USA Deaf Track and Field sent three (3) representatives to the 21st USATF Conference in Mobile, Alabama.  They were Willy Moers (elite athlete), Karen Sanfacon (coach) and Thomas Withrow (USADTF President).  We all were the 1st timers.  USADTF Secretary Tiffany Granfors went to the conference the previous 2 years.  Tiffany has paved the road for us this year using her contacts from those 2 conferences. 

Upon arrival, we were impressed with how things were set up for everything from exhibits to registration booths to workshops.  However, we were faced a situation with interpreters where we were limited to just two (2) interpreters for 3 of us.  I confronted the interpreter coordinator and she called Thomas McLean, USATF Executive Director.  Thomas was very good with this and authorized to fund additional interpreters).  The situation improved greatly as the conference progressed. 

We attended several workshops and we were able to spread out ourselves to several rooms with additional interpreters. 

I had the opportunity to meet Mr. McLean, we greeted each other for the first time after several conversations via e mails.  We clicked immediately and agreed to a sit down meeting which was set up for that Friday at noon.  Willy was able to join us.  We had a good 50 minutes meeting and covered a good deal of issues.  More on this down below. 

Karen Sanfacon, a Long Distance coach, met with some people in LD.  She was fortunate to have met Tom Cotner the chairperson for the US Cross Country National Championship which took place in Mobile.  Tom and I talked about our interest in resume our CC championship.  Suddenly, Mr. Grissom, the USATF LD coordinator, came to us and agreed to bring the issue to his board meeting to see if they would be willing to include our Deaf runners in their meet(s) in near future.  We were talking about a couple of years down the road.  That night, Tom came to me excitedly to inform us that the motion has passed to include us in the very next US Nationals in Sacramento next year (2002).  We were flabbergasted.  Now, we need to gather a good number of Cross Country runners to participate.  More on this within next few months. 

Another interesting workshop was the Throws.  We listened to some lectures given by people like Harold Connely (last USA gold medalist in Hammer) and USATF Shot Put leader, Rob Lasorsa.  One thing led to other. We were discussing about Physical Education issue national-wide.  We all agreed that PE needs to be implemented back into secondary curriculum and make it a 4 year requirement toward graduation.  A national wide task force is being in works now.  USATF stated that based on overall researches, it shows that earlier an athlete learn how to do things, the higher performance they are likely to accomplish later on.  Europeans teach athletes fundamentals at early age.  The earliest age recommended was around 10 years old. 

USATF and USADTF are working toward a closer relationship.  The first sign of this was a good lengthy meeting with the Executive Director, Thomas McLean.We talked about things such as interpreting issues, workshops on Deaf athletes for next USATF conference, better communication channel, possible support for 2005 Deaflympics and many other things.  We came to a point where we are invited to participate in an all-important meeting with all Association representatives (a total of 102 reps).  We will represent USA DEAF TRACK & FIELD which will separate us from the Disability group that USATF has in place. USATF has recognize our unigue needs and Thomas wants us to present to the reps about our needs and how we may work together to utilize resources where the Deaf athletes in mainstream would benefit. This is a golden opportunity for us to proceed one step further  We agreed that we will meet in Indianapolis sometime in March for meeting with CRAIG MASBACK, the CEO and Thomas himself and a few other USATF Representatives to discuss on how we can strengthen our relationship and be actively involved in USATF. USADTF is very pleased to see something like this happening and will keep the readers up to date as they come. (Editor's note: Tiffany Granfors and Thomas Withrow are flying to Indianapolis on March 6th for a meeting.  Further report will be forthcoming.) 

On the Friday evening, we attended the USATF banquet.  All VIP people were there including John Godina, Maurice Green, Andy Webb and Stacy Dragilia.  We were pleased to have met with Maurice Green. He came to us after Willy and I waved to him.  Interesting note is that the Deaf World Record holder in 100m and the World Record holder in 100m are Wendel Gaskin and Maurice Green, respectively.  They live in SAME city - Kansas City.  They have trained together at times. 

Finally, we observed the US Cross Country Championship.  We now have a better idea what it might look next year when some Deaf CC runners participate in the event.  More information on our participation in the USATF CC Nationals is forthcoming. 

Hope this report has given you ample view of what has happened and what might to come. 

USADTFly yours, 

Thomas Withrow, President 
USA Deaf Track and Field