Olympic Athletics: Higher, Faster, Further

The Olympic Games gave me the opportunity of witnessing athletes from around the world, not only the faces familiar from the Grand Prix events I’d see most weeks during the summer. Not only Eastern Bloc legends but also Africans, Aussies and New Zealanders seemed exotic species in the Sixties and Seventies. Thus I grabbed the opportunity to watch the likes of javelin thrower Ruth Fuchs, miler John Walker and the Kenyan Kip Keino once every four years.

Africans weren’t as prominent on the athletics scene as they are today, and Keino was probably the only name and face I would recognise prior to the Munich Olympics in 1972. That all changed after the 400m hurdles final. David Hemery was fancied to repeat his Mexico triumph and led around the final bend, only for the little-known Ugandan John Akii-Bua to stride past in the inside lane, break the world record and keep on going! His was a great story.

That year, Valeri Borzov and Renate Stecher each claimed a sprint double, and Britain’s hopes of long-distance gold were upset by the Finn Lasse Viren, who won both the 5,000 and 10,000 metres. I’d wanted the familiar Belgian Puttemans to win but the bearded Viren was a shock winner. Despite being largely absent from intervening competition, he actually repeated the double four years later. My interest in the field events was also sparked by a great contest in the men’s javelin. Long before the era of Zelezny and Backley I recall going into our close afterwards hurling a stick (fortunately no cars or people were around) trying to replicate the efforts of the Soviet Union’s Janis Lusis (his sideboards as mighty as his reputation) and West Germany’s small but chunky Klaus Wolfermann. I recall watching the Latvian’s final throw landed just 2cm short of Wolfermann’s mark.

The events proceeding on the greensward may have been fitted into the TV schedule around the track races but they generated just as much drama. The shot putt wasn’t as watchable as the rest; simply enormous muscle machines hoisting a cannonball into the turf. At least the javelin, discus and hammer prolonged the viewer experience, watching the flight of the weapon and trying to guess the distance.

I would try to copy the triple jump on sandy beaches in Cornwall or Spain but, try as I might, there was no danger of threatening the distances achieved by Victor Saneyev, who won three consecutive Olympic golds. He wouldn’t have lived, though, with the likes of his successors Edwards, Olsson or Taylor.

There was no danger, either, of me even attempting a high jump, even had Dick Fosbury not in ’68 innovated his backward ‘flop’ which has been the only tactic in town ever since. 51 years on, I still can’t fathom how the human body can contort itself to clear a bar way above its height. In fact, the whole mental process required is beyond my on limited imagination. And so I am happy to watch in amazement a succession of ultra-tall beanpoles striding in an arc to the crowd’s rhythmic claps before leaping head-first up and hopefully over the delicately balanced metal rod.

The steely-eyed Croatian Blanka Vladic epitomises the female high-jumper although not even she could get within a foot of the best achieved by the incredible Cuban, Javier Sotomayor.  Whilst six feet five, he wasn’t quite as skeletal as many fellow competitors but his speed and technique won him the Barcelona gold medal in 1992 and in Salamanca a year later the world record of 2.45m which still stands. That’s more than eight feet, the height of my ceiling! However, my favourite Olympic high jump champion must be the Swede Stefan Holm. Less than six feet tall, he nonetheless scooped the top prize at Athens, clearing 2.36m, 55cm above his own height. One up for the little guy!

Unlike Sotomayor, I don’t think he ever failed a drugs test, unlike our own sprinting superstar, Linford Christie. Along with his contemporaries Lewis, Johnson, Mitchell et al, his achievements are somewhat tainted by his association with illegal supplements. His disqualification at Seoul was quickly overturned and he was imperious at Barcelona four years later. Even I was caught up in the emotion of the event. With few Americans in the frame, he had a glorious opportunity to repeat the feat in Atlanta only to be chucked out of the final for two false starts.

The 400m Hurdles is such a killer event. Sprinting a whole lap while finding additional bursts of energy to leap over ten barriers must be a true lung-buster. Consequently I always doff my (imaginary) hat to the masters and mistresses of the race. From David Hemery in 1968 to the peerless Ed Moses in the Seventies and Eighties, then Essex’s own Sally Gunnell in ’92, I usually make a particular point of watching the one-lap hurdles competition. It rarely disappoints.

Of course, sprints are usually settled by mere hundredths of a second, which adds to the excitement of watching. There’s nothing worse han nipping out for a biscuit and finding I’ve missed a whole bloody race. Slow-motion highlights can’t beat watching it live. Yet the relays usually require multiple viewings as the eye can’t possibly take in all the action from all eight or nine lanes. It’s not just a matter of who’s winning on the home straight; there’s all the trips, stutters and fluffed exchanges which demand the attention. Take the Beijing women’s 4x100, for example. The Americans dropped the baton in their heat, leaving the Jamaicans as hot favourites in the final, with the Britons ever hopeful of a bronze. Watching it live, I was incredulous that the Russians and Belgians were first and second to cross the line. What happened? The answer is the usual stuff: all those training drills and it all went pear-shaped on the second exchange. Eight years later, a retrospective drug test failure by one of the Russian athletes meant that only four of the eight nations in that race were officially ranked, and of all nations it was Belgium who became Oympic champions!

One of my most memorable sprint relays, which bring the Olympic athletics programme to such a frenzied finish, was not one of the Bolt-tastic triumphs of Jamaica but the men’s 4x400m in London. I’ve become accustomed to the USA rompng home by huge margins but on his occasion, Ramon Miller held on to the American leader and swept past to gain gold for the little ol’ Bahamas. A week earlier, the nation went nuts for Team GB on what became known as Super Saturday. I must confess I missed most of it, including the victories of Jessica Ennis and Greg Rutherford. However, there was no escaping the phenomenon that is Mo Farah who pulled away with that familiar sprint to clinch the 10,000 metres. Unless you’re one of Tommy Robinson’s racist cronies, how can you not love Mo? His Rio double was the icing on an especially lavish cake.

Over the years on the box I’ve witnessed some spine-tingling races involving Coe v Ovett, Michael Johnson, Usain Bolt, Christine Uhuruogu’s totally unexpected 400m finish in Beijing and many others.  But the Olympics aren’t all about medals and world records.  Sometimes you have to admire those who have qualified because they are their country’s finest, be they from the USA, China, Togo or Vanuatu. Simply achieving your best on the greatest stage must be an ambition for any young athlete. Mind you, attaining no fewer than five personal bests in two days and capturing gold at the end must be an experience to savour like no other.

One of the most memorable performances came from the 21 year-old Belgian Nafi Thiam in the Rio heptathlon. In Briton, the multi-disciplinary event was all about Jessica Ennis-Hill repeating her 2012 gold. However, she was overshadowed by the six-foot youngster who rose to the occasion brilliantly. It proved to be no flash-in-the-pan, either. Thiam has since become world and European champion, too. Oh, and she is also a geography undergraduate at Liege. Who said athletes must be totally single-minded to win? Successful Olympians can be human too.