Sorry for the delay in posting this, but my recap of The Final Third of the Berlin World Championships is now up at Runner's Tribe (First Third, Second Third). I not only summarized the last three days, but I also took a look at how the last three days affected some of the major questions in Berlin:
- Was Ethiopia able to gain any ground on Kenya in the distances medal count?
- Could the USA regain its mojo against the Caribbean in the sprints?
- Did the rest of the world mount a challenge to Europe in the field events?
- And was this championships indeed a success for the US distance squad?
And I even include graphs! So here's a snippet of what you'll find, and be warned, it's a long one!
In the men's 4 x 100m relay, the US were disqualified
for passing the baton outside of the zone. They didn't make it out of
their semifinals. Jamaica won uncontested in the second fastest time ever,
37.31 seconds. Interestingly, it was strangely anti-climactic seeing Bolt
not break a world record. Talk about high expectations! The US women
didn't make it out of the semifinals either. During a bad exchange between
Alexandria Andreson and Muna Lee, Lee injured her leg and went down.
Jamaica again went on to win gold, with the Bahamas taking silver. It
would be an exaggeration to say that the short relays were a microcosm of the
World Championships for the US sprinters, but they certainly made one thing
abundantly clear: the short sprints were not the US strong point in
Berlin.
As you can see from the graph (click to see larger graph), the US won eight medals in the
long sprints--those consisting of 400 meters--and just six in the short sprints,
despite there being five short sprints and just three long sprints. On the
other hand, the Caribbean islands scored 15 medals in the short sprints and just
six in the long. The US still has a firm grip on the 400 meter
distance. It's the short sprints where we have either lost ground or
continue to fail to execute. In some cases, like with Usain Bolt in the
men's short sprints, all anyone can do is grin and bear it. There was no
beating Bolt in Berlin. The same goes for the US 4 x 400 meter teams,
however. The US is simply too deep at that distance.
Interestingly, of the eight sprint medals won by non-Caribbean or US
athletes, five of them came in the relays. It should be noted, however,
that if the US could find four athletes who can pass a baton around the track in
the 4 x 100 meters, and if Bahamas hadn't been DQ'd in the 4 x 400 meters, the
number of medals would likely have been just two. As for the individual
medallists, they consisted of Priscilla Lopes-Schliep of Canada (silver in
the 100 hurdles), Alonso Edward of Panama (silver in the 200 meters), and
Antonina Krivoshapka of Russia (bronze in the 400 meters).
In
terms of depth, there are a number of countries with many very good
runners. But sprinting at the highest level has really become the game of
one country and a few small neighboring islands.
Read the entire article here.
I should also point out that Runner's Tribe put up an amazing amount of interviews, recaps and op-ed pieces about the world championships, so there is plenty to see and read. I particularly recommend the articles by Len Johnson, a former journalist who has covered numerous Olympics and World Championships. His wealth of knowledge and perspective on the sport is always interesting. Find his articles here.
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