#13 - Winter 2003

____________________________________________________

Wrap up reports:

  • USATF Annual Meeting
  • 2005 Deaflympics Track & Field Coaches Weekend
  • USADSF House of Delegates Meeting

____________________________________________________

USATF Annual Meeting

USADTF sent Wayne Langbein to USATF Annual Meeting at Greensboro, North Carolina on December 3 to 7, 2003. This is his summarized report of highlights:

This is my second time representing USADTF after attending Kansas City last year. I’ve noticed meetings and workshops have become more productive. The only struggle USADTF is still experiencing is with Disabled Sports Organization and the issue around trying to separate ourselves from them.

Opening Session Highlights:


Bill Roe

President Bill Roe and CEO Craig Masback officially opened the 2003 USATF Annual Meeting. There were a record number of attendees nearly 1,500 celebrating "25 Years of Excellence."
Roe set the tone early by forcefully issuing a statement of beliefs. Roe especially stressed the principles of the "Zero Tolerance" policy that USATF Board of Directors boldly adopted. They wanted zero tolerance for drugs, because athletes will prove themselves on a level playing field.
Masback detailed the successes the organization enjoyed in 2003. He paid tribute to the grass roots contributors. He also enumerated the key achievements in 2003 under each of USATF's six strategic objectives: building the brand of track and field in America; identifying and helping the development of future stars; extending our world-leading role in coaching; generating increased revenues; being a leader in the youth fitness movement; and being a leader in the fight against drugs in sport. The bottom line he said “we must embrace the role of promulgating a zero tolerance message from the top to the bottom of our organization.”

Disabled Sports Organization (DSO) Highlights:
We approved the meeting minutes from December 2002 in Kansas City.
DSO Chairperson gave the report. Mostly talked about paralympics. US Paralympics developed an elite program in 21 of the Paralympics Sports including track and field. DSO addressed athletes with physical and visual disabilities are still refining their goals and where they fit into the US Paralympics plans. Chairperson encouraged associations need to put more effort into the involvement of the athletics with disabilities especially the youth.

Each committee reports were given. Here's the exact report I presented for USADTF.
  • It has been a quiet year for USA Deaf Track & Field. Earlier in the year, we had revised coaches and athletes criteria, which were set forth by USOC.
  • We selected Thomas Withrow as our 2005 Track & Field Deaflympics Head Coach to represent our team in Melbourne, Australia. Thomas has recruited five specialty coaches; Jesse Bailey of New Mexico, Don Boyer of Maryland, Willard Moers of Colorado, William Ramborger of South Carolina, and Karen Sanfacon of Virginia. The weekend before Thanksgiving, all 2005 Track & Field coaches came to DC for a coaches session. The main topics were to recruit athletes in various channels, brainstorm fundraising efforts, and use web based communication.
  • We were supposed to have Trials this coming June 2004, however due to the time frame of having the 2005 Deaflympics in January and athletes having only six months to fundraise approximately seven thousand dollars. USADTF felt it was not in the best interest of the athletes to do the Trials. Instead the method of hand-picked athletes based on their recent best performances will be used. At this moment, athletes are encouraged to submit their proof of performance and the deadline is January 5, 2004. Once selected, athletes will have mini-training camp in July 2004 prior to the Deaflympics.
  • This past summer we were unable to receive any type of grant monies. Therefore we were unable to provide our coaches any Level I and II coaching school education.
  • USADTF sent Tiffany Granfors for an onsite inspection in hopes to host 2006 Youth Panamdes at Disney Wide World of Sports. Currently, at this point, it is still under discussion.
  • Last month in November, we finally released new and revamped website. Our URL is www.usadtf.org.
  • This coming April and May, we will have Family Track and Field Games (FTFG) and hoping that eight schools will host this event. This event has its own purpose to select youth athletes to represent USA in Montréal, Canada for 3rd Youth Panamdes Games on August 7 to 15, 2004.
DSO has proposed that next year the competition rules for Disabled Sports will be included in the National Federation High School (NFHS) rulebook. Cynthia Doyle of Indiana who works for NFHS will be responsible for this. In the USATF rule book all of the adaptations for the disabled athletes are listed.
Last year, Eric Zemper of Michigan was supposed to make a video instructing officials how to deal with competition rules for disabled sports. Due to the cost of making video and timing, instead, Eric has made a power point slide show. Soon, around late January to February of 2004, slide show presentation will be available for downloading from the National Official website. Unfortunately we were not consulted about this. I double-checked to see if rules are correct for deaf athletes. Good thing that there are not many rules for deaf athletes. Only one small adaptation was the starting line.

Workshop Highlights:
The Pathophysiology of Dehydration by Dr. Doug Casa
It has long been preached to runners and all athletes that you should consume “as much fluid as possible” to ward off the demons of dehydration. Most recently, runners and medical staff have been told to limit hydration due to the potential dangers associated with overhydrating. Thus, we have a double-edged sword situation: drink enough fluids during activity to prevent dehydration but do not consume too much fluid, which would cause the potentially dangerous problem of hyponatremia.
Dehydration is caused by two distinct factors that may occur during exercise. One is the loss of fluids from sweat, urine, and respiration losses. The acute change of fluid stores from that of a steady-state condition of normal body water to that being something less than normal body water. Second is the fluid intake does not match up to fluid losses. This is when fluid consumption is less than fluid loss.
Dehydration occurs:
  • During moderate and intense activity – as the intensity of an activity increases, the sweat rate increases. Increasing intensity will likely decrease the amount of time the individual can focus on rehydration.
  • During activity in warm and hot conditions – as the temperature increases the sweat rate increase.
  • In those with high sweat rates – those individuals with high sweat rates will have the need to replenish more fluids for a certain time.
  • When proper hydration is not attained at the start – individuals begin an exercise session not properly hydrated, they may reach a dangerous dehydration level more rapidly.
  • During multiple practices the same day – the number of exercise sessions in a day increase this will increase the amount of fluid needed during the course of the day.
  • When there is poor vigilance – athletes who are not educated about the needs to properly hydrate will not actively pursue a proactive hydration protocol to address individual fluid needs.
  • In larger individual – person’s size influences sweat rate, so those who are larger will generally have a higher sweat rate.
In the absence of guidelines for optimum hydration, thirst can be a guiding factor. The sensation of thirst is a general indicator of dehydration. It is clear signal to drink.
Exertional Hyponatremia (low blood sodium) is caused by two distinct but often additive conditions that may arise during prolonged exercise, most often 4 hours or more. One is the excessive intake of fluid. Athletes ingest significantly more fluid then they lose in sweat and urine over a given period of time. Secondly, the ingestion of low-sodium fluids. Athletes drink fluids that are low in sodium.
Exertional Hyponatremia occurs:
  • In sports that last longer than four hours – this gives athletes more time to drink and to lose large amounts of sodium through prolonged sweating.
  • During lower-intensity endurance activities – where athletes have the opportunity to ingest large volumes of fluid.
  • When athletes drink large volumes of water without adequate sodium intake – blood sodium levels fall quickly whenever excess water is ingested.
There is a great performance benefit associated with proper hydration during exercise, but overdrinking must be avoided. Athletes who lose and replace fluids at equal rates greatly diminish the risk of Exertional Hyponatremia – especially, if they drink fluids that contain adequate sodium.
Optimum hydration is geared around the general premise that fluid intake should match fluid losses and that these processes are extremely individualized. The crux of this process is trying, to the best of your ability, to match fluid intake with fluid losses.

Sports Medicine & Science
Sports Medicine & Science committee panel had a six-year medical data report (including from all World Championships, Pan-Am, Trials, Youth, and Olympics) on injuries. The percentage of injuries occur in Training – 41%, Competition – 36%, Outside non-related sports – 18%, and other 5% are old injuries that are brought in before training begun.
With the above data one can see the need of medical staffing. The committee panel highly recommends 1 physician per 50-60 athletes, 1 certification athlete trainer per 25-30 athletes, and 1 licensed massage therapy per 25-30 athletes.
As you know the environmental conditions in Athens, Greece has high heat, humidity, and bad air pollution. Their air quality is similar to Los Angeles’ smog. Again, the same committee panel also recommends14 days to acclimate. USOC made a head start and has a training ground near Athens for most sports including track & field for athletes to train prior Olympic Games in August.

Exhibition Highlights:
Dartfish – Computer Assisted Video Analysis
I got the chance to see the newest software that could be the biggest achievement. In 2003 Dartfish became an official supplier of USATF. Dartfish is a leader in video processing software and will be used at USATF High Performance Centers throughout 2004 including the 2004 Olympic Trials and 2004 Olympic Games. Dartfish provides a powerful tool for analyzing performances. The following is an introduction to Dartfish Analyzer. You will learn to:
  • Load and view clips of throws
  • Synchronize clips for side by side comparison
  • Overlay clips for precise comparison
  • Use measurement tools to estimate stride length
  • Use measurement tools to estimate angles
  • Use measurement tools to estimate release velocity
It was amazing to see this video. I wished I had this during my discus, hammer, and shot put throwing prime days back then. Also this is a perfect tool for coaches who have a hard time telling stubborn athletes that they are doing the wrong way. For example if the athlete in shot put practice threw a good one. Then, next throw is a bad one. Two-overlay video will tell you the difference instantly!! This does not only imply for Track & Field, it’s great for other sports such as basketball, baseball, bowling, golf, skiing, soccer, swimming and many more! Check out www.dartfish.com. For track & field specific related, check out www.darttrack.com.

Defeet – Custom Socks
I own a lot of pair of Defeet socks. They are great and highly recommended. This company makes customs socks that have variety of colors to match your school colors and also add school’s logo on it. For runners, I suggest the Cush style sock, which has a little bit of padding in their socks. For more information, check out www.defeet.com.

Hall of Fame Highlights:
Four stars elected to the 2003 Hall of Fame inductees.


John Carlos

John was the winner of numerous national titles, but is best known for winning the bronze medal in the 200m at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City. The former world record holder at 100 yards and 200m.


Larry James

Larry won the 400m silver medal and a gold medal in the 4x400m relay at the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City. An NCAA champion while at Villanova and he is a former 400m world record holder.

Mike Larrabee
Who died on April 22, 2003 at age 69, will always be remembered for his amazing comeback win in the 400m a the 1964 Olympic Games in Tokyo. Also a gold medalist in the men's 4x400m relay in Tokyo. He tied the 400m world record (44.9 seconds) in winning the 1964 Olympic Trials in Los Angeles.


Mary Decker Slaney

Mary was the 1983 world champion in the women's 1500m and 3000m, beating Soviet athletes at the height of the Cold War in a feat that would bear her name as "The Decker Double". She set 36 national records and 17 official and unofficial world records at various distances.

  
2003 world champion decathlete Tom Pappas and long distance runner Deena Drossin Kastor were named 2003 Jesse Owens award recipients.

Women's high jumper Tisha Waller named Visa Humanitarian of the Year.

Double World Youth Athletics gold medalist Jason Richardson named the 2003 Verizon Youth Athlete of the Year.

Miscellaneous:
As you already know about USATF has developed a “zero tolerance” for substance abuse. USATF has teamed up with WADA (World Anti-Doping Agency) and USADA (United States Anti-Doping Agency) making documents to educate all athletes against the dangers of substance abuse in sport. By leveling the playing field they hope to attract additional athletes into track and field. Each athlete must realize the consequences, including a lifetime ban from the sport, for using banned substances, especially anabolic steroids. For parents, coaches, and athletes who want a brochure, you can call 1-800-233-0393 and ask for a free “The Journey” athlete toolkit. For more information regarding this, check out www.usantidoping.org. I highly recommended that you look into this.

____________________________________________________

2005 Deaflympics Track & Field Coaches Weekend

Coaches Weekend Report
November 21-23, 2003
Glenn Dale, Maryland

Probably for the first time ever, we had our USA Deaflympics Coaches gathered to plan the whole year prior to the 20th Deaflympics. The Head Coach, Thomas Withrow and the 5 Specialty Coaches, Jesse Bailey, Don Boyer, Willy Moers, Bill Ramborger and Karen Sanfacon met on November 21 through 23 at the Withrow's place.

Coaches kicked off by eating at a restaurant and caught up with each other. We, then, went to Thomas' place to start the weekend. We discussed the updated information that I learned from the House of Delegates - USADSF Conference. Issues being covered were the procedure of our team selection process, amount of fund required by athletes which at that moment was set at $6800 per athlete (this has gone down to mid $4000 unofficially now), goals being established by the Head Coach and each of Specialty Coaches. The meeting on Friday evening set the tone for the entire weekend.

On Saturday, coaches met again and went over those issues: We started with some trivial questions about Deaflympics history. It was a good refreshing time to recall the history.

Important Dates between now and the 20th Deaflympics
Coaches/Athletes/Other Personnel Network
Communication among the team members
Apparels/Equipment
Fund Raising projects
Athletes Application
Mandatory Training Camp in July
Prospective athletes being discussed
How to Prepare Our Athletes for the Competition Level

We wrapped up the entire issues on Sunday morning. We shared some thoughts, ideas and all those things. We decided we should meet again in sometime in May to go over all athletes being selected and to finalize all matters.

We discussed on importance of raising funds for the next meeting, ordering apparels, shoes and equipment. We agreed to proceed with the ESPN fund raising program and a few other things.

The Coaches Weekend left each coach with a positive and wonderful feeling and we felt confident and comfortable with things geared towards a stronger USA Deaflympics Track and Field team in 2005.

Interesting notes that we noticed that out of 6 coaches, 5 were former Deaflympians.

We all agreed that the USA Deaflympics Track and Field Coaching staff should meet 1 year in advance to prepare for the upcoming months. It brings a stronger bonding and good sense of how things are to be done. Better understanding of what are expected of them. Thomas believed that all 5 coaches left with good feeling and ready to go.

This concludes the Coaches Weekend report.

Gladly submitted,

Thomas Withrow, President
USA Deaf Track and Field

____________________________________________________

USADSF House of Delegates Meeting

USADSF House of Delegates
October 31 - November 2
Salt Lake City, Utah

All HoD and USADSF Board members arrived on either October 30 or 31. We had some snow during those days. It was nice to see white snow. Some members arrived late due to weather.

The HoD meeting began on Saturday morning with Bobbie Beth Scoggins welcoming us. Not all NSOs sent their representatives. There were only 7 NSOs, along with a few Ad Hoc groups. Bobbie Beth discussed the plan for the day. We began with divided groups into Summer Games, Winter Games and General Insurance information sharing. I attended the Summer Games session where Jack Lamberton, the VP of International Affairs, and Michele Berke , Summer USA Team Director, hosted and talked about up coming 20th Deaflympics in Melbourne. Jack filled us in with some general information on funds and expectations. Currently, we are not getting any financial assistance from USOC. At that point, Jack informed us all officially that the costs per athlete stands at $6800 which would cover lodging, meals, airfares, and training camp and apparels. (Note: the amount has gone down to $4500 as of a couple of weeks ago. USADSF made a commitment to raise $450,000 themselves) Michele took over when Jack concluded. Michele was quite comfortable and confident when presenting the information regarding to various aspects of USA team.

Hotel has been secured for the USA Team. 200 units have been reserved and it is within walking distance to 5 or 6 venues, including track/field facilities.

Jack and Michele talked about training camp. Tentatively, the USA team will meet in Los Angeles on December 26, 2004 and the team would go on a chartered airplane to Australia for our training camp at Australia Institute of Sports complex in the capital city - Canberra. The soccer team would move to Melbourne one day earlier for their first soccer match on January 4th. The rest of the team would be there in time for the Opening Ceremony on the 5th.

Apparels were discussed and Michele received some ideas. She will work with her committee on this. She shared that we need to come up with our own competition uniforms and any other apparels needed for our own sports.

The committee has came up with a better way of keeping tabs on our athletes' progress and data by having Stuart Ikeda developing a website for coaches, athletes and administrators to go to and update their portfolios. It is not up and running as of now. When it is, coaches can look up athletes for any updates on their fund raising, etc. Athletes would be able to feed data through this website, rather than using hard copies. For those who do not have access to the website, will get hard copies. However, Michele claimed that every athlete had an e-mail address back in 2001.

Michele continued discussing with NSOs individually. NSOs have different issues. USADTF and Michele (Jack was aware of this) agreed that USADTF will manage the funds collected from athletes and USADTF will make payments to the Summer Deaflympics Committee on a scheduled dateline.

Saturday afternoon, there was a clinic given by a lady who supposedly to be an expertise in fund-raising projects. She offered ideas. However, most of the ideas were not applicable for NSOs. What she was good in were for locals.

We went onto having NSO Council. We went over various businesses and reports were being announced with most of them pointing the reports being printed in the manuals. Basically, reports were made. Names were nominated for both Female and Male Athletes of the Year.

There was a discussion on past officers remaining as voting members. There were matters that we decided to refer to the board for further action.

On Sunday, there was a big debate about insurance and membership dues. USADSF Board has been struggling with skyrocketed insurance premiums after 9/11. The treasurer proposed that the membership due be increased to $25, a huge jump from current $10. There was no concrete supporting points to back the change. It was decided that we would have another HoD meeting during the USADBA Tournament in April in Salt Lake City. (I personally am concerned about this. Because not all NSOs will be there for obvious reasons, funds are low. So, the voting on increased membership dues may not reflect the true wish by all NSOs). We will wait to hear from USADSF for further information.

This concluded the USADSF HoD Conference report.

Respectfully submitted,

Thomas Withrow, President
USA Deaf Track and Field