Part I

Part II

BANK OF AMERICA MARATHON

CHICAGO IL – Bank of America today announced two-time women’s champion Berhane Adere (ETH) will attempt a first-ever three-peat at the 2008 Bank of America Chicago Marathon, while six-time top-three Chicago finisher Daniel Njenga (KEN) looks for his first win in the Windy City. The additions of Adere and Njenga complete the elite field for the Oct. 12 race.

Ethiopia’s Berhane Adere en route to her national
record 2:20:42 in Chicago [Photo: Victah Sailer]

Adere has thrilled Chicago fans the last two years winning back-to-back championships in the final stretches, most recently sprinting past an unaware Adriana Pirtea (ROU) in the final meters of the 2007 race. In 2006, Adere and Galina Bogomolova (RUS) trailed Constantina Tomescu-Dita (ROU) who led the field at record pace through the first 16 miles of the 26.2-mile course. Catching the Romanian in the 22nd mile, Adere and Bogomolova battled shoulder to shoulder until the Ethiopian edged into the lead and broke the tape only five seconds in front of runner-up Bogomolova.

Adding drama to the mix, Adere will face off against both Pirtea and Tomescu-Dita in the 31st running of the Bank of America Chicago Marathon. Tomescu-Dita arrives hot off an Olympic gold medal win in the women’s marathon in Beijing while her fellow Romanian Pirtea shaved five minutes off her marathon debut in Chicago last fall with a 2:28:52 in London in April.

Njenga is Chicago’s very own heartbreak kid, finishing second or third in each of his previous six consecutive Chicago appearances, including a third-place showing behind the photo finish of Patrick Ivuti (KEN) and Jaouad Gharib (MAR). Never losing to the same competitor twice, Njenga has placed behind Chicago champoins Ivuti, Robert K. Cheruyiot, Felix Limo, Evans Rutto and Khalid Khannouchi, virtually a who’s who of the world’s best marathon runners. Njenga is one of six men in the field who have posted personal bests below 2:07:00.

The announcement completes the field for the 2008 Bank of America Chicago Marathon. A complete start list follows.

2008 Bank of America Chicago Marathon Elite Field
Name Citizenship Personal Record

Women
Berhane Adere ETH 2:20:42
Bezunesh Bekele ETH 2:23:09
Alevtina Biktimirova RUS 2:25:12
Desiree Davila USA 2:37:50
Colleen De Reuck USA 2:26:35
Zoila Gomez USA 2:33:53
Lidiya Grigoryeva RUS 2:25:10
Kate O’Neill USA 2:36:15
Adriana Pirtea ROU 2:28:52
Kiyoko Shimahara JPN 2:26:14
Worknesh Tola ETH 2:25:37
Constantina Tomescu-Dita ROU 2:21:30

Men
Moses Arusei KEN 2:06:50
Christopher Cheboiboch KEN 2:08:17
Timothy Cherigat KEN 2:09:34
Evans Cheruiyot KEN 2:09:16
Joseph Chirlee KEN 2:12:10
Arata Fujiwara JPN 2:08:40
James Getanda KEN 2:11:50
Salim Kipsang KEN 2:07:29
William Kipsang KEN 2:05:49
Richard Limo KEN 2:06:45
David Mandago KEN 2:07:23
Emmanuel Mutai KEN 2:06:15
Daniel Njenga KEN 2:06:16
Michael Reneau USA 2:17:46
Todd Snyder USA 2:21:00

Bank of America Chicago Marathon
The 2008 Bank of America Chicago Marathon will start and finish in Chicago’s Grant Park beginning with the wheelchair race at 7:50 a.m. on Sunday, Oct. 12. Registration opened to the public on Feb. 1 and closed on April 23 when the participant capacity of 45,000 was reached. In advance of the race, a two-day Health & Fitness Expo will be held at McCormick Place on Friday, Oct. 10 and Saturday, Oct. 11. In its 31st year, the Bank of America Chicago Marathon annually attracts 45,000 runners, 1.5 million spectators and 125,000 Expo visitors and generates more than $10 million for charities. The Bank of America Chicago Marathon is one of the five races that comprise the World Marathon Majors. More information on the race and how to get involved is available at chicagomarathon.com.

Bank of America
Bank of America is one of the world’s largest financial institutions, serving individual consumers, small and middle market businesses and large corporations with a full range of banking, investing, asset management and other financial and risk-management products and services. The company provides unmatched convenience in the United States, serving more than 59 million consumer and small business relationships with more than 6,100 retail banking offices, more than 18,500 ATMs and award-winning online banking with more than 25 million active users. Bank of America offers industry leading support to more than 4 million small business owners through a suite of innovative, easy-to-use online products and services. The company serves clients in more than 150 countries and has relationships with 99 percent of the U.S. Fortune 500 companies and 83 percent of the Fortune Global 500. Bank of America Corporation stock (NYSE: BAC) is a component of the Dow Jones Industrial Average and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange.
www.bankofamerica.com

Out to prove herself again after Beijing

By Michael Butcher for the IAAF

Newcastle, UK – Anyone who has witnessed Gete Wami’s gutsy trademark runs knows that this is one athlete who has no fear of digging deep to get the best out of herself.

Gete Wami successfully defends in Berlin
[Photo: Bongarts]

That is why, when the field lines up on Sunday morning in Newcastle for the annual Bupa 13.1 Mile jaunt to the seaside in South Shields, that the compact Ethiopian will be the one to beat.

It is almost a year since the 33-year-old impressed the world with her double marathon feat of winning in Berlin before engaging in an epic battle just 35 days later with Paula Radcliffe through the streets of New York.

Radcliffe eventually won that titanic struggle and her shadow hangs over this race too since she holds the Tyneside course record of 65:40, a time that Wami has never challenged in her long career.

The Ethiopian’s best stands at 70:22 from Berlin two years ago while her best so far this year is outside 71mins when she finished third in Dubai.

Wami has something to live up to since there have been two previous Ethiopian winners of this race, the imperious Derartu Tulu three years ago, and former track star, Berhane Adere. Will Wami make it three out of four for the east African nation?

The only doubt hanging over her is the fact that she dropped out of the Olympic marathon in August. So there is an element of having to prove herself once again despite her experience.

Johnson, Tulu, Pavey… to challenge

If there is any sign of weakness there are plenty of candidates more than willing to turn the screw including former winners, Benita Johnson of Australia and Tulu herself who returns once more to the north-east.

Unlike Wami, Johnson finished the Olympic marathon, though in a lowly 21st, just ahead of Radcliffe, so there is more injured pride seeking a return to form since her glory year of 2004 when she streaked away with the World Cross Country title.

But there is one person who has trained specifically for this race who might trump them all, Britain’s Jo Pavey.

It is four years since the Exeter runner finished fourth here on her debut over the distance and she is determined to make amends for missing out on a top three spot. In the final mile she almost folded, but gathered herself to finish gamely.

After Beijing, where she contested the 10,000m,crossing the line 12th in a personal best 31:12.30, the 35-year-oldhas been putting in the miles to give herself the best chance possible of carrying off the honours on Tyneside.

“My training has been going well,” said Pavey, who suffered a bout of flu after the Games. “I’ve been completely focussed on being in the best shape possible for this challenge.”

Two weeks ago she topped up her preparation with some useful speed work by finishing third in a women’s Hyde Park 5km behind the Olympic 5000m bronze medallist, Meseret Defar (ETH).

Other contenders for the title are another Ethiopian Worknesh Kidane and Hungarian Anika Kalovics who proved she is in shape winning over the distance in Udine last month in 70:08.

Kibet the favourite in the men’s race

The men’s race welcomes the 2007 World Championships shock marathon champion, Luke Kibet of Kenya. It was the unsung Kibet who mastered near impossible conditions in Osaka to record only the second Kenyan World championship marathon victory in 20 years, setting the country up nicely for its first ever Olympic marathon men’s title this year through compatriot Sammy Wanjiru

Former Berlin, Chicago and London marathon champion Felix Limo (KEN), is also in the field while USA’s Abdi Abdirahman could figure prominently. The former Somalian is looking for a sharpener for his New York marathon appearance in a month’s time.

Kara Goucher became the first American women to win this race last year in its 27-year history. Is it Abdirahman’s turn to do likewise for the men?

Palin Administration Against Sudan Divestment Before It Was For It, Documents Show

By JUSTIN ROOD, ABC NEWS

Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin fought to protest atrocities in Sudan by dropping assets tied to the country’s brutal regime from the state’s multi-billion-dollar investment fund, she claimed during Thursday’s vice presidential debate.

Not quite, according to a review of the public record and according to the recollections of a legislator and others who pushed a measure to divest Alaskan holdings in Sudan-linked investments.

“The [Palin] administration killed our bill,” said Alaska state representative Les Gara, D-Anchorage. Gara and state Rep. Bob Lynn, R-Anchorage, co-sponsored a resolution early this year to force the Alaska Permanent Fund – a $40 billion investment fund, a portion of whose dividends are distributed annually to state residents to divest millions of dollars in holdings tied to the Sudanese government.

In Thursday’s debate, Palin said she had advocated the state divest from Sudan. “When I and others in the legislature found out that we had some millions of dollars [of Permanent Fund investments] in Sudan, we called for divestment through legislation of those dollars,” Palin said.

But a search of news clips and transcripts from the first three months of this year did not turn up an instance in which Palin mentioned the Sudanese crisis or concerns about Alaska’s investments tied to the ruling regime. Moreover, Palin’s administration openly opposed the bill, and stated its opposition in a public hearing on the measure.

“The legislation is well-intended, and the desire to make a difference is noble, but mixing moral and political agendas at the expense of our citizens’ financial security is not a good combination,” testified Brian Andrews, Palin’s deputy revenue commissioner, before a hearing on the Gara-Lynn Sudan divestment bill in February. Minutes from the meeting are posted online by the legislature.

Gara says the lack of support from Palin’s administration helped kill the measure.

“I walked out of that hearing livid,” Gara recalled of the February meeting. Because of the Palin administration’s opposition to the bill, “We could not get a vote in that committee,” he explained. At no point did Palin come out in support of the effort, Gara said.

The bill’s Republican co-sponsor remembers things differently. “I know she was very strongly behind this,” said Rep. Lynn. Asked why, if Palin supported the bill, one of her administration’s officials would speak against it, Lynn demurred. “We don’t all work in lockstep here,” he said. “People have different opinions,” he added.

Lynn said he and Palin agreed to re-introduce the bill next January, and push to pass it then. He declined to consider whether stronger support from Palin would have helped the bill survive this winter. “I’m not going to do this what if, what if, what if,” he said. “These are hypotheticals.”

Gara said that after it was clear the bill had stalled, he and others pressed the administration directly on Sudan divestment.

“We were outraged,” Gara recounted. “We went to the Commissioner of Revenue and said, ‘What the hell are you guys doing? This is genocide. We’re going to keep pushing this until we divest.”

Two months later, at the end of the legislative session, the administration softened its position. Appearing before a Senate committee which was considering a companion measure to Gara’s bill, Palin’s Revenue commissioner, Patrick Galvin, stated the administration supported such a measure, though it hoped to amend the bill to allow for investments held indirectly, for example in index funds.

“We have a moral responsibility to condemn the genocide in Darfur,” Palin told a reporter in April, through a spokesperson. “I commend the actions of the Senate State Affairs Committee and I hope the entire legislature gets a chance to weigh in on this matter.”

“At the last minute they showed up” and supported the divestment effort, Gara said. But by then the legislative session was almost over, and there wasn’t enough time to get it passed.

The Alaska Permanent Fund currently holds $22 million in Sudan-linked investments, according to the non-profit Sudan Divestment Task Force. Divestment advocates say the fund does not need an act of the state legislature to divest itself of those holdings.

The McCain-Palin campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., has been a strong supporter of Sudan divestment efforts, and has urged Americans to liquidate their holdings in companies who do business there. He was criticized for that position when it was revealed in May his wife Cindy held $2 million in investment funds owning shares of Sudan-linked companies. She sold those holdings following a reporter’s inquiries.

ADDIS ABABA, ETHIOPIA (APA)

The Ethiopian authorities on Friday evening announced the increase of fuel prices by lifting subsidies, despite a decline of the price of oil in the international market.

The new tariff on fuel will be implemented on Saturday, which is also expected to lead to a rise in transport fares and the prices of other commodities, including food prices.

The Ethiopian Ministry of Trade and Industry said in a statement issued here Friday that the government has decided to increase the oil price to avoid any subsidy on oil.

The ministry indicated that the government used to subsidize oil by investing hundreds of millions of dollars annually.

“This new tariff was introduced to lift the government’s subsidy on oil, which has been made during the past several years. Now, the government has decided to subsidize food items instead of oil,” the statement said.

Accordingly, the statement said, the government increased the price of benzene from 9 birr and 65 cents to 10 Birr and 15 cents, which makes the price to exceed one US dollar for the first time.

(CNN) – A national poll of people who watched the vice presidential debate Thursday night suggests that Democratic Sen. Joe Biden won, but also says Republican Gov. Sarah Palin exceeded expectations.

The CNN/Opinion Research Corp. said 51 percent of those polled thought Biden did the best job, while 36 percent thought Palin did the best job.

But respondents said the folksy Palin was more likable, scoring 54 percent to Biden’s 36 percent. Seventy percent said Biden was more of a typical politician.

Both candidates exceeded expectations — 84 percent of the people polled said Palin did a better job than they expected, while 64 percent said Biden also exceeded expectations.

How Palin would perform had been a major issue for the Alaska governor, who had some well-publicized fumbles during interviews with CBS’ Katie Couric leading up to the debate.

Respondents thought Biden was better at expressing his views, giving him 52 percent to Palin’s 36 percent. iReport.com: Tell us who you think did best

On the question of the candidates’ qualifications to assume the presidency, 87 percent of those polled said Biden is qualified and 42 percent said Palin is qualified.

The candidates sparred over which team would be the better agent of change, and Biden came out on top of that debate, with 53 percent of those polled giving the nod to the Delaware senator while 42 percent said Palin was more likely to bring change.

Respondents overwhelmingly said moderator Gwen Ifill was fair during the vice presidential debate, repudiating critics who said that Ifill, of PBS, would be biased because she is writing a book that includes Biden’s running mate, Sen. Barack Obama.

Ninety-five percent of those polled said Ifill was fair.

The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

Obama was selected as a winner over Republican Sen. John McCain in a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll on the September 26 presidential debate.