever it will be after the election next August to succeed longtime president Lamine Diack — can now likely go to European TV interests and say, OK, now I can offer you London 2017 and Doha 2019, and both will work well in European time zones, so, you know, let’s say we talk.

Also, track and field is one of the few sports, if not the only, in which the world championships are followed by more events. Are there more NFL football games, for instance, after the Super Bowl? So having the 2019 worlds at the end of the season will, finally, logically mark the end of the season.

In international sports politics, it can typically prove key to come back with an enhanced second bid. In essence, Doha started with a 10-vote head start.

Because it was a secret ballot, the machinations of the second round may forever be unknown, despite the best efforts of all involved to figure out whose votes in the first round went where in the second, particularly the six first-round Barcelona votes.

It is what it is.

This, too — USATF emerged here as a real force on the scene, with chief executive Max Siegel and board chairwoman Stephanie Hightower, who played key roles in the campaign, significantly enhancing their profiles.

Both got credit from insiders where credit is due: Siegel for being the sharp executive he was hired two-plus years ago to be, Hightower for giving him room to run the business that USATF has to be.

Of course, track and field is a sport. But USATF is also a real business.

Since 2011, USATF has achieved a 79 percent increase in revenue — from $19 million to $34 million.

Since 2011, it has grown its net assets, cash and investments, by 472 percent — from $3.6 million to a projected $17 million by the end of 2014.

In a couple weeks, at USATF’s annual meeting in Anaheim, California, the federation is due to announce two more new sponsors.

Where is all that money going? Just one indicator among many: USATF spent more than $11 million in sport-performance dollars in 2014.

“We have been undertaking a fundamental change of our corporate culture and business model from the national office perspective,” Siegel said.

“At times people have felt that as CEO I should be more in a media spotlight, but my view of a CEO, as an organization’s top business executive, is to execute our business in the most effective way possible.

“It is my job to bring in the revenues that fund the programs that grow our sport, from grass roots to professional athletes to masters athletes. Without the funds, and without the business, the programs and the sport don’t grow.

“We are now at a point that our efforts and results are speaking for themselves. Now that we have a track record of success, we are in a position to talk about what we can do, together as an organization, including our constituent groups, committees, officials, coaches and volunteers. As much as we have done, we have far more to accomplish and much more growth ahead of us.”

For her part, Hightower said, “… Because we have allowed [Siegel] to do business in the way that is most effective, our financial growth has been phenomenal. As we have grown, we have had several moments where it is clear that our governance has not fully ‘caught up’ with the change and growth of the Olympic movement in general,” an acknowledgment that governance change is assuredly the next step awaiting USATF.

To that end, she continued, “The USOC has set an example for effective governance that manages the more traditional, ‘amateur’ aspects of Olympic sport while enabling the business side of the sport to thrive. We have substantial progress yet to make to make ourselves more efficient and to better ensure that our constituents, staff and board all are contributing in the most effective ways possible.”

From the heart, Doha wins for 2019

MONACO — Qatar’s Mutaz Essa Barshim is just 23, a bronze medalist in the men's high jump at the London 2012 Olympics, silver medalist in the event at the 2013 world championships, gold medalist at the 2014 world indoor championships. Speaking here Tuesday with real passion and soul to the 27 members of the ruling council of international track and field’s governing body, the IAAF, Barshim said, on behalf of Doha’s bid for the 2019 world championships, “Are you willing to expand the sport that we love?”

Doha had it all Tuesday: facilities, resource, ambition, the advantage of coming back humbled after losing to London for 2017. With Eugene, Oregon, pressing hard, plainly presenting for one and all the question that dared to be asked — was the IAAF willing to entertain the notion of going, finally, to the United States — Doha played the trump card.

Mutaz Essa Barshim.

The IAAF awarded its 2019 championships to Doha in a close vote, the Qatari capital winning over Eugene in a second round of voting, 15-12.

In a first round, Doha had gotten 12 votes, Eugene nine. The third city in the mix, Barcelona, got six votes and was eliminated.

It is entirely typical in bid contests, whether for the Olympic Games or otherwise, for bid cities to put celebrity athletes front and center to troll for votes. Usually, these athletes read from cue cards or look uncomfortable and the whole thing seems forced and weird.

When it works, however, it really works.

Three years ago, for instance, the Pyeongchang 2018 Winter Games bid committee relied on Toby Dawson, the U.S. skier who had been born in Korea, then adopted by an American family. His heartwarming story tugged at emotions as Pyeongchang rolled to a landslide victory.

On Tuesday, the U.S. sprinter Allyson Felix was — as always — elegant in advancing Eugene’s case. Giving of her time on her (29th) birthday, she said, “Putting your event in Eugene will launch a revolution of throwing, running and jumping in our country."

The Americans had made it abundantly clear that they saw the 2019 vote as a defining moment for the IAAF. If not now for track and field in the United States, when?

“Destiny is calling us,” bid leader Vin Lananna said. “America is waiting. Eugene is ready. Let’s tell our story together.”

From the American view, there was so much positive about this Eugene candidacy:

A re-done Hayward Field. The potential of packed stands, morning and night, a marked contrast to the worlds in 2013 (Moscow) and 2011 (Daegu, South Korea), which suffered from empty stadiums.

As the Americans told the council in the last question to be asked, a 2019 Eugene championships would be broadcast live on NBC. As Felix and others made abundantly plain, the worlds would re-energize the sport in the United States — the engine for much more to come in bigger cities.

What was left unsaid but nonetheless clearly understood, meantime, were other factors. Consider:

— Doha would put on the 2019 worlds from Sept. 28-Oct. 6. For contrast, the 2015 worlds will be Aug. 22 in Beijing, the 2017 edition Aug. 5-13 in London.

Doha 2019 would be just 10 months before the 2020 Summer Games in Tokyo. How would that affect athlete training?

That time frame, moreover, lines up in the middle of other peak broadcast seasons, including the NFL.

— This was the rare circumstance in which the U.S. could actually be seen as the developing market.

In his remarks to the council, Lananna said, “Really, what is the takeaway? The United States promises to you today to deliver an unbelievable world championships.”

The challenge for Eugene: Doha promised the same thing, albeit in so many words.

While the U.S. is still climbing back into the international bid game, Doha — and Qatar — are by now seasoned veterans.

Over the next year, Qatar will play host to 43 international sports events. It will stage world championships in swimming and team handball, among others. In 2018, it will put on the world gymnastics championships. Of course, in 2022 it gets the soccer World Cup.

Perhaps of most relevance to the IAAF, Doha bid three years ago for the 2017 worlds. London won, 16-10, amid a pledge from Sebastian Coe, the leader of the London 2012 Games, to keep track and field at Olympic Stadium after those Games.

“When you lose, you should be humble,” Sheik Saoud bin Abdulrahman al Thani, the Doha 2019 bid leader and general secretary of the Qatar Olympic Committee, said. “Not every game will you win.”

For 2019, the Qataris promised a 100-meter video board atop the stadium. Five-star accommodations. A night marathon along the Corniche.

The late September start, they said, means that futuristic air conditioning systems in the stadium won’t be needed — but they have it and, they declared, can get temperatures down in two hours.

A Be In TV executive, Yousef Al Obaidly, promised “the most comprehensive promotional package ever.”

There’s a new mega-airport in Doha. Qatar Airways rocks.

And on and on.

“Today,” Dahlan al Hamad, president of the Qatar Athletics Federation and an IAAF vice president told the council, “we have the choice to make a deep impact, in a place where our sport can really grow, with a partner that can help us to make it happen.”

To critics of Doha, Sheikh Saoud had this to say in an interview: “We tell them to come and witness for yourself. Come and see. A lot of people don’t have the financial power [that Qatar does]. Not a lot of people choose to use sport … for everything. We believe in sport.”

Last week, at a major Olympic meeting in Bangkok, the feeling was Eugene was looking at five -- maybe eight -- votes maximum, in the first round. It wasn’t clear whether the Oregon city would even make it through to the second round.

The Eugene presentation Tuesday was, in every way, first rate. That clearly helped.

But so, too, Doha.

And only one of the two had Mutaz Essa Barshim.

“We need you to be the spark,” he told the IAAF council.

“We need everybody’s help. We need to make an impact. We need to take athletics to a new place. I’m not the only one sharing this dream.”

He added for emphasis a moment later, “We need everybody to come together for the sport that we love.”

None of this was rehearsed. Barshim spoke without notes. He did not pause or need for an instant to collect himself. “No script,” he said.

“Almost I had tears,” Sheikh Saoud, who has seen it all, said later. “The way he spoke — he was not just a star athlete. He was a star of expression.

“Most council members,” the sheik reminded, “were athletes. They were in his shoes. They know how it is.”

“From the heart,” Barshim would say later.

It’s a lesson worth remembering. For all the resource, it always comes down to this: sport — even, perhaps especially, the bidding for the events at which high-level sport is contested — is about emotion, about human connection.

On this day in Monaco, Doha had it. See you in 2019 in Qatar.

IAAF 2019, IOC 2022: why so different?

The International Olympic Committee’s Winter Games bid 2022 process is, to put it charitably, struggling. Six cities have dropped out. Just two are left, Beijing and Almaty, Kazakhstan. At the very same time, the IAAF’s bid contest for the 2019 track and field world championship seemingly couldn’t be going better. On Friday, an evaluation commission, headed by Sebastian Coe, the 1980s track star who is an IAAF vice president and of course oversaw the 2012 London Summer Games, wrapped up a worldwide tour that took it across the world to the three cities in the race: Barcelona; Eugene, Oregon; and Doha, Qatar.

It’s almost impossible not to compare and contrast, and to wonder what the IAAF is obviously doing so right.

Because it’s not just 2019.

The 2013 world championships were in Moscow, at Luzhhniki Stadium, site of the opening and closing ceremonies of the 1980 Summer Olympics; 2015 will be in Beijing, back at the Bird’s Nest; 2017 in London, at Olympic Stadium. There’s a good case to be made that the 2021 worlds will likely fall in Tokyo, to make use of the new Olympic Stadium there after the 2020 Games.

Absolutely, the IAAF is not perfect. Far from it. The 2013 worlds, in particular, were marked by attendance woes early in the championships. The 2011 worlds were in Daegu, South Korea, hardly one of your must-see tourist hot spots.

But even significant glitches such as these have hardly stopped some of the world’s great cities from lining up to bid for what is, after the Summer Games and FIFA’s World Cup, indisputably one of Olympic sport’s glamour events — a nine-day run featuring some of sport’s great stars, including the likes of sprinters Usain Bolt of Jamaica and American Allyson Felix and the French pole-vaulter Renaud Lavillenie.

If 2011 was in Daegu, remember, 2009 was in Berlin, at historic Olympic Stadium. And it was in 2009 in Berlin, on the blue track, that Bolt ran his signature world records: 9.58 in the 100, 19.19 in the 200.

Even the United States wants in for 2019, with Eugene launching the first American bid since Stanford’s 1999 and 2001 unsuccessful efforts.

No way Eugene is one of the world’s great cities. Absolutely it is one of the world's great college towns. It is also home to one of the most famous track facilities anywhere, venerable Hayward Field. This summer, it put on the IAAF junior championships.

Barcelona of course staged the 1992 Summer Olympics. More recently and relevantly, it played host to the 2010 European track and field championships and the 2012 IAAF juniors.

Doha put on the 2010 IAAF world indoors. It finished second, behind London, in the race for the 2017 outdoor worlds, and is due in the coming months and years to host any number of other championships, including short-course swimming (December), team handball (early 2015), gymnastics (2018) and, certainly, soccer’s World Cup in 2022.

Barcelona assuredly can count on support from track and field’s European center; Eugene would refurbish “iconic” Hayward; Doha would present the championships not in August but in late September and early October and, moreover, run the marathon at night under floodlights, conjuring up memories of Abebe Bikila at the Rome 1960 Summer Games.

To be clear, there are manifest differences between an Olympic Games and a track and field world championships.

An Olympics features multiple world championships all going on at the same time; an IAAF worlds is just one. An Olympics runs for 17 days; an IAAF worlds, only the nine. And so on.

Even so, an IAAF worlds — especially in comparison to a Winter Games — is still a pretty darn big deal. There were roughly 2,850 athletes from 89 countries at the Sochi 2014 Olympics. Moscow 2013, meanwhile, saw 1,974 athletes from 206 nations.

To underscore: a track world championships typically means an assembly of more nations than anywhere but a Summer Olympics.

The track championships are hugely international but manageable, not the sort of thing that requires a city or nation to undergo a perceived onerous investment. In short, it doesn’t cost, just to pick a number out of the blue sky, $51 billion.

Which everyone knows is what a Winter Games costs, right?

Oh, wait.

The IOC now stands poised in Monaco at an all-members session in December to assess president Thomas Bach’s review and potential reform session, dubbed “Agenda 2020.” That $51 billion figure, widely associated with the Sochi Games, is the number believed to have played a role, big or small, in scaring off the six cities now out of 2022 — Lviv, Stockholm, St. Moritz/Davos, Krakow, Munich and, most recently, Oslo.

Of course It’s more than that.

It is absolutely the case that in this last year of his presidency, the IAAF, under Lamine Diack, is in something of a holding pattern. It is also undeniably true that over the past 15 years track and field has seen more than its fair share of doping-related scandals, some involving its biggest stars.

The latest, which dropped Friday: a reported positive A test for Kenya’s Rita Jeptoo, winner the last two years of both the Boston and Chicago marathons.

None of this, however, has stopped cities from wanting its biggest event — including the robust campaign going on now for 2019.

Why? Because for all its flaws, and there are many, track and field is and forever will be the sport, the one nearly everyone can do, the one that despite its highly professionalized nature remains the “vintage” sport — if you will — of the movement.

It is, despite everything, elemental.

All of this is part and parcel of the underlying contest within the 2019 contest, which all involved with track and field are keenly aware — one for 2019, the other the looming contest for the IAAF top job.

Coe has been the point man for the evaluation commission.

Meanwhile, his presumed rival for the IAAF presidency, Ukraine’s Sergey Bubka, the 1980s and ‘90s pole vault star, himself another IAAF vice president who is also a member of the IOC executive board, has been simultaneously traveling the world.

While Coe was in Doha, there was Bubka in Algeria, meeting with top African Olympic and track officials and tweeting about it.

Official dinner hosted by Mr Palenfo. Reporter asks how I feel in #Africa. I feelhere like I'm at home' @ACNOA_ANOCA pic.twitter.com/zRpCFk9Dgw

— Sergey Bubka (@sergey_bubka) October 30, 2014

When Diack -- who is from Senegal -- approached Coe to head the evaluation commission, meantime, close observers took that as an unmistakable signal about what in the world of track and field is what. For his part, through the October tour of Spain, Oregon and Qatar, Coe has stressed time and again that he is fulfilling this role in service to the IAAF.

For those who wondered if this world tour was going to be all about Coe -- no. To reframe Meghan Trainor’s hit song — it’s all about the bids.

To be honest, Coe has to do it this way, all the while being completely upbeat about all three cities — because, at the 2019 election Nov. 18 in Monaco, there is going to be one winner and two who go home empty-handed. Any perceived negativity anytime, anywhere — that wouldn’t serve anyone in that position well for the presidential election next August in Beijing.

This shadow dance is reaching a stage where the two undeclared candidates, Coe and Bubka, should soon be publicly forthcoming about their intentions — perhaps at the IAAF gala in Monaco in November, the same week as the 2019 elections, or soon thereafter.

Which leads back to the IOC.

The fix the IOC has got itself in has to be seen big picture.

When Juan Antonio Samaranch was president, from 1980 until 2001, one of the most clever — and under-appreciated — aspects of his tenure was to “hide” the Games themselves behind the concept of the movement.

The movement was all. The Games, while essential, were simply part of the overarching movement.

Under Jacques Rogge, whose term stretched from 2001 until 2013, this scenario switched.

The Games achieved primacy.

The unintended consequence:

By putting the Games first, the IOC is now increasingly seen worldwide as an event-maker — to take it further, an event-maker in a business where money, not the stories of the athletes, has become a central concern.

This was perhaps unavoidable after Games in Beijing ($40 billion-plus) and Sochi ($51 billion).

Regardless — it is profoundly unfortunate.

Money, though necessary, is not at all the IOC’s mission: it is to move the world forward, little by little, piece by piece, day by day, through one-to-one change via the athletes and the young people of the world. The shorthand for all this is expressed through the key Olympic values: friendship, excellence, respect.

A few voices would be eager — who are even now trying — to say what the IOC is truly about.

Why are those voices not being heard? Because the IOC is an easy target. And because the IOC is not telling its side of the story clearly, concisely or even well.

In politics, especially sports politics, it’s a raw truth that the truth matters — but what matters more is perception.

Perception is what is dragging at the IOC.

The IOC has a chance to effect significant change at that Monaco session, though with Bach announcing recently that bid-city visits by the members won’t be considered anew it’s not clear how far any real reform might stretch.

In the meantime, the IAAF — despite its figurative hurdles — heads into its November election for 2019 in a position of considerable strength. And seemingly poised, with a new generation of leadership at the ready, to grow the sport further.

At the closing news conference Friday in Doha, Coe was naturally asked about 2022, and the many allegations around the soccer tournament there.

“We came here to make a judgment about the worthiness of the city to stage a track and field championships,” he said, “so our focus has been entirely of this city and the other two cities to deliver this championships.

“We haven’t spent, and nor should we spend, any time worrying about other sports and other situations."

Coe praised each of the three 2019 cities. He also said the one that wins will be “the one in position to present the sport in the best possible light,” adding, “We are looking for a city that understands why it wants to host [the championships]."

Eugene's improbable 2019 bid: can it be a winner?

EUGENE, Oregon -- It rained, hard, Sunday afternoon. Then, abruptly, it stopped. On Monday, no rain. Was that random -- or, you know, a sign from above that Eugene's audacious bid for the 2019 track and field world championships is somehow feeling the heavenly love, too? Is this all just cosmic destiny, or what?

How is it that Eugene is not only in this thing but could actually win? For sure it could lose. But, seriously -- it might just win.

The logic of cold, hard rain says Eugene, a college town in the remote Pacific Northwest, has no business being in a contest with two world-class cities, Barcelona and Doha, Qatar. An IAAF evaluation commission, headed by Britain's Lord Sebastian Coe, the 1980s track star who is an IAAF vice president and of course served as boss of the London 2012 Summer Games, wrapped up its two-day visit Monday to Eugene; the IAAF commission visited Barcelona Oct. 14-15; it is due to go to Doha from here, with the visit there Oct. 30-31. The 2019 election is Nov. 18 in Monaco -- essentially, three weeks away.

What, meanwhile, is logic when it confronts passion? Doesn't track and field, more than anything, need passion?

These are but some of the several elemental questions underpinning this 2019 IAAF election.

As Coe -- who is relentlessly neutral about the entire 2019 process -- made plain in a news conference Monday at the University of Oregon basketball arena, it's apparent there is great enthusiasm in and about Eugene, indeed throughout Oregon, for track and field. That has nothing to do with the other two 2019 candidates; it doesn't reflect on them or the process in any way; no clues should be divined, because there are none, about whether Eugene is favored or definitely is not. The enthusiasm here is just -- obvious.

"This," Coe said, "is a community that understands track and field."

He outlined, too, five "really important values" the IAAF is looking for: the nature of the community itself; the necessary partnerships (think security, transport and the like); making sure the event is not "hermetically sealed" from life in the community; ensuring as well that the event would be used in alignment with local ambitions (think health and wellness); and, last but surely not least, the ability to use a championships to attract young people to track and field.

Now, getting down to business:

All in, there are 27 possible votes. How many of those are -- or might be -- likely to be favorable to the United States?

The outdoor worlds have never been to this country. Stanford put forth bids in 1999 and 2001. There’s abundant reason there haven’t been other bids — see above, 27 votes, in a world in which over the years “United States” has not reliably been a vote-getter.

The last Summer Olympics? Atlanta, 1996. The last Winter Games? Salt Lake City, 2002, and those were rocked by a corruption scandal.

Indianapolis played host to the 1987 world track indoors. Portland will put on the 2016 world indoors.

Aha, say the sunny-side up people! Portland!

Indeed.

This frames the crux of the matter:

Everyone connected to track and field in the United States agrees it would be a great thing to stage the worlds. Is 2019 the right time, and is Eugene the right place?

There are two theories at work:

One, the idea of having the worlds in Eugene is patently ridiculous.

Two, the dominoes may be falling just so and Eugene might sneak this one out.

In order:

No way Eugene can win, ought to win, should win, and here are just some of the reasons (among many) why:

— Eugene put on the six-day junior world championships at Hayward Field last summer. They were more than fine -- for a juniors. Guess what? The logistics of the juniors proved that Eugene is light years away from what it takes to run the nine-day, far more complex senior championships.

— Eugene is, at best, a sleepy college town far away from anywhere. It’s two hours-plus to a decent airport (in Portland). The late-night West Coast time-zone is a killer. Track and field is already a niche sport. Putting the 2019 worlds in a niche town in a niche state will further serve only to consign, indeed condemn, the sport to little or no notice in the United States for a long, long time.

-- When you are in a town not your own for nine days, it can seem like a lot longer when you are trying to discern something else to do and, especially, find places to eat.

Here was the local paper, the Register-Guard, in an editorial Sunday that can only be described as either "boosterish" or "loving" below two headlines, one that proclaimed, "Championships belong in Eugene," the other, "To a greater degree than anywhere else, track and field is in the city's DNA."

Pause here for a moment.

Disclaimer: obviously the newspaper is not part of the bid committee. Even so, this fact is difficult for non-Americans to understand and these kinds of headlines are head-scratchers in the international bid game. When will some Americans, even if well-meaning, understand that non-Americans do not appreciate that we are not the end-all, be-all in the entire world?

Do they comprehend at the Register-Guard that because of a crazy thing called the "internet" this stuff can get read now beyond the borders of the United States? Do they appreciate that these headlines were the talk -- with heads shaking in bewilderment if not dismay -- among those in the know Sunday night?

Who says any championships "belong" in Eugene? The sense of entitlement that word connotes is precisely the attitude the U.S. Olympic Committee has spent nearly five years not just running but sprinting away from.

And what wise minds on the newspaper board decided that Eugene, Oregon, had more in its cultural heart and soul than literally "anywhere else" on Planet Earth? For real?

Anyway, from the editorial:

"A member of the evaluation committee, torn by having to choose among a twilight walk on Doha’s corniche, an evening at a Barcelona tapas bar or an August afternoon at Hayward field, might consider stopping a runner at random on one of Eugene’s trails, and asking what a good split time would be in a 1,500 meter race.

"That should settle the matter in Eugene’s favor."

Or -- a member of the commission might stop that same runner and ask where in the hell you might eat on Day Eight in the greater Eugene scene. Don't miss Track Town Pizza (but not for a week straight). So what's an out-of-towner to do? Not everyone is going to Marché, next to the boutique Inn at the 5th. Again, what to do? Elmer's for comfort food in Springfield, hard by the I-5 and Beltline Road? (Bonus: Gateway Mall and Target just down the street!) How do you think Elmer's would stack up against the amazing seafood in Doha or the paella in Barcelona?

— Consider this cycle: Beijing 2015, London 2017, Somewhere 2019. After the Summer Games in 2020, wouldn’t it makes sense — in the same way it did to make post-Olympic use of the stadiums in Beijing and London — to go back to Tokyo in 2021? Further, assuming the United States wins in 2017 for the Summer Games in 2024, wouldn’t it again make eminent sense to stage the test event in the winning city in 2023 — just for the sake of conversation in, say, Los Angeles?

If you were trying to grow the sport of track and field in the United States, would you rather have a world championships at Hayward Field or at the LA Memorial Coliseum, site of the 1932 and 1984 Summer Games? Hayward was repeatedly described Monday as "iconic." You want "iconic"? Let's match Hayward against the Coliseum.

Even USA Track & Field has already recognized that LA maybe has something going for it: the U.S. marathon Trials are going to be there in 2016.

Yes, yes, yes -- Los Angeles and Eugene share the same time zone. But LA has the ESPN and Fox studios. In LA, the worlds would be a story, maybe the story. Remember, there's no NFL team in LA, and unless that changes, in late August a track worlds might well own SoCal.

Thank you, downer cows, for your views. Your time is up.

OK, cheery optimists. Your turn:

— The outgoing IAAF president, Lamine Diack, has always wanted a worlds in the United States. Diack's political acumen should not be underestimated, even on his way out.

— Since 2010, the USOC, and in particular board chairman Larry Probst and chief executive Scott Blackmun, have traveled the world, emphasizing relationship-building and stressing that the United States is keen to be a partner in the so-called “Olympic family.”

Eugene’s campaign is clearly a major USOC priority: Blackmun, recovering from shoulder surgery, was nonetheless here Sunday, when the rain was coming down hard, to make the case to the IAAF. Look, a 2019 worlds would be the biggest Olympic sports event in the United States since Atlanta 1996. After the Summer Games themselves and soccer’s World Cup, the track championships are the next big thing — so this is, indeed, a very big deal.

How big? Oregon Gov. John Kitzhaber appeared Sunday evening at the traditional welcome dinner.

"We’re at the vanguard of a national quest — a quest to bring the world back to the United States,” Vin Lananna, the senior University of Oregon athletic director and president of the local entity called TrackTown USA that is pushing the bid, was said to have told the IAAF working group Sunday behind closed doors.

— Maybe, just maybe, the world of Olympic sport is increasingly hospitable to the Americans. The alpine ski worlds are in Vail and Beaver Creek this coming February; that is the biggest event on the winter sports calendar. Is the IAAF going to be the first of the major summer sports to show that it’s time to come back to the USA as well — to be, if you will, the group of thought leaders showing the way?

— USA Track & Field, often maligned over the years, has quietly been on something of a positive roll, building up sponsors and momentum since Max Siegel took over as chief executive two-plus years ago. A 2019 Eugene victory would give the sport five years in the national spotlight — with the possibility of five more if the USOC were to win for 2024.

Siegel said Monday, “An event of this magnitude on U.S. soil will allow us to galvanize and focus this entire country over a sustained period of time in bringing awareness and promoting the sport.

“What it does it allows you to come up in a strategic way in engaging fans and sponsors, further educating them about the sport and the commercial opportunities available in the space.

“We'd have five years to rally everybody.”

-- It's no secret that Eugene and seemingly most of Oregon is Nike country. USATF has a new deal with Nike. The IAAF and adidas have long been partners. But, you know, what if?

— Perhaps, too, it is now the case that in our increasingly convergent 21st century you don’t need a big city as the stage for a world championships. The 2015 FINA swim championships are in Kazan, Russia, in the dead-center of nowhere. Kazan?! Plain fact: wherever you are, television and social media carry the event to the world.

Reality checks:

Eugene has two primary weaknesses — size and venue.

Full details of the Eugene 2019 plan have not been made public.

But enough is known about what matters.

When the U.S. Olympic Trials are on, Hayward Field holds roughly 20,000 people. That’s not anywhere enough for a worlds.

If Eugene wins for 2019, Hayward would be renovated with seating for 32,000. If the bid is not successful — and the plan has always been for Hayward to be re-done — the facility would be built out so it can play host to NCAA championships on a regular basis.

For emphasis, none of this would be public money — all of it would come from private fundraising.

You can bet, too, that a re-done Hayward would be a world leader in technology and innovation. Lananna, at Monday's news conference, dropped sly hints about just that.

Secondly, accommodation.

In Eugene right now, the count of existing hotel stock — that includes university residence halls and housing, which can be used for athletes and others — stands at roughly 11,000. Don’t be quick to dismiss some of that university housing; some is pretty darn nice condo-style stuff.

The rise of the Oregon football program means that Autzen Stadium is now packed on multiple football Saturdays every year. Where do those people stay? If you go 90 minutes out from Eugene, that total of 11,000 rises to 17,000 rooms and 20,000 beds.

Meanwhile, nine new properties with over 3,000 rooms are already in the works.

Speaking of convergence — what if this Eugene 2019 bid marks the perfect coming-together of relationships, partnerships and opportunity?

“We have a strong desire to host this championships,” Lananna said. “This is what we do here. We work at it: 24/7, 365 days a year, we do track and field.

“We have the resources, we have the commitments, we have the community behind us. Therefore we can do it.

“Lastly, we will pack the stadium every single day for every single event for the world championships. Every single young man, every young woman will be treated to the experience of their lives in the sport they have dedicated their lives to. That is why we are trying to host the championships. This is not a legacy for Eugene or for the United States. This is a legacy for the sport. This IAAF council,” he said, “has an opportunity to create their own legacy.”

A sprint champion to want to believe in

Wouldn’t American track and field be so much better, goes the mournful refrain, if only there were a sprint champion everyone could actually believe in? Who wasn’t, you know, doped to the gills? Maybe Kendal Williams doesn’t go on to run 9.57. But now that he has won the men’s 100 at the world juniors in Eugene, Oregon, maybe it’s time, too, to celebrate the very sort of young athlete everyone says they really want — but then hardly gives more than a moment to when he does exactly what they say they’re begging for.

In Eugene, Williams defeated favorite Trayvon Bromell in the 100, running 10.21 to Bromell’s 10.28. They then teamed up — along with Jalen Miller and Trentavis Friday, the Eugene 200-meter champion — as the Americans won the 4x100 relay.

“I’ve been waiting all year for my time to come,” Williams said after the 100. “It finally came.”

First things first: of course 10.2 is not going to win anything at the Olympics. These were the juniors. Nonetheless, Kendal Williams has world-class potential. He is about a month shy of his 19th birthday, is about to start at Florida State and is already running 10.2 without lifting weights in high school.

Why no weights? Because he went to Stanton College Preparatory School, one of Jacksonville, Florida’s, most academically renowned institutions, dating to the 1860s, when it began serving the African-American community.

“Kendal went to an academic school,” said his father, Ken. adding a moment later, “They tore down the weight room to put another classroom in.”

Second, of course it’s always dangerous when it comes to the issue of performance-enhancing drugs to know absolutely, positively for sure if someone is clean. In the case of Kendal Williams every shred of evidence would suggest he is, as the old advertising saying goes, 99 and 44/100 percent clean.

Never mind the tests — and, yes, he has been tested, and the tests are clean.

It’s more, way more, than that.

“The kid I raised, the family we have, he would not even consider that,” Ken Williams said, adding, “We have instilled in him the fortitude, the character, whatever it takes to be a man of integrity. The character of a man is instilled by the standards he sets for himself. I love that and I tell that to him all the time.”

Asked how certain he was that Kendall Williams was clean, his coach, James May, said, “I’m 100 percent sure. There are very few kids I can say that about. Mostly god did a remarkable job.”

“He is a good, wholesome young man,” said Terry Isley, who is now a first officer for American Airlines, used to fly for the U.S. Navy — serving, all in, for 27 years — and is a family friend, adding, “The household he comes from is the same cloth. His dad and mom. He has an older brother. The older brother dated the same girl for three or four years before he married her. How often does that happen? I would be shocked. You can never say never. But what I see and know of him, I don’t see that being a problem.”

Kendal Williams’ older brother, Ken, 26, and his wife, Kimberly, are expecting their first child, a boy, in November.

His dad, Ken, and mom, also named Kimberly, have been together for 29 years. They are high school sweethearts.  He is an AT&T project manager; she is an AT&T finance manager.

Ken Williams’ mother -- that is, Kendal Williams' grandmother -- passed away three years ago; Kendal's grandparents had been married for 58 years.

Ken William’s parents met in college at Florida A&M. Kimberly Williams’ parents met in college at Bethune-Cookman.

Both of Kendal Williams’ grandfathers are graduates of Stanton Prep.

“My wife and I both came from two-parent homes and they came from two-parent homes. That’s been important to us,” Ken Williams said. “That’s been important to us, to raise our kids and give them that foundation. You don’t always see that these days.

“There’s a lot to be said for two parents in the home. Hopefully, kids will understand that marriage is you both have to give 100 percent all the time, and it’s work. I’d like to think we helped guide [Kendal] into the person he will become for the next four years.”

Athletic talent runs through the extended family. James Loney, who now plays for the Tampa Bay Rays, is a cousin.

Kendal Williams’ speed was obvious way back. In eighth grade, Isley’s son, Merrick, and Kendal ran a 100; halfway, Merrick was perhaps three or four meters ahead; by the finish, Kendal was three or four meters up.

“A lot of guys can run. But I had never seen anything like that,” said Isley, who played college football. “He ran 10.90-something, 10.92. That wasn’t what impressed me. It was his top-end speed. My wife said, ‘You can still outrun him.’ I said, ‘No.’ I said, ‘His top-end speed is world-class.’ The people around me laughed. I said, ‘I know what I am saying.’ “

May happened to be at the meet that day. To be on May’s team would be a commitment for the Williams family — a 40-mile drive.

“To show you the athleticism, the first time I showed [Kendal] how to long jump, he went 21 feet,” May said. This was March of Kendal's eighth-grade year, he said.

With Kendal, Isley and all of six other kids, May’s team would later go on to win the middle-school state meet.

“I’m always suspect of major leaps,” May said, meaning in times, which is why Kendal Williams’ progressions are further evidence of regular development.

In the 100, for instance, the progressions read like this: 2011 10.46, 2012 10.37, 2013 10.18, 2014 a personal-best 10.21. The 2012 and 2013 times were both wind-aided, both readings slightly above the allowable 2.0 meters per second.

The winning time in Eugene was run into a slight headwind, 0.6 meters per second. No question it is the real deal.

“Most sprinters run better in heat. He ran better in cool weather. He ran a PR in that weather,” May said.

You know what else? After Kendal Williams won the 100 in Eugene, May said, “He said thank you.”

'Anything is possible': Williams wins juniors 100

EUGENE, Oregon — Two days ago, after Universal Sports posted onto Twitter a shot of a skinny Usain Bolt racing at the IAAF world junior championships — before a home crowd in Kingston, Jamaica, in 2002 — he told his 3.4 million-plus followers, “Still the greatest moment of my life.” This from a guy who, of course, has gone on to win six Olympic individual and relay medals as well as eight world titles and who holds the world record in the 200 meters, 19.19 seconds, and the 100, 9.58.

For social media purposes this week, meanwhile, that wasn’t all. Bolt followed up on Instagram by proclaiming, “It’s been a journey and a half from world juniors to now,” adding the hashtags, “anything is possible,” and “keep believing.”

On Wednesday here at Hayward Field, Trayvon Bromell was expected to win the men’s 100 meters. He had set the world junior record earlier this year on the very same track. Instead, in one of those upsets that makes track and field eminently watchable, another American, Kendal Williams, won, proof that, as Bolt said, anything is possible.

Williams crossed in 10.21 seconds, Bromell in 10.28.

Yoshihide Kiryu of Japan took third, in 10.34

“I’ve been waiting all year for my time to shine,” Williams said later. “It finally came.”

The gold is the first for the United States at these world juniors.

It is also the first men’s 100-meter gold in the world juniors in 10 years, since Ivory Williams’ 10.29 in Grosseto, Italy. Over history, it made for the fourth time a U.S. male has won gold in the 100 at the world juniors.

The women’s 100 also produced a fascinating winner — Britain’s Dina Asher-Smith, who crushed the field with an explosive start and a take-no-prisoners style that makes for great theater down the lanes. She won in 11.23.

Afterward, asked to explain her victory, she said, “I can’t let myself slack.”

Fascinatingly, there were no Jamaicans — men’s or women’s — in either the men’s or women’s 100 final.

The focus heading into the meet had been all about Bromell. He had even been one of the invited athletes at the IAAF pre-meet news conference, and understandably.

On this same Hayward track, at the NCAA championships in June, he ran the 100 in 9.97, the first junior to run under 10 seconds.

The thing is, it’s difficult to know whether junior performances are a predictor of much of anything.

At those 2002 juniors, Bolt won the 200, in 20.61. He didn’t run the 100. Here are your top three finishers in that 100: Darrel Brown and Marc Burns, both of Trinidad and Tobago, and American Willie Hordge.

Bolt was just 15 at that race, about a month shy of 16.

Bromell turned 19 two weeks ago. The grind of a long season was wearing on him. But at that news conference he tried to make like, not.

He said, “Going back to getting my maintenance done on my body, I feel like I can still run fast. I don’t feel like I’m going to run any slower. I feel like my heart won’t let me. So we shall see if history will be made again.”

Here is the thing about history and track and field. It can often turn on a combination of weather and fate. When they combine in your favor, it’s all good. When it’s not that way — that’s why they run the races.

For instance, in May, at the Big 12 championships in Lubbock, Texas, when Bromell ran a 9.77 for 100 meters, that was very, very fast.

Then again, that day he had the wind at his back. The weather, you know. The wind was measured at 4.2 meters per second, which is way, way more than the 2.0 allowed under the rules of track and field.

That race brought Bromell lots and lots of attention.

In fact, for entertainment purposes only, history buffs might want to note that Carl Lewis — whose fastest legal time was a 9.86, in Tokyo in 1991 — ran 9.78 with an even stronger 5.2 wind at his back in Indianapolis in 1988.

So Bromell, at 19, is already faster on a windy day than Carl Lewis.

This is why Bromell got — and is getting, especially from track geeks — lots of attention.

When he ran 9.97 at the NCAAs in June — the wind that day at his back was 1.8, legal but very close — he took four-hundredths of a second off the former world junior record, which he had jointly held with Trinidad's Brown.

American Jeff Demps and Japan’s Kiryu also ran 10.01 but their times were never ratified as world junior records.

Meanwhile, back in Florida, in May, Williams won the state titles in both the 100- and 200-meter dashes, becoming just the third athlete in state history to win four straight in the 200 (one of whom was Houston McTear in the 1970s). Williams won the 100 in 10.33, the 200 in 20.96. But who noticed outside of a few locals and the coaches at Florida State, where he’s headed?

This week in Eugene, Bromell opened Tuesday with a 10.13. That was a tenth of a second better than anyone in the field, which was what most people here saw.

But not if you were paying close attention: Williams was next, in a personal-best 10.23.

Cejhae Greene of Antigua went 10.27. No one else was under 10.3.

On Wednesday morning, the rain — the weather again — came down hard. The sequence here:  mid-day Tuesday in the sun, then semis and finals Wednesday evening on a soggy track.

“It it was a hot day, you probably would have seen three people go under 10 seconds, man,” Bromell would say later.

It was not hot. It was decidedly cool, sweatshirt weather, maybe more. A couple ladies were seen Wednesday evening eating popcorn under the Hayward stands wrapped in blankets. One volunteer, displaying awesome local knowledge for summer in Oregon, opted for a black down jacket. It was zipped up.

In the semifinal, Bromell again topped the field, now in 10.29, and in a still wind. He looked sluggish.

And the field crept closer, Levi Cadogan of Barbados in that same semifinal just two-hundredths back, Ojie Edoburun of Britain five-hundredths behind.

In his semi, Williams, ran an easy 10.49 to win.

In the final, Bromell actually got off to a great start, a reaction time of 0.121 off the gun, fastest in the field, Williams going 0.149.

But Bromell just didn’t have more, and by halfway down, it was clear Williams would take the race.

For Williams, that 10.21 was, again, a new personal best. Anything is possible. Keep believing.

“Execution was, I think, priority No. 2 behind mentally staying in the game,” Williams said later. “Not letting anything or anybody else mess with your mojo.”

He also said, “At the end of the day, I’m happy for Trayvon. He has accomplished a lot. He’s a humble kid. I like him. But at the end of the day, I still had to focus on what I had to do. I can’t run Trayvon Bromell’s race better than Trayvon Bromell can do. I had to go out there and run Kendall Williams’ race.”

Bromell said, “I seen the whole race when I came up. I seen Kendall right beside me. He had great knee lift. He was executing well. I was like, man, it’s his time to shine. I’ve had a great run this year. I’m just glad I got through the season healthy. It’s a blessing for him and I’m happy for him.”

He also said, and though these are the juniors these are words of wisdom from someone who is only 19, “You can’t run a fast race every time. You can’t PR every time.”

Eugene, beyond the 2014 world juniors?

EUGENE, Oregon — First and foremost, Eugene is not TrackTown USA. That is an excellent bit of marketing. But everything is relative. This is a college town, and as track's worldwide governing body, the IAAF, comes to the United States for the first time in more than 20 years for a championship of any sort, it must be said, like it or not, this is most appropriately CollegeFootballTown USA. Anybody who tells you anything else simply picked a bad week to stop sniffing whatever might be in the air by the 7-Eleven at the corner of Franklin and Patterson.

Just a couple blocks away from that 7-Eleven, Hayward Field, site of the IAAF world juniors, which get underway Tuesday, is — to use the preferred term — venerable, the fans said to be knowledgeable.

Even so, the local football palace, Autzen Stadium, where the IAAF held a party Monday night, is insane on a college football Saturday. Let us recap the past few seasons: 2010 Rose Bowl, 2011 BCS championship game, 2012 Rose Bowl victors, 2013 Fiesta Bowl winners.

It’s Nike money that helped bring the 2014 world juniors here. That’s fine. You want to see what Nike money can really do?

Check out the Hatfield-Dowlin complex, the 145,000-square foot, six-story black steel and glass football "performance facility" that opened here last year. Where to begin? The special wood floors in the weight room, the individually ventilated lockers to eliminate odors, the infection-free surfaces, the barber shop, specially designated workspaces for pro scouts as well as the dogs of the press, foosball tables in the players’ lounge that were made in Barcelona, the same sound engineering in the lobby that is used at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland and on and on and on.

Even the Eugene Register-Guard, the local newspaper, knows what’s what. Monday’s edition displayed a feature on sprinter Kaylin Whitney while helpfully offering a sidebar on 10 Americans to watch at the world juniors.

Even so, on that Register-Guard website's sport section's drop-down menu, you can readily see that track -- and kudos to the paper for even mentioning track -- is sixth on its priority list. After "local," which figures, what dominates? "Oregon Ducks football." Under blogs, what's first? "Oregon football."

Here is the dilemma:

There is no TrackTown USA.

Not New York, not Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco, Houston, Dallas, Denver, Phoenix, Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Kansas City, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Seattle, Miami, Cleveland, Cincinnati, Boston, Washington, nowhere. Not Las Vegas. Not nothing.

If there were a TrackTown, there would have been a world championships here in the United States, the big deal itself, already.

The last major IAAF event in the United States took place in 1992, the cross-country championships in Boston. The world indoors were in 1987, in Indianapolis. The IAAF World Race Walking Cup was held in the United States twice, in New York in 1987 and San Jose in 1991.

Lamine Diack, who has been president of the IAAF for nearly 15 years, has said many, many times that he wished there could be a way to get it done in the States.

But how? What venue? Hayward seats 20,000-ish, max; that is not major league. How many hotel rooms are there in Eugene? Answer: not anywhere near enough. And have you tried to get to Eugene? It’s a long way from anywhere — 20-hours plus from Europe, as those on the IAAF’s ruling Council learned while slogging Sunday through jet lag and their meetings at the Valley River Inn.

Vin Lananna, who deserves a lot of credit for getting the world indoors to Portland in 2016 and is trying diligently to bring the world championships to Eugene in 2019, now calls Hayward Field the “Carnegie Hall of track and field.” He likens it to Augusta National and Wimbledon, trying to play it up as a destination, a place where, as he said at Monday’s news conference, “special things happen,” like Ashton Eaton’s 2012 world record in the decathlon.

Again, excellent branding.

Eugene as a "destination" is an intriguing concept. There's now a Five Guys burger place here. That's a positive. Also, the Starbucks by the P.F. Chang's at the Oakway complex now features that new Clover brewing system, and you don't find that everywhere. So -- whoo! If for some reason you don't like that Starbucks, there's literally another Starbucks across the street. Which is, you know, nice. Eugene!

Make no mistake: these world juniors are surely an event unto themselves, but they are here to serve as the trial run for those 2019 worlds. Eugene is bidding against Doha and Barcelona. The IAAF will choose the winner later this year.

Diack said at Monday’s news conference that the world juniors mark “an important moment for the future of track and field” in the United States.

Asked later how important a successful world juniors would be for the Eugene 2019 bid, he answered, “Let us see the six days,” a reference to how long the meet goes.

“That’s a lot of pressure, President Diack,” Lananna said with a laugh.

Again, give Lananna credit. Consider the sequencing: Beijing 2015. London 2017. 2019 -- another great world capital for the IAAF like ... Eugene?!

Perhaps, though, Eugene does win for 2019.

Nike money can do a lot of things — even perhaps cozy up in places alongside adidas money, with which the IAAF has long been familiar. Now that Nike and USA Track & Field are in business together until 2040, who knows how the world might change? Wouldn’t Phil Knight want to see the championships in the United States before time claims its inevitable reward? Perhaps there are other factors and strategies at work, political or otherwise, that will ultimately see Eugene emerge the victor.

Then again, if it’s just the ability to use money to get projects done — hello, Doha? The Qatari capital finished runner-up to London for the 2017 worlds. It’s probable 2019 would be a far-better time for Doha than 2021, which would be the year before the soccer World Cup and thus likely too frenetic. And Doha is now seriously in the business of staging world championships for any number of federations; the world short-course swim championships will be there this December, for instance.

A group representing Doha perched over the weekend in the lobby of the Valley River Inn, as the Council was meeting.

Look, it’s bid season, and that is all well and good.

It’s a good idea, meanwhile, to consider timing and context when examining what people say. Here, then, are two 2011 quotes from the senior vice president of the IAAF, Bob Hersh, who happens to be an American, when there was no U.S. bid underway, and none was envisioned, and perhaps this speaks to the idea of TrackTown USA, or any such thing.

Citing stadiums in Austin, Texas; Columbus, Ohio; and Seattle, Hersh said, “You look at large stadiums in cities that are big enough to host it,” meaning a world championships, "and they’ve removed the tracks.”

In that same story, he said, referring to the United States, “We just don’t have the wherewithal, starting with the fact that there is no stadium that could accommodate it.”

This, too, from Lananna, asked Monday to describe how Eugene got the world juniors: “It has long been a dream to host one of these world championships. We looked at what made the most sense on a college campus.”

Which this event does.

Beyond that?

Not just three dopers -- at least four!

Do you believe in redemption, and the power of second chances? Or was what went down Thursday in Lausanne, Switzerland, just the saddest of all possible advertisements for track and field? Three dopers, all American, went 1-2-3 Thursday in the sport’s glamor event, the men’s 100 meters, at the Lausanne Diamond League event: Justin Gatlin, Tyson Gay and Mike Rodgers.

Consider just some of these other first-rate performances Thursday at the Athletissima meet, as the Lausanne stop is known:

Grenada’s Kirani James and American LaShawn Merritt went under 44 seconds in the men’s 400, James winning in a world-leading 43.74 seconds, Merritt in a season-best 43.92. The women’s 100 saw a sub-11: both Michelle-Lee Ahye of Trinidad & Tobago and Murielle Ahoure of Ivory Coast timed in 10.98, Ahye getting the photo finish.

Barbora Spotakova of the Czech Republic threw the javelin 66.72 meters, or 218 feet, 10 inches.

An 18-year-old Kenyan, Ronald Kwemoi, ran a personal-best 3:31.48 to take out Silas Kiplagat and others in winning the men’s 1500.

In the men’s high jump, Bogdan Bondarenko and Andriy Protsenko, both of Ukraine, went 2.40m, or 7-10 1/2. There have now been 50 2.40m-plus jumps in history; 12 have been in 2014.

And yet — what’s the headline from Thursday in Lausanne?

You bet.

Gatlin ran 9.8 to win, his second-fastest time ever, off his personal best by just one-hundredth of a second. Gay, in his first race back after a year away because of suspension, went 9.93. Rodgers, who last week won the U.S. nationals in Sacramento, ran a season-best 9.98.

Ah, but it doesn’t end there.

Typically, of the eight guys in a 100-meter final, it’s not unreasonable — at least since 1988, and Ben Johnson — to wonder, how many might be dopers?

In this instance, we have at least an inkling, and it wasn’t just three.

It was four!

To the inside of Gay in Lane 2, Rodgers in 3 and Gatlin, the 2004 Olympic champion — all decked out for the Fourth of July in red, white and blue — in Lane 4, we present Pascal Mancini of Switzerland, in Lane 1. He finished eighth, in 10.43.

Mancini was busted for nandrolone.

Rodgers tested positive for a stimulant and drew a nine-month ban.

Gatlin served a four-year ban between 2006 and 2010 for testosterone.

Gay tested positive for an anabolic steroid last summer. He received a reduced one-year suspension for cooperating with USADA. Neither the IAAF nor WADA appealed.

What Gay told USADA — and in particular about Jon Drummond, who trained Gay from 2007 until just after the 2012 Olympics, and has for years been an influential figure in USA Track and Field circles — remains unclear.

Drummond is such a key figure that he served on the USATF panel that released its findings Thursday about the disqualification controversies at the indoor nationals in February in Albuquerque.

Drummond, meanwhile, has filed a defamation lawsuit in Texas state court against USADA; its chief executive, Travis Tygart; and Gay. That case is likely on its way out of state court and en route to federal court.

After Thursday’s 100 in Lausanne, Gay told reporters, “It’s been a little bit tough training, a lot of stress but I made it through.”

Gay had not met with reporters before the meet. Gatlin did, and was in something of a philosophical way:

“My journey rebuilding my career has been an eye-opening experience,” he said. “It let me understand what real life was about outside track and field. I was basically sheltered by track and field all the way from high school, got a full scholarship to college, two years in college, turned professional, one of the highest-paid post-collegiate athletes. Then I didn’t run for four years, so I was able to understand what being a man in the real world is about, and struggles, and once I came back to the sport, I was grateful.

“I wish him [Gay] luck because it can be a stressful time, not only on the track but what the media thinks about you, what personal [things] people think about you and how they look at you. It’s going to be with him for the rest of his career. I’ve been back in track longer now than for how long I was away for and every year I’ve got better and better. That’s only been my focus and maybe he can take a lesson from that, or if he wanted to go his own path.

“I haven’t talked to him, I’ve seen him around but I haven’t talked to him. It’s that competitive edge and competitive spirit but we give each other gentlemanly nods.”

As should be obvious, track and field has many, many issues.

It also has incredible strengths. It is universal. It is elemental. It is primal.

For these strengths to come through, the sport must be able to assert its credibility.

The only way that can happen is for fans to believe what they are seeing is real.

When a race like the Lausanne men’s 100 goes down, it can be a huge turnoff. No two ways about it.

The tension, of course, is that Gatlin, Gay, Rodgers, Mancini and who knows who else have a right to make a living.

“Why are we saying this race should not be happening?” Gatlin had said beforehand. “It is because of my past discretions, because then I shouldn’t have been at the worlds and shouldn’t have been at the Olympics if that’s the case. Or is it all on what he’s done thus far? I have no power to say what races he can be in and what he can’t be in. I’m just here on my own to win and to run. If he’s here and I line up against him I can’t complain and moan about it, I’ve just got to go out there and do my job.”

There’s another tension, too, and it was beautifully described by the former Irish steeplechase record-holder Roisin McGettigan, who found out this week that she was being upgraded to a bronze medal at the 2009 European indoor championships.

“That’s the thing about doping,” McGettigan told an Irish newspaper, “it makes clean athletes doubt what they’re doing. You train harder to try and reach their standards,” meaning athletes suspected of using illicit performance-enhancing drugs, “and that often leads to injuries or illness.”

Which leads, perhaps in a meandering fashion, perhaps not, to the men’s 200 Thursday in Lausanne.

In May, Yohan Blake, the 2011 100 world champion, had run a spectacular anchor leg, an unofficial 19-flat, to power the Jamaican team to a world-record 1:18.63 in the 4x200 relay in the Bahamas.

On Thursday, Panama’s Alonso Edward won the 200, in 19.84.

Blake, who likes to call himself the Beast, got off to an indifferent start Thursday, and that’s being gracious. He faded down the stretch. He finished sixth, in 20.48.

Nickel Ashmeade of Jamaica took second, in 20.06. France’s Christophe Lemaitre got third, in a season-best 20.11, and as he went by Blake, he gave him a stare, like, what is up, dude?

Blake trains with Usain Bolt, with coach Glen Mills. Blake suddenly looks awfully, well, un-Beast-ly. Bolt has yet to appear this summer.

At the end of last July, the world found out, thanks to World Anti-Doping Agency statistics, how minimally Jamaican sprinters had been tested and, in turn, how lax the Jamaican anti-doping program had been.

Now, in summer 2014: is it just that those Jamaican yams simply aren’t doing the job?

Or is there a different truth waiting to emerge?