1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

[Guest]

Recently I met an individual who publicly claimed he was a member of the 1980 U.S. Olympic track & field team. I approached him after a banquet and he claimed to have qualified in the 10,000. I have been unable to find his name associated with any rankings or meets from that era (last name Julian).

Looking for some help here. Does anyone have a list of the entrants and top finishers in the 1980 trials 10,000? I would like to see if this guy is legit.

[hj197steve]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

It appears he is a total out and out ****ing liar. No "Julian" in 1980 FOT 10,000, and no "Julian" on entire US list in 10k for that year.

[Guest]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

Amen, that is exactly what I thought. As a former collegiate runner, I thought he was also a %$#@ liar but refrained from saying so. It was convenient that he picked the only Olympics we boycotted. His other great line of b.s. was that he once ran a sub 4 mile in route to a 10K finish. I knew he was bogus on that one but wanted to confirm completely. thanks for your help.

[Conor Dary]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

The qualifiers in 1980 in the 10k were Virgin, Salazar and I think Fredericks. Definitely no Julian.

[Track fan]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

That sub 4 minute while doing 10 K is laughable the two mile was recently or still is above eight?(Not sure the race is run infrequently) Either way I would have laughed his ass off. It would have been even funnier if he had a mesomorph build and weighed 250 pounds........

[kuha]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

Piling on is such fun! Hjsteve may have already covered this ground, but it's a fact that there was no "Julien" in the 10,000 at all--not even among the DNFs (who happen to have been Paul Geis and Stan Vernon--and yes, I admit it, I looked that up--so sue me already). This reminds me of a guy Conor Dary & I knew 30 years ago who claimed to have been on a WR Villanova relay squad a few years earlier. When we pointed out that his name wasn't in the record books, he responded by saying that he was a "last minute" addition to the team, etc. It's amazing how "normal" psycopathic liars can seem. My question is: why do people lie about things like this? Only .003% (that's an EXACT figure) of the US popular would even CARE that someone made the '80 10,000 team, but--and this is the clincher--of that pathetic number, fully 86% (another EXACT number) could easily test the claim to see if was true. So, basically, the only ones who would believe Mr. Liar-Liar-Pants-on-Fire Julien would be the ones who didn't care one way or the other. We need more federal budget money for research into Athletic Munchhousen (sp?) Syndrome.

[Pego]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

Herr Baron Munchhausen.

[Guest]

Re: 1980 Olympic trials in Eugene

I have always just referred to '80 as the Trials, as it was known that there would be no US team. Given the parameters, it was still a pretty cool meet. My favorite impression of the meet was the ever energenic Karin Smith helping the cleaning crew sweep out the stands.

[Truth Squad]

Re: 1980 "Olympic trials" in Eugene

>I have always just referred to '80 as the Trials, as it was known that there would be no US team.<

And I have never referred to people who succeeded in those Trials as Olympians. To me, an Olympian is one who participates in the Olympics. The USOC prevented these individuals from participating in the Olympics by yielding to Pres. Carter's request to boycott. This organization then compounded its cowardice with a remarkable display of dishonesty when it decided that it would refer to its non-Olympic team as an Olympic team and call the athletes Olympians. The meet in Eugene was not an Olympic trials meet and these athletes were not Olympians. The USOC disrespected the English language and perpetrated a fraud on the public by proclaiming otherwise. And to this day, they have never confessed error and they continue to refer to these innocent victims of their own evil policy as Olympians. Shame on them.

[MJD]

Re: 1980

The following is an email that my wife got from a co-worker last spring. There are any number of things wrong with it starting with the fact that the weekend in question did not have a marathon in Montreal:

"I ran the race in 3:04:56 and placed 274 out of 8700 participants which was
a full 42km marathon. I did qualify for Chicago with being under the 3:10
qualifying goal. I have never been to Montreal before and there was so much
to do at night time so I did not get to bed early enough Saturday night
1:15am. I was still a bit tired and did not push to my full extent and
figure I could of came closer to 3 hrs flat with more rest but I did enjoy
myself the whole weekend."

[kuha]

Re: 1980

Re: the above. Thanks, Pego, for the correct spelling. And it's to T&FN's credit that they went clearly against public opinion at the time (1980) in expressing their disagreement with Carter's Olympic boycott. If it wasn't obvious then, it's quite evident now that their stance was exactly right. As we all know, the '80 boycott robbed a generation of American athletes of their chance for public recognition.

[Pego]

Re: 1980

I never forgave Jimmy Carter for that arrogant act. It ruined 2 OG's plus a lot more in addition to what Kuha already stated.

[Track fan]

Re: 1980

I really feel sorry for the people who were in their primes in 80' for the rest of their lives they will never know what might have been.......

[Jack Philips]

Re: 1980

Carter was to blame and there were many athletes who suffered from the boycott. I especially felt badly for Edwin Moses. I believe he would have had three Olympic golds in-a-row and almost a fourth in Seoul. We'll never know.

[kuha]

Re: 1980

Moses could almost have run backward and won the '80 gold medal. He was clearly robbed. One can also speculate that athletes like Don Paige, Steve Scott, Henry Marsh, Craig Virgin, Renaldo Nehemiah, Tony Sandoval, Larry Myricks, Willie Banks, Mac Wilkins, etc., etc., would have had a fighting chance (or better) to be in the medal hunt. In terms of the Olympics, this is the Lost Generation of American track.