{"id":579,"date":"2011-09-12T08:39:00","date_gmt":"2011-09-12T15:39:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/?p=579"},"modified":"2011-09-12T08:39:00","modified_gmt":"2011-09-12T15:39:00","slug":"twenty-five-is-good-but-not-our-potential","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/?p=579","title":{"rendered":"Twenty Five is Good, But Not Our Potential"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"image\"<\/a>I\u2019ve been amazed at the talk that has surrounded the twenty five medals that we (the U.S.) won at the World Championships in Daegu. The tone has been as if we had achieved the unachievable. As if we had set some new standard of excellence in the sport. There were headlines proclaiming \u201cU.S. Still the Gold Standard in Track and Field\u201d; and \u201cHow Good Was Surprisingly Good U.S. Team\u201d. <\/p>\n

If you read my \u201cReport Card\u201d on the U.S. efforts in Daegu, I would contend that the team was good, but not great. With all the medals that we left on the table \u2013 women\u2019s 400, men\u2019s 400 hurdles, men\u2019s shot put, men\u2019s 4×1, women\u2019s 800, men\u2019s 400, and only single medals in the men\u2019s 100 & 200 we just didn\u2019t live up to our potential. <\/p>\n

Yes, twenty five medals was better than anyone else took home, but if you consider that 3rd<\/sup> place Kenya (with 17 medals) basically only competes in the distance events, we took home 8 more medals than a small country that competes in two thirds fewer events than we do! <\/p>\n

Let me put it another way. I\u2019ve seen many writers compare our medal total to years gone by as a measure of how well this team performed. But if you take a look at the inaugural World Championships over a quarter century ago (\u201983), we brought home twenty two medals with one arm tied behind our backs! Yes, because that was during the height of \"image\"<\/a>the \u201cEastern Bloc\u201d and their systematic doping and \u201csuper women\u201d \u2013 leaving us only able to bring home FOUR medals with our women! Twenty two medals were won nearly solo by our men \u2013 I would call that one arm behind our back! If you go back to 1976, which was the last Olympics that wasn\u2019t boycotted by one side or the other before the implementation of the World Championships \u2013 we also took home twenty two medals there in an Eastern Bloc dominated affair on the women\u2019s side that saw our women bring home a total of THREE medals! My point is that with our women no longer encumbered by competing against \u201ccheating\u201d athletes, thirty medals or more should have been ancient history by now with our men\u2019s teams having the ability to bring home nearly twenty medals by themselves! <\/p>\n

Let me throw in one other wrinkle in this discussion of medals in Majors. Those teams, those that preceded them, and several up to the early 90\u2019s, were dominated by AMATEUR athletes \u2013 athletes that had to split their training with holding down \u201cregular\u201d jobs while they tried to fulfill their athletic dreams \u2013 athletes that worked as bank tellers, security guards, teachers and other \u201cday jobs\u201d to pay the bills. Compared to today\u2019s athletes for whom track and field IS their job \u2013 and instead of going to the office are able to go to the track\/weight room and deal with coaches, physios and masseurs in their pursuit of World and Olympic medals. It seems to me that these \u201cProfessionals\u201d have a distinct advantage over their predecessors in that they are able to focus completely on the sport. So I\u2019m not sure why we are trying to compare the successes of the past with today\u2019s athletes \u2013 unless it\u2019s to say look what was accomplished with LESS. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s why I say that we are seriously under achieving. Of course there\u2019s the contingent that will say \u201cwell the world has caught up to us\u201d. But considering how far ahead we once were, that\u2019s more an indictment that we\u2019ve stopped growing\/progressing, than that the rest of the world has \u201ccaught up\u201d. They\u2019ve caught up because we\u2019ve slowed down! And to say that we had a great meet in Daegu, or that we\u2019re doing just fine, seems to be reflective of a society that has become complacent and accepting of mediocrity. Or what I call \u201cThe Barney Complex\u201d \u2013 \u201cyou\u2019re special just the way you are\u201d. <\/p>\n

One would almost forget that this is the nation that not to\"image\"<\/a>o long ago was producing some of history\u2019s most revered athletes. We\u2019re still playing catch up to Edwin Moses, Evelyn Ashford, Carl Lewis, Mike Powell, Michael Johnson, Charles Austin, Jackie Joyner Kersee, John Powell, Mac Wilkins, Kim Gallagher, Johnny Gray, and Valerie Brisco among a host of others. We had Tommie Smith, John Carlos, Jim Hines and Charlie Greene simultaneously \u2013 yet we\u2019re happy to have one Tyson Gay. We had Butch Reynolds, Steve Lewis, Danny Everett and Michael Johnson ALL at the same time. Not too long ago having multiple stars was commonplace in the U.S. \u2013 Carl Lewis, Mike Powell and Mike Conley; Conley and Kenny Harrison; Charles Austin and Hollis Conway; JJK and Marion Jones; Ben Plucknett, Mac Wilkins, John Powell AND Art Burns. My point is that right now we\u2019d be ecstatic to have just one of those per event, yet we used to produce them in bunches! <\/p>\n

So it\u2019s not that the world has caught up; we\u2019ve fallen behind our own pace \u2013 and producing medalists in spite of ourselves! People are excited about twenty five medals when in reality we wake \"image\"<\/a>up on any given morning secure in the knowledge that without doing anything we will get on average at least one medal in each sprint and hurdle event and each of the relays at any given Major. That\u2019s 14 medals nearly guaranteed without doing anything other than having an open tryout \u2013 our Trials! And even there we are behind our once world leading pace. Granted the winds in Daegu were a bit limiting, but consider that our men won medals with times of 10.08, 19.70 and 44.63. With the exception of the 200 mark, we\u2019ve done better in nearly every Major since the 1960\u2019s \u2013 and Tommie Smith approached that 200 mark (19.83) way back in 1968. We felt fortunate to take high jump and long jump gold, yet in \u201991 both Powell AND Lewis were over 29 feet, and in \u201996 Austin was making attempts near 8 feet. And while we are struggling to get a man into contention in the 800 and marvel at David Rudisha, Johnny Gray had four seasons under 1:43.00 in the 80\u2019s\/90\u2019s; and he, Mark Everett, and Rich Kenah all medaled at various Majors in the 90\u2019s! <\/p>\n

My point here is that on the surface we have a handful of athletes right now that are at AR levels and among the best of all time in their events – Tyson Gay, Carmelita Jeter, Jeremy Wariner, David Oliver, Dwight Phillips, Christian Taylor, Kara Patterson, Jill Camarena, and Christian Cantwell \u2013 and some of them are even getting a bit long in the tooth. But in most cases, however, we have athletes that are competing at 1980\u2019s & \u201890s levels \u2013 at best. Yet these are professionals with all the modern advantages that their predecessors didn\u2019t have, including the ability to devote all their time and efforts into perfecting their craft. So no, the world hasn\u2019t caught up \u2013 we\u2019ve spent too long running in place. <\/p>\n

Why? Personally I think it comes down to two things \u2013 training and organization. We certainly have athletes in this country of 350 Million people, with the physical attributes necessary to put up the same type of marks all t\"image\"<\/a>he athletes I\u2019ve listed once did. But somehow we\u2019re not identifying, nurturing and developing those athletes \u2013 in large part because, in my opinion, we lack the organization to do so. The old Eastern Bloc programs of East Germany and the Soviet Union were the epitome of identification and development of athletes. Today, Jamaica has focused in on sprinting identifying athletes early and funneling them to their best programs. We in contrast have not changed from the days of the Eastern Bloc to now \u2013 we are still relying on individuals to rise to the top on their own. That\u2019s why the Eastern Bloc made it so hard on us in the 70\u2019s and 80\u2019s; why the African nations have virtually run us off the podium in the middle and long distances; and why Jamaica has \u201ccaught up\u201d to us in sprinting. <\/p>\n

So, no I\u2019m not excited about twenty five medals \u2013 because I don\u2019t believe we are maximizing our potential. I believe our potential is closer to forty medals. And in subsequent posts I will tell you how I think we can close that gap.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019ve been amazed at the talk that has surrounded the twenty five medals that we (the U.S.) won at the World Championships in Daegu. The tone has been as if we had achieved the unachievable. As if we had set some new standard of excellence in the sport. There were headlines proclaiming \u201cU.S. Still the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-579","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa3DCY-9l","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=579"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/579\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=579"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=579"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=579"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}