Team USA
Time For A New Selection Process
Saturday, August 23rd, 2008
Sports Illustrated track & field writer Tim Layden, writing recently about the USA 4×100m relay teams’ disastrous performances at the Beijing Olympics, had this insight about our selection process:
Efforts have been made in the past to conduct national relay training, but in the end, the brutal U.S. Trials system prevents coaches from knowing until the last minute who might be sent to the Games or the worlds.
That got me to thinking. I had always thought that our choices for a selection process were limited to an either/or scenario: a one-shot trials or a committee process like the one USA Gymnastics uses—one that leaves the athletes little or no say in the matter. Imagine a selection process that was similar to the points system used to select the athletes who will compete in the IAAF’s World Athletics Final next month. Here’s how that one works:
After the last [IAAF World Athletics Tour] Meeting before the World Athletics Final, the 7 Athletes having the highest number of points with their best 5 results (4 for throws) will qualify for each event of the World Athletics Final.
If we took that selection process and modified it to select a team of three athletes per event, we would be able to account for the injuries and other life events (births, marriages, family emergencies, illnesses, etc.) that inevitably happen within the four-year Olympic cycle, we would have a selection process that is not quite as brutal as the one-shot system we currently have and we would still empower the athletes to control their own destinies. Now doesn’t that make at least a little bit of sense?
Jeremy Wariner: Then And Now
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2004 Athens Olympics
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2008 Beijing Olympics
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It’ll be interesting to track Jeremy Wariner’s places, lane draws, times and reaction times as he advances through the Beijing 400m heats and compare them to what he did in Athens at the 2004 Olympics when he won the gold medal. Notice that he always draws a crappy lane in the heats. Both his reaction time and his time in his opening heat are better this year than in 2004.
Update: Both his reaction time and his time in his semi-final heat are better this year than in 2004. Of course, LaShawn Merritt’s time (44.12) and reaction time (0.187) in his semi-final heat were both better than Wariner’s.
Update: Ouch.
Is Allyson Felix’ Time In 200m Heats A Cause For Concern?
Monday, August 18th, 2008
If Allyson Felix is not careful, she could find herself suffering the same fate Tyson Gay had in the men’s 100m—that is, being a spectator when it’s time for the finals. Her qualifying mark of 23.02 in the opening heats of the women’s 200m dash was ranked only 9th. She hadn’t raced since the London Grand Prix on July 25th, 2008. There she finished 4th with a time of 23.00, a full 3/10th of a second behind Sherone Simpson’s winning time of 22.70. Ten days ago, she wrote this in her blog:
I ran very poorly in Stockholm and London because I was just exhausted. I had made trips back and forth to Europe and my legs were simply dead. My coach Bobby Kersee and I debated running the 200m in London because I was feeling fatigued so when I came off the curve and realized I couldn’t shift to another gear I just cruised in as to prevent injury.
Now it appears that her legs might not be any less dead than they were in London. Of course, these are the opening heats and she did finish 1st in hers. Still, her winning time was only the 4th fastest out of 6 heats. A year ago in Osaka, she ran her opening heat at the world championships in 22.50, over a half second faster than she ran today. Nobody else ran faster than her that day. Today, eight people have done so.
Taylor Upsets Clement In USA 400m Hurdles Sweep
Monday, August 18th, 2008
Although Kerron Clement was the heavy favorite to win the Men’s 400m Hurdles at the Beijing Olympics, Angelo Taylor peaked at the perfect time and had what it took to upset Clement and win the gold medal. His time of 47.25, a PR, was just 1/100th of a second slower than Clement’s PR of 47.24. Clement ran nowhere near that time, finishing in 47.98 to win the silver medal. Bershawn Jackson completed the USA sweep by finishing 3rd with a time of 48.06, well off his PR of 47.30.
Finally! Gold For Team USA
Monday, August 18th, 2008
Finally! An American track & field athlete has won a gold medal at the Beijing Olympics! Stephanie Brown-Trafton has won the women’s discus throw with a toss of 64.74m. The 6′-4", 225lb. Californian went into the Games as one of the favorites with the 3rd farthest throw in the world in 2008, a mark of 66.17m. Her teammate Aretha Thurmond finished 10th with a throw of 59.80m.
Not The Olympics I Expected
Sunday, August 17th, 2008Wow! This is certainly not the Olympics I expected! There’s the whole NBC coverage thing (or severe lack thereof), there’s the severe medal drought thus far by Team USA and now I see that Russia—a team that has been accused by the head of the IOC’s medical commission of systematic doping—is leading by a wide margin in the Track & Field Placing Table. What’s next? Is the…
No, never mind. I don’t want to say anything that might remotely jinx these Games even further for Team USA. Let me put my Pollyanna glasses on and figure out whether or not there’s a silver lining around the Bird’s Nest.
Team USA’s mens distance runners/race walkers ready to challenge in Beijing
Sunday, August 10th, 2008INDIANAPOLIS - Olympic Trials champions Bernard Lagat, Ryan Hall, Nick Symmonds and Abdi Abdirahman are poised and ready to lead America’s men’s middle and long distance competitors against the world this month at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, China.
800 Meters
Much to the delight of a partisan crowd at historic Hayward Field in Eugene, Ore., the top three finishers in the men’s 800m final at the 2008 Olympic Trials all have ties to the Eugene area.
After finding himself boxed in on the backstretch of the last lap in the final in Eugene, two-time USA Outdoor Championships runner-up Nick Symmonds (Springfield, Ore.) found a sliver of daylight and utilized his kick to propel him to the finish line first and on to the Olympic Team roster for the first time in his young career. Symmonds’ winning time of 1:44.10 is a new personal best and the fastest time by an American this year.