Money can’t buy Olympic medals

I marvel at the tremendous effort he made to overhaul the American favourite Michael Tinsley and win by one-hundredth of a second in a time of 47.69 seconds.

Three years and hundreds of thousands of dollars in elite funding later, I watched as a pitiful Gordon finished last in his first round Olympic heat in 49.98 seconds, 2.29 seconds (equivalent to about 19 metres in distance) slower than in 2013.

Even as a 17-year-old at the World Championships in Berlin, Gordon placed fourth clocking 48.26. How could he have regressed so much when he was supposed to get better? Perhaps he was too busy “keeping pace with technology from Courts” that he couldn’t keep pace with anyone in his heat? Then there’s Richard “more talk, less speed” Thompson.

After running 9.97 in the 100 metres at the National Championship in June and being “ready for Rio,” all he could manage was 10.29 and a first-round exit.

I mean, what does it say when our 100-metres champion “gives it all he had” and gets beaten by a 40-year-old (Kim Collins)? Perhaps something is wrong with the clock/track at the Hasely Crawford Stadium.

Talking about Hasely, he ran 10.06 in 1976 to win Olympic gold. He trained in the cane fields of south Trinidad without any funding whatsoever.

Forty years later, none of our elite-funded sprinters could come close to Hasely’s time.

Tell me again, what was “elite funding” supposed to accomplish? Improve athletes’ performances? One wonders if the funding was used for its intended purpose.

When will we learn that money can’t buy Olympic medals?

Noel Kalicharan via emai