Sport's Defining Moments 7: The Fastest Man
There's obviously something completely different, completely special, about being the 100m World Record Holder and/or the winner of the 100m at the Olympic Games. The fastest man in the world, the fastest human that's ever lived, across ground, with no artificial support.
Would that it were always without artificial support, eh?
The first I remember watching live is Carl Lewis in 1984, the great Carl Lewis - so that makes eight 100m men's Olympic finals I've seen, not to mention several World Championship finals. There's nearly always a story, nearly always something remarkable, though of those 8, there are two which are particularly fabled, for different reasons.
Carl Lewis was an all-American superstar of the 1980s, graceful, arrogant, untouchable, winner of four golds at the Los Angeles Olympics. Then, all of a sudden, he wasn't untouchable. There was a new guy, all bulging muscles, stocky and stern, explosive rather than fluent. Ben Johnson burst on the scene at the 1987 World Athletics Championships and nothing would ever be the same again.
In terms of perception, though not quite in terms of reality, professional sport can be seen as pre- and post-Johnson. Ben Johnson was the end of innocence for anyone that was innocent. When I watched Des Lynam, shocked and shockingly, read out the news that Johnson had failed a test for anabolic steroids a few days after he had destroyed the field in the 1988 Olympic final with a new World Record of 9.79 seconds, I was just 10, so I was still innocent. When it comes to cheating in sport, I've rarely been innocent since.
This is a line-up for the 100m final at 1988 Olympics - Johnson, Lewis, Linford Christie, Calvin Smith, Dennis Mitchell, Robson Da Silva, Desai Williams, Ray Stewart. Calvin Smith was over the line 4th, in a time of 9.99 seconds, and is quite simply convinced he is the deserving winner of the race on the day. I rather feel he might be right.
So very many of the fastest 100m runners since then have some kind of taint on them, from Johnson to Christie to Dennis Mitchell to Maurice Greene and Justin Gatlin, Tim Montgomery, Dwain Chambers, Tyson Gay and Asafa Powell. It can sometimes be hard to find one of the fastest ones who doesn't, who's never been anywhere near a failed test.
So, along came this guy. This tall, smiling guy who was a 200m prodigy as a teenager. From the sprinting hotbed of Jamaica, he came along to the Beijing Olympics on good form but not exactly an overwhelming favourite. And he made a mark like Ben Johnson had made a mark 20 years earlier, 9.69 instead of 9.79, streets ahead of the field, doing a little dance of celebration as he crossed the line.
Unimaginably quick, and the world had a new star, and a star we could believe in. And we still believe in.
Oh, doping. Damn doping. Doping and the defences of doping. Over a couple of decades of watching people say they don't dope, you do get pretty good at knowing who's definitely DEFINITELY telling the truth, and who's almost certainly lying. So, when a positive test or a doping story comes, whether at the time or retrospectively, it's only rarely a crushing disappointment. I was disappointed in Tyson Gay, but then impressed by his honest response. Darren Campbell, Chris Froome, Bradley Wiggins, Paula Radcliffe, Calvin Smith, Michael Johnson, these are people who've so clearly and straightforwardly refuted the possibility they've doped, and you just know from the simplicity and the fervour and the detail that they're telling the truth. I'd be pretty gutted to find out otherwise, and would, frankly, think they had some kind of dark personality disorder, so utterly believable are they.
So, then, you worry, why doesn't everyone who doesn't dope speak so clearly and straightforwardly against it. If I didn't dope and someone had a vague suspicion I did, I would publish every detail of how it was simply impossible I was doping. There is more and more of that going on, but why doesn't every clean sportsperson do it?
What of Bolt, then, the saviour of sprinting, is he believable? Yeah, I thiink so, yeah, he's always been a freak of speed, there's no sudden unlikely surge, there's no excessive musculature, he smiles, he treats enquiries about doping jovially and easily, not with threat and rhetoric like Lance Armstrong. I believe strongly in one or two other spectacularly quick men, like Ato Boldon and Donovan Bailey, so if Bolt really is the fastest man who's ever lived, which I really think he is, doping or not, then his times aren't inconceivably fast. But, oh, the Jamaican doping programme is so damn weak, and far too many of his compatriots have dodgy tests for my liking. But Bolt has never had a dodgy test, nor do I believe he will.
Bolt went even faster the next year, 9.59 at the Daegu World Championships, 19.19 in the 200m, the most thrilling, freakishly amazing athletic feats I've ever seen. Perfection. He won't top that, I really think. If anyone else tops it, say at the 2020 Olympics, I've got to say, the chances are, I won't believe in them. That's lots of people's fault, but it starts with Ben Johnson.
Would that it were always without artificial support, eh?
The first I remember watching live is Carl Lewis in 1984, the great Carl Lewis - so that makes eight 100m men's Olympic finals I've seen, not to mention several World Championship finals. There's nearly always a story, nearly always something remarkable, though of those 8, there are two which are particularly fabled, for different reasons.
Carl Lewis was an all-American superstar of the 1980s, graceful, arrogant, untouchable, winner of four golds at the Los Angeles Olympics. Then, all of a sudden, he wasn't untouchable. There was a new guy, all bulging muscles, stocky and stern, explosive rather than fluent. Ben Johnson burst on the scene at the 1987 World Athletics Championships and nothing would ever be the same again.
In terms of perception, though not quite in terms of reality, professional sport can be seen as pre- and post-Johnson. Ben Johnson was the end of innocence for anyone that was innocent. When I watched Des Lynam, shocked and shockingly, read out the news that Johnson had failed a test for anabolic steroids a few days after he had destroyed the field in the 1988 Olympic final with a new World Record of 9.79 seconds, I was just 10, so I was still innocent. When it comes to cheating in sport, I've rarely been innocent since.
This is a line-up for the 100m final at 1988 Olympics - Johnson, Lewis, Linford Christie, Calvin Smith, Dennis Mitchell, Robson Da Silva, Desai Williams, Ray Stewart. Calvin Smith was over the line 4th, in a time of 9.99 seconds, and is quite simply convinced he is the deserving winner of the race on the day. I rather feel he might be right.
So very many of the fastest 100m runners since then have some kind of taint on them, from Johnson to Christie to Dennis Mitchell to Maurice Greene and Justin Gatlin, Tim Montgomery, Dwain Chambers, Tyson Gay and Asafa Powell. It can sometimes be hard to find one of the fastest ones who doesn't, who's never been anywhere near a failed test.
So, along came this guy. This tall, smiling guy who was a 200m prodigy as a teenager. From the sprinting hotbed of Jamaica, he came along to the Beijing Olympics on good form but not exactly an overwhelming favourite. And he made a mark like Ben Johnson had made a mark 20 years earlier, 9.69 instead of 9.79, streets ahead of the field, doing a little dance of celebration as he crossed the line.
Unimaginably quick, and the world had a new star, and a star we could believe in. And we still believe in.
Oh, doping. Damn doping. Doping and the defences of doping. Over a couple of decades of watching people say they don't dope, you do get pretty good at knowing who's definitely DEFINITELY telling the truth, and who's almost certainly lying. So, when a positive test or a doping story comes, whether at the time or retrospectively, it's only rarely a crushing disappointment. I was disappointed in Tyson Gay, but then impressed by his honest response. Darren Campbell, Chris Froome, Bradley Wiggins, Paula Radcliffe, Calvin Smith, Michael Johnson, these are people who've so clearly and straightforwardly refuted the possibility they've doped, and you just know from the simplicity and the fervour and the detail that they're telling the truth. I'd be pretty gutted to find out otherwise, and would, frankly, think they had some kind of dark personality disorder, so utterly believable are they.
So, then, you worry, why doesn't everyone who doesn't dope speak so clearly and straightforwardly against it. If I didn't dope and someone had a vague suspicion I did, I would publish every detail of how it was simply impossible I was doping. There is more and more of that going on, but why doesn't every clean sportsperson do it?
What of Bolt, then, the saviour of sprinting, is he believable? Yeah, I thiink so, yeah, he's always been a freak of speed, there's no sudden unlikely surge, there's no excessive musculature, he smiles, he treats enquiries about doping jovially and easily, not with threat and rhetoric like Lance Armstrong. I believe strongly in one or two other spectacularly quick men, like Ato Boldon and Donovan Bailey, so if Bolt really is the fastest man who's ever lived, which I really think he is, doping or not, then his times aren't inconceivably fast. But, oh, the Jamaican doping programme is so damn weak, and far too many of his compatriots have dodgy tests for my liking. But Bolt has never had a dodgy test, nor do I believe he will.
Bolt went even faster the next year, 9.59 at the Daegu World Championships, 19.19 in the 200m, the most thrilling, freakishly amazing athletic feats I've ever seen. Perfection. He won't top that, I really think. If anyone else tops it, say at the 2020 Olympics, I've got to say, the chances are, I won't believe in them. That's lots of people's fault, but it starts with Ben Johnson.
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