byLarry EderThere are few things that infuriate me more than that hearing a women athlete has been told that she is fat, or needs to loose weight. Truth is this, with proper nutrition, eight to ten hours of sleep, and a good workout schedule, your body will get to the weight that it is supposed to be.
This column and many other thoughtful, controversial, provocative columns can be found at GlobeRunner.org, all from the pen of one Mr. Pat Butcher.
It’s not over ’til the fat lady…… runs the 800 metres.
In 2.09.00, as it happens.
And that was easily sufficient to cap victory for Jessica Ennis in
the celebrated heptathlon in Götzis, Austria on Sunday, beating her
rival, world champion Tatyana Chernova by 132 points; and breaking
Sydney Olympic champion Denise Lewis’ national record. For good measure,
the reigning Olympic champion, Natalya Dobrijnska was relegated to
ninth place
Two months out from the Olympic Games in east London, that ain’t a
bad place to be; which is more than can be said for the clown at the
British federation who observed recently (according to her coach Tony
Minichiello) that Ennis was overweight; a slur corroborated by the
British number 2, Louise Hazel, who has received the same ‘advice’ to
lose weight, a comment bound to cause seizures in the TV producer in
Daegu, who decided he was making an ‘up close and personal’ documentary
on Hazel each time she emerged from under a parasol during the World
Champs.
But enough of this frivolity. For a start, this particular federation
clown – it’s got to be a ‘he’ hasn’t it; there are times, all too
frequently, when you’re not proud of your own gender? – and I’ve got a
pretty shrewd idea who it is, would be hard pressed to name the events
in the heptathlon, in order or not.
That incidentally was something that Daley Thompson would ask re the
decathlon of journalists who requested an interview. Of course, he
refused even on those rare occasions they got it right.
On one such occasion, several centuries ago, your correspondent,
emboldened by Steve Ovett’s magnificent putdown of him, that the
decathlon is nothing more than, ‘nine Mickey Mouse events, followed by a
slow 1500 metres,’ I once challenged Thompson, either to a straight
1500 metres, or I’d give him a 25 metres start over a Mile. He called my
bluff in Paris a couple of years later, following an indoor heptathlon
for him, and a liquid lunch for me, to immediately take to the track
over 800 metres. I demurred, just as he had done.
My offer still stands, incidentally, since although I’m still 15
years older, I used to run more than 30 seconds faster over 1500 metres.
Also his kids think he’s fat; which is where we came in.
Nonetheless, it is hard to get excited about the multi-events, and I
doubtless echo runners the world over in this. I have long felt that the
IAAF should follow the example of the Modern Pentathlon federation, and
set up the final events, 800 metres for women, 1500 metres for men, as
handicaps; which is to say, as with the Modern Pentathlon final event,
the cross country, the heptathlon/decathlon leaders after 6/9 events set
off ahead by the amount of time commensurate with their points lead.
That way, the first one across the line is the overall winner; and you
don’t have to wait for the ridiculous computation of points to tell you –
as with Thompson in Los Angeles 1984 – that the person in seventh place
has actually won the gold medal.
The most endearing thing about the multi-events is that the athletes
actually seem to like one another, the camaraderie of two long days of
close competition engendering a respect which is not noted elsewhere in
track and field athletics, if not cross country (remember that?).
And Ennis seems a particularly human example of the elite athlete.
Both she and coach Minichello are firmly grounded in the down-to-earth
culture of their steel city home of Sheffield. You can’t get more down
home than Minichiello, quoted in Saturday’s Guardian newspaper, “We
don’t do training camps. We don’t need to. I’ve got a 200m indoor track,
with a 400m track a stone’s throw away, and a great weights room… so we
stay close to home and find competitions that are close to home’.
For a long-term cynic like myself, one unintended sub-text of that
quote is that they don’t need to go abroad to escape the dope-testers;
which is always gratifying to know.
There is always a lot of nonsense dredged up in the run-up to a major
championship, the more so when the Olympic Games is on your door-step.
So expect a lot more of the fat-girl type of stories, not necessarily
about Ennis (and Hazel), there are lots more targets out there. And, who
knows, there might even be a few serious stories?
But the best of the weekend news is that Ennis has taken a serious
option on her young life and career’s objective – an Olympic gold medal.
