Twenty minutes before the official day six schedule got underway in the Olympic Stadium last night, there was a rather bizarre scene as Isaac Makwala rattled round the finishing bend and down the home straight in 20.2 seconds
all on his own.
“We have now an additi…” the announced had stammered as he introduced him, unused as the rest of us to such circumstances an additional race for you, in the 200 metres round one: “an additional race for you, a 200 metres first-round heat.”
Set a target of 20.53 seconds to join those who had already qualified for the 200 metres semi-finals Makwala put in a remarkable effort to defy the miserable conditions – much worse than they had been two days earlier for his rivals – the lack of competition to drive him on and the demoralisation he had admitted to feeling after being thrown out of the 400 metres final the previous night for medical reasons.
As he celebrated by performing a succession of press-ups to demonstrate just how fit he is,
the mind’s eye conjured with
an image of Usain Bolt being subjected to what confronted Makwala the previous evening when he was accused of, rather than proven to be suffering from, norovirus that has blighted this event and forced a number of athletes to be quarantined.
Makwala is a world class athlete but he has nothing approaching the profile of Bolt. Nor does he come from one of the world’s sporting super powers.
In that context, if the version of events presented by his country’s officials – that there had been no medical tests conducted before the decision was made, that they had not been properly informed of the decision and had heard their athlete could not run from the media – the manner of his removal from contention for the 400 metres title on Tuesday night is consequently the latest decision by world athletics governing body the IAAF to leave a very bad taste in the mouth.
Pam Venning, the IAAF’s head of medicine, as she appeared on television immediately after a subdued looking Wayde van Niekerk had won that 400 metres final to defend the decision to throw Makwala out, asserted that she could do nothing other than “trust my doctors.” Such faith in the opinion of fellow medics did not, apparently, extend to the Botswana medical team who had reportedly declared him fully fit.
The way Makwala’s fellow athletes viewed the matter was summed up by the man to whom he was expected to give the toughest challenge, van Niekerk expressing his support in diplomatic but powerful fashion.
“I believe he would have done very well. I‘ve got sympathy.
I really wish I could give him my medal,” he said.
Such heavy handedness which, if the Botswana officials are
to be believed, borders on contemptuous and plays to the impression that there remains an arrogance at the heart of the IAAF, while it is pure hypothesis to wonder what might have happened had they subjected Bolt – or for that matter, van Niekerk, for whom the championship timetable was revised to allow him to compete in both the 200 and 400 metres – to such treatment.
The value of medals in terms of commercial marketability is such that it is almost inconceivable that they will admit to making a mistake in what one of Venning’s BBC interrogators suggested might even be seen as a restraint of trade.
The decision to let Makwala run what amounted to a solo semi-final against no-one but himself last night might be seen in that light as something of a sop in being allowed to run in an event from which he appeared to have been correctly withdrawn ahead of its heats after a dispute over his withdrawal from another.
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