{"id":606,"date":"2011-11-04T13:45:00","date_gmt":"2011-11-04T20:45:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/?p=606"},"modified":"2011-12-29T09:12:26","modified_gmt":"2011-12-29T17:12:26","slug":"john-smith-reboots-w-dix-bailey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/?p=606","title":{"rendered":"John Smith Reboots w\/ Dix & Bailey!"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"image\"<\/a>The last time U.S. sprint fortunes were in the precarious position we are now was coming off the 1996 Olympics. Yes, Michael Johnson won the long sprint double \u2013 the 200 in WR time. But for four straight Majors (\u201992, \u201993, \u201995 & \u201996), we had lost the men\u2019s 100 meters \u2013 and Donovan Bailey (CAN) took possession of the WR with his \u201996 win. In \u201995 & \u201996 we lost the 4×1 relay as well \u2013 botched handoff in \u201995, poor personnel management in \u201996. Sound familiar?<\/p>\n

Early during that same time frame, Coach John Smith was nurturing quarter milers Steve Lewis, Danny Everett and Quincy Watts who won Olympic gold in \u201988 (Lewis) & \u201992 (Watts); a couple of bronze (Everett, \u201988 & \u201991); and a silver (Lewis \u201992). But in the middle of the decade Smith rebooted, and started attracting pure sprinters.<\/p>\n

He began with Jon Drummond in 1993 \u2013 and he lead off a WR 4×1 in Stuttgart. Then added Ato Boldon (TRI) in \u201895, who took bronze in Goteborg and that \u201996 Olympic final. A year after Atlanta he added one Maurice Greene, who didn\u2019t perform as well as expected in Goteborg in \u201995 and missed the team entirely in \u201996. The rest as they say \u201cis history\u201d \u2013 Greene going on to win 100 meter gold medals in \u201997, \u201999, \u201900, and \u201901 \u2013 and set a WR 9.79 in \u201999. Like John Wayne leading the cavalry, John Smith and his sprint crew came in to bring U.S. sprinting back to a place of prominence in the world.<\/p>\n

Well it\u2019s starting to look like 1997 all over again, because we\u2019ve lost the 100 in the last three Majors \u2013 and the 200 to boot. We\u2019ve lost the WR in the 100 \u2013 and the 200 too. And we\u2019ve lost the last three 4×1\u2019s \u2013 all to poor baton work. And once again, it looks like John Wayne, make that John Smith, may be riding in to save the day \u2013 with a group that closely resembles that \u201997 group.<\/p>\n

\"image\"<\/a>I received confirmation from Coach Smith this afternoon that this year\u2019s \u201creboot\u201d will have Trinidadian Richard Thompson \u2013 silver medalist in the Beijing 100; and Americans, Walter Dix \u2013 this year\u2019s double silver medalist in Daegu \u2013 and Ryan Bailey \u2013 the 6\u2019 4\u201d National Jr. College Record holder in the 100 meters! Dix and Bailey both have great top end speed and finishes, but often give up much ground early race. As luck would have it, Smith is a pioneer of the \u201cDrive Phase\u201d \u2013 the starting technique that saw Jon Drummond blaze to the front of races time after time, and that allowed Maurice Greene to be right where he needed to be to execute his own tremendous top end drive home.<\/p>\n

They will join a squad that already has Daegu gold medalists Carmelita Jeter (100) & Jason Richardson (110H), and 4th<\/sup> placer Jaysuma Ndure (200). In September I asked<\/a>what happened to U.S. sprint camps, well this has the potential to be the best ever!<\/p>\n

If I sound excited, it\u2019s because I am. Coach Smith has the history and the pedigree, and the new additions to his camp certainly have the potential. Now if only 2011 will mirror 1997. This is going to be an Olympic season to watch!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The last time U.S. sprint fortunes were in the precarious position we are now was coming off the 1996 Olympics. Yes, Michael Johnson won the long sprint double \u2013 the 200 in WR time. But for four straight Majors (\u201992, \u201993, \u201995 & \u201996), we had lost the men\u2019s 100 meters \u2013 and Donovan Bailey […]<\/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":[76,77,12,93,88,91,146,92],"class_list":["post-606","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-bailey","tag-dix","tag-jeter","tag-ndure","tag-richardson","tag-smith","tag-sprint-camps","tag-thompson"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pa3DCY-9M","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606","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=606"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":704,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/606\/revisions\/704"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=606"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=606"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/trackchill.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=606"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}