For U.S. Olympic track, multiple setbacks in one very bad

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For U.S. Olympic track, multiple setbacks in one very bad day



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Olivier Morin / AFP

Kerron Stewart, second from left, of Jamaica edges out Lauryn Williams, left, Torri Edwards, second from right and Muna Lee, right, all of the U.S., to finish in third place in the women's 100-meter dash final.


[COLOR=#333333! important]No medal in the women's 100, no finalists in men's 1,500 or men's high jump: It's one disappointment after another.[/COLOR]
[COLOR=#999999! important]By Philip Hersh, Special to The Times
August 18, 2008 [/COLOR]
BEIJING -- It was barely 8 a.m. Sunday when 2004 Olympic bronze medalist Deena Kastor dropped out of the marathon after just three miles with what turned out to be a broken foot.

That was only the first setback of a day in which the U.S. track team had one failure follow another for 15 hours.

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"The sky is not falling, but it's not a good start," said Doug Logan, who took over as chief executive of USA Track & Field a month ago.

"It is early in my tenure, it is early in the Games, but as a fan of U.S. track and field, of course I'm concerned."

This is why:


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* No medal in the women's 100, as Jamaica became the first country to sweep the event, while defending silver medalist Lauryn Williams of the U.S. took fourth.

* No finalist in the men's 1,500, as reigning world champion Bernard Lagat did not get out of the Sunday semifinals while his U.S. teammates, flag bearer Lopez Lomong and Leonel Manzano, each finished last in his heat.

* No finalist in the men's high jump final for the first time in Olympic history, other than the boycotted 1980 Games, as top U.S. jumper Andra Manson was 13th in qualifying for a 12-person final.

* Only one woman, Sanya Richards, moving into the finals of the 400 meters, a race in which the U.S. had the maximum three finalists in the 2004 Olympics.

* A halt to the progress the United States has been making in distance running, as Galen Rupp's team-leading 13th in the men's 10,000 was lower than the best U.S. finish in the last two Olympics.

* Saturday, the leading U.S. finisher in the men's long jump qualified 18th, meaning no finalist in that event for the first time in non-boycotted history.

"It is very humbling," Williams said. "We're getting a pretty good taste of what it's like to be at the bottom, and it's going to make us hungry to get back to the top.

"We are always in the forefront of the sprints, and for Jamaica to take it over from us, we're not going to take that lightly."

Shelly-Ann Fraser joined another 21-year-old, men's winner Usain Bolt, as the first Jamaicans to win an Olympic 100-meter title. Fraser had a personal-best 10.78 seconds in the women's final, while Sherone Simpson and Kerron Stewart tied for second in 10.98.

Williams (11.03) finished just ahead of U.S. Olympic trials winner Muna Lee (11.07). Torri Edwards, who had the world leading time this season coming into the Olympics, was last in 11.20.

"It stinks," Lee said, "but we will bounce back."

To Logan, having Jamaica sweep the U.S. out of the 100 medals was "more meaningful than the other disappointments."

This was the first time -- with an asterisk -- that no U.S. woman wound up with a medal in the Olympic 100 since 1976. Marion Jones won the 2000 gold, only to lose it when she finally admitted to doping last year, and the United States boycotted the 1980 Moscow Games.

"It's quite bizarre," British runner Jeannette Kwakye, who finished sixth, said of the U.S. medal shutout.

"We definitely need something to turn our morale around," Williams said.

That could come Monday night, when the U.S. men have a chance to sweep the 400-meter hurdles.

When Friday's opening day of the Olympic track meet ended with Shalane Flanagan's surprise bronze medal in the 10,000, it was easy to forget an earlier sub-par performance in the shot put.

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U.S. men recently had been dominating the event to the point that there was talk of a sweep, but Christian Cantwell wound up salvaging a medal with a final throw that moved him from fifth to second.

"We have to reflect on what went wrong after getting spanked like this," Cantwell said.

Blake Russell (27th) was the only U.S. finisher in the marathon, won by Romania's Constantina Tomescu. The third U.S. entrant, Magdalena Lewy-Boulet, dropped out after 12 miles with stiffness in her knee.


FEATURE GALLERIES FROM THE OLYMPIC GAMES Ouch! Kobe Mania Jammin' Pride


Although Lagat had struggled in Friday's opening round, his elimination in the semis still was stunning, even if he missed advancing by just .02 seconds while finishing sixth in his heat.

He spent too much energy trying to get out of trouble in both rounds and simply lacked the kick that helped him win 2007 world titles in the 1,500 and 5,000.

Lagat made tactical miscalculations rare for a runner who dictated the way races were run a year ago, and his body did not respond the way he needed. That has left him wondering whether to run the 5,000 beginning Wednesday.

"I had my strategy going in," Lagat said, "but things didn't fall into place."

Not on a day when one thing after another fell apart for Team USA.

Philip Hersh covers Olympic sports for the Times and the Chicago Tribune

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World’s Fastest county? It’s Jamaica, mon

By Josh Peter, Yahoo! Sports 2 hours, 20 minutes ago

• Buzz Up
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BEIJING – Once the superpower of sprinting, America is succumbing to a country with less than one percent of the U.S. population. That’s because the 2.8 million people living in Jamaica now include the fastest men and women in the world.
A day after Usain Bolt became the first Jamaican to win the gold medal in the 100 meters, a trio of Jamaicans became the first in Olympic history to capture all three medals in the women’s 100 final. Running into a slight headwind, Shelly-Ann Fraser won the race in 10.78 seconds, the fastest time recorded this year. Her teammates, Kerron Stewart and Sherone Simpson, finished in a dead heat for the silver.
“For us to get 1-2-3, Jamaica’s saying something,’’ Stewart said. “And they need to pay attention.’’
Though Stewart never specified who “they’’ are, it’s safe to assume she’s referring to the Americans, three of whom qualified for the women’s 100 final but left the track in frustration and disgrace.


It was the first time since 1976 the U.S. team has been shut out of a medal in the women’s 100. (That excludes the 1980 Games in Moscow, which the United States boycotted, and the gold medal Marion Jones won in the 100 at the 2000 Olympics but had to forfeit after admitting she used banned performance-enhancing substances.)
Following the 100 final here Sunday night, USA Track & Field lodged a protest claiming the race should not have been run because American Torri Edwards false-started when she appeared to flinch before the gun sounded. But the protest was rejected by the International Association of Athletics Federation (IAAF), which governs track and field. And so the Americans lost yet again in the face of a staggering reality.
The United States boasts a population of about 300 million, not to mention past 100-meter gold medalists such as Carl Lewis, Gail Devers and Florence Griffith-Joyner, who established a dominance that’s quickly crumbling against a country a mere fraction of America’s size.
After the completion of the men’s and women’s 100, the Jamaicans have four medals in the sprints. Bolt won the men’s 100 on Saturday in 9.69 seconds, a new world record, despite showboating the final 20 meters. Jamaica’s Asafa Powell, who finished fifth, held the world record of 9.74 seconds before Bolt lowered it to 9.72 in May.
The Americans have won just one medal in the sprints – the bronze Walter Dix took in the men’s final.
“We’ve had a long history of sprinting,’’ said Don Quarrie, a retired Jamaican sprinter who finished second to Hasely Crawford of Trinidad in the 100 final at the 1976 Games. Quarrie is one of six Jamaicans who settled for Olympic silver before Bolt’s transcendent performance and before Jamaica struck gold again Sunday.
“This is a crazy Bolt effect,’’ Fraser said. “The secret of the team’s success: reggae power.’’
But that doesn’t fully explain what has transpired during the opening three days of competition in track and field. Not only is Jamaica considerably smaller than the United States, it’s also considerably poorer. That has left the Caribbean country to make due with inferior facilities partially offset by the sprinters’ passion.
Behind soccer, track ranks as the sport of choice for Jamaicans. And some might assume there’s something in their genes. Donovan Bailey, the 1996 Olympic gold medalist in the 100, and Ben Johnson, who won the gold medal in the 100 at the 1988 Games only to be stripped of it when he tested positive for steroids, were both born in Jamaica.
Now Jamaicans no longer have to fret about the native-born sons who won gold for another country.
“I think the future is going to look even brighter because now everybody is going to want to sprint,’’ said Quarrie, a technical adviser for the Jamaican track team. “So it’s only going to get better.’’
Dr. Herb Elliott, a member of the IAAF’s anti-doping commission and a Jamaican, said the country’s gold medal performances in the sprints should be no surprise.
“We have a number of doctors who have looked at these guys, and we are not changing them because they have natural speed,’’ Elliot said. “…You want to see something? Come to Kingston when we have our high school national championships. If you come there on a Saturday of the championships, and you come there after 11 o’clock, you won’t get through. The stadium will be packed.’’
But for those focused on the National Stadium here in Beijing, Don Anderson, the head of Jamaica’s Olympic delegation, suggested something else.
“Look for more,’’ he said. He meant more gold medals.
Bolt is the favorite in the men’s 200. Veronica Campbell-Brown, a Jamaican who won the 200 at the 2004 Olympics, is expected to contend with American Allyson Felix for the gold in that event. Then comes the 4x100 relays. Each time the Jamaicans triumph, reggae music will blast through the speakers.
The U.S. sprinters and everyone else better get used to the sound.
Josh Peter is a writer for Yahoo! Sports. Send Josh a question or comment for potential use in a future column or webcast.

[Sir X]

Don't patronise us, says Jamaican chief

Jessica Halloran | August 18, 2008

THE medical chief of the Jamaican sprint factory, Dr Herb Elliott, has rubbished suspicions that drug use may be behind Usain Bolt's incredible win in the 100 metres in 9.69 seconds, declaring the victory a product of knowledge.
In the minutes following the world-record sprint, Elliott was cornered by the media and he revealed Bolt had been tested six times since arriving in Beijing on August 1.
Elliott, who also has a doctorate in biochemistry, said Jamaica's doors were open to those who were suspicious.
"I don't care about the rumours. He's been tested over and over again," Elliott said. "I say come down and see our program, come down and see our testing, come down and see how we operate, we have nothing to hide. Come anytime. Day or night.
"The athletes who train abroad are more likely to come home with problems. We've caught four of them so far. All training in America."
In response, a journalist asked: "So the evil is in America?"
"No, they were not strong enough to tell somebody to go to hell," Elliott answered. "Let's face it, there are gurus out there trying to tell people if you take this pill you will run fast. What you do is I tell them [to say], 'I am going to call Jamaica to talk to my doctor about this' … they can do that."
Of the eight men who lined up in the 100 final on Saturday night, three were Jamaican. Bolt's friend Asafa Powell, one-time world record holder, again struggled on the major championship stage, finishing fifth. Michael Frater finished sixth.
With a population of 2.65 million, Jamaica's track-and-field team is a small one - 52 members - but 41 are sprinters. They are medal contenders in the women's 100, the men's and women's 200, the women's 100 hurdles and the 4x100 relays.
Athletics world governing body, the IAAF, is the only organisation that undertakes widespread testing in Jamaica and the island is the fifth-most tested nation.
Jamaica's long-awaited first fully functioning anti-doping body - the Jamaican Anti-Doping Commission (Jadco) - was approved for establishment on August 11.
Elliott, who is the vice president of the Jamaican track federation, and a member of the IAAF medical and anti-doping commission, has been named as a member of Jadco.
Elliott said that over the years Jamaica had accumulated knowledge and employed those with the best expertise in the sport - not cheated the system.
"What we didn't have, we would invite in," Elliott said. "For example, I found out that a certain guy was an authority on hamstring injuries, so I went to see him, spent time with him, then [brought] him to Jamaica to lecture, that's how we do it."
He hoped that the "condescending" myth that Jamaicans had little idea about how to manufacture sprint stars was now debunked. "We know as much as the other people about physiology in general," he said. "They think that down there we don't know what we are doing, but we know what we are doing."
Referring to the unnamed doubters, he said: "Oh yes, they are very condescending. They don't realise that many of us studied abroad at the best universities and we're top students. So when they come with that condescending bull**************** we just dismiss them."
Elliott, who first saw Bolt sprint as a 13-year-old, believed his brilliance was a rare gift. "Usain Bolts of Jamaica come once a century," he said.
And how fast could Bolt have run had he not soaked up victory before the finish line? "I don't know," he said. "He's never done it [before]."

[Sir X]

Reggae power and Bolt spur Jamaican women

• <LI class=publication>Reuters
• , Sunday August 17 2008

By Nick Mulvenney
BEIJING, Aug 17 (Reuters) - Shelly-Ann Fraser credited the power of reggae and the inspiration of compatriot Usain Bolt for the Jamaican sweep of the women's 100 metres medals at the Beijing Olympics on Sunday.
The 21-year-old Fraser won Jamaica's first gold medal in the women's blue riband sprint with Sherone Simpson and Kerron Stewart both taking silver after officials were unable to separate them in a photo finish.
"When I crossed the line and saw Sherone and Kerron there -- that was the moment. I wouldn't trade it for anything else," Fraser told reporters.
"Oh my God! That is too much. The secret of the team's success: reggae power."
Fraser said Bolt's explosive world record run to win Jamaica's first men's Olympic 100 metres title on Saturday had inspired her victory.
"Last night was amazing, it was crazy," she said. "I wanted to come out and do the same thing."
After the race, American Torri Edwards said she thought she had false started and U.S Track and Field appealed against the result. The International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) rejected the protest.
"I wasn't aware of anything going on about the false start, I just heard about it after I finished," said Fraser. Stewart was in the next lane to former world champion Edwards and acknowledged there had been movement.
"She was closer to me so I felt the false start but the race is over, there is nothing we can do about it. Jamaica came out on top," the 24-year-old said.
"I can't say it hurt me because I got a medal."
Jamaica has never been short of female sprinting talent.
Marlene Ottey won multiple Olympic medals, none of them gold, while Juliet Cuthbert won silver in Barcelona in 1992.
Tanya Lawrence finished on the podium in Sydney in 2000 and now has a silver after winner Marion Jones's medals were taken away from her for a doping offence.
Veronica Campbell-Brown, who was unable to make the 100 metres team for Beijing despite being the world champion, won bronze in Athens four years ago.
"It means a great deal for Jamaica, so many women before us came so close," said Fraser.
"It's a great accomplishment. Coming into the Olympics, people thought we weren't as experienced. Give us a chance -- we make the best of it."
(Additional reporting by Ken Wills, John Chalmers and Gene Cherry, editing by Ralph Gowling)
(For more stories visit our multimedia website "Road to Beijing" at http://www.reuters.com/news/sports/2008olympics; and see our blog at http://blogs.reuters.com/china)


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Usain Bolt: a Jamaican miracle




(Photographer: Dylan Martinez)



Usain Bolt of Jamaica celebrates gold







Rick Broadbent in Beijing

div#related-article-links p a, div#related-article-links p a:visited {color:#06c;}Video: watch Usain Bolt in the 100metres final
In the bowels of the Bird's Nest stood a grey-haired man quoting General Patton and likening Usain Bolt to Marian Anderson, the contralto famed for performing on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial. Yet this man was Jamaican and dismissive of American lures, citing the racism he suffered there to the drugs his athletes took as reasons for staying home. All this while, the debate raged about Jamaica's lack of an anti-doping federation.
“When I studied in the States, I thought, ‘I don't need your condescending crap',” he said. “Now they still think we don't know anything down in Jamaica.” They clearly know something and Herb Elliott, the Jamaican team doctor and member of the IAAF anti-doping commission, invited the suspicious to investigate. “Come down and see our programme, come down and see our testing, we have nothing to hide,” he said after Bolt had just changed the parameters of the 100 metres by dipping below 9.7 seconds.
“Those [Jamaican] people who got caught were training abroad. They were not strong enough. I don't know of any Jamaican doctor who has given an anabolic steroid injection, but others have sold their soul.” While it sounds simplistic to suggest Jamaican-born athletes such as Trevor Graham, Ben Johnson and Linford Christie ran into trouble only because they left a drug-free haven, Glen Mills, Bolt's coach, said that a positive test would force Bolt to flee his homeland. “Jamaica's a violent place,” he said. The new sensation has been tested seven times since he has been in Beijing, but Elliott says that the IOC needs to prove that the miracle was real.

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Jamaica celebrated wildly and Bob Marley's son, Julian, played a gig in Beijing. Marc Burns, seventh in the final and a close friend, said that Bolt could run 9.55 and that the rest would need “a small automobile” to keep pace.
Richard Thompson, the runner-up, said: “I could see him slowing down and I was still pumping to the line. He's a phenomenal athlete.” Mills said that the 200 metres remains “his comfort zone”, which is bad news for the others in that field because Bolt slowed down after 80 metres on Saturday, put his arms out in celebration and thumped his heart. “That's me,” he said. “I like to have fun and stay relaxed. I didn't even know I had the record until I'd done my victory lap.” Elliott has known Bolt since he was 10 and paraphrased Patton to explain the laid-back approach. “Any man who dies for his country is a damned fool,” he said. “Better to make the other guy die for his.”
They were dying little deaths all over the track in the greatest 100 metres in history as six men went under ten seconds. “Toscanini said Marian Anderson's contralto voice comes along every 100 years,” Elliott went on. “And a guy like Usain Bolt comes along once a century.”
So how did this happen? Bolt bucks convention. At 6ft 5in, he should be too tall to be a sprinter. “People think you have to be short, strong and stocky to be a great sprinter and Usain Bolt has defied that,” Thompson said. “It's the beginning of something else.” He eats poorly as evinced by his pre-miracle routine. “I never had breakfast,” he said. “I woke up at 11 o'clock, sat around and watched TV, then had some chicken nuggets, slept for two hours, then went back and got some more nuggets.” He completed 9.69sec of magic with a shoelace undone.
Bolt is only 21, but he is no rookie. “People think he came from nowhere, but he won the world junior title when he was 15 and then grew 1½ inches and we had to back off,” Elliott said. Last year, he won silver in the 200metres at the World Championships.
Jamaica has form, too - Don Quarrie's 200 metres title in 1976 being the highlight - but Bolt and Asafa Powell have taken sprinting to a new level, while the women have continued to excel. Much of it is down to Mills and Stephen Francis. Mills has Jamaica's Order of Distinction for his work, and now runs the IAAF-backed High Performance Centre in Kingston. Francis, Powell's coach, is one of the co-founders of MVP (Maximising Velocity and Power), set up in 1999 to stop the brawn drain to the US. “Our athletes were coming back tired and drained after scholarships,” Elliott said.
“It was the same when I was there. You race too much and get burnt out. I'd complain and they'd say I was an uppity black man. Usain doesn't get that bull**************** in Jamaica.” The Jamaican Prime Minister phoned Bolt and Powell on Saturday, but the Government was no help when Francis had to sell his car to make ends meet as he tried to keep the best Jamaican talent at home.
It has paid off, but nature is as much a factor as nurture and, according to Burns, Bolt is a freak of it. Unfortunately while Jamaica has no anti-doping federation, there will be lingering suspicion. Whatever, the final was astonishing. Breaking the world record on your fifth senior run at 100 metres was one thing, but this was mesmerising. “He's still got a long way to go,” Mills said.
He also has God on his side. “I pray each night to keep me strong,” Bolt said. “They say He helps them who help themselves.” For his next trick,he may help himself to Michael Johnson's 200metres record.

• Have your say

I'm an american black woman and me and my fiance watched and we celebrated this young man's win, it was a very emotional win for him and family. We did'nt see race this man deserves to be champ, once again congratulations. To Jamaica hold your head high. We love you in the states, much respect.

Tonya Caldwell, Detroit, usa

"The Bolt" must try for the best 100m world record ever before he gets too old!

Owen, SG,

These insinuations of drug use by Bolt are mean spirited and disgusting. The fact is that Jamaica has a very long tradition of excellence in athletics. The excellent climate and good food are contributing factors. But the real "secret' behind Jamaica's success in athletics is simple: Hard work!

Garth Rex, Glendale Heights, USA