Men's Performance Of The Year

[DrJay]

...and the helium enema to make him lighter! :roll:

Them'd be some funny soundin' farts!

Oh, I'd vote for the 200, though the OG marathon might be a close second. Hard to compare the two, apples and oranges.

[eldrick]

bolt shouda run ~9.60 with good RT & no celebrating - we want a measure of that performance's ultimate value & that looks fair value

his 200m was run into a wind with another crappy RT, was worth ~ 19.20 with no wind/good RT

superficially, they look = ( seeing as 200m time = ~ double 100m time for equally strong 100/200 guys )

however, his 200 was poorly "paced" - 9.96/9.34

he went out too fast & came back too slow ( remember, x-man & deloach have come back in 9.3 - 9.4 )

ideally, if he'd paced it better & went out in say, 10.05, he couda come back quicker for a time ~ 0.05s better than he actually ran ( 19.25 actual or 19.15 if you factor in wind/crappy RT )

on that basis, i'd give the nod to his 200m by a short head

[EPelle]

The 100m "performance" irritated Rogge and generated a great deal of ink. And it was quite fast as well. As a matter of fact, it was faster than any human had ever run legally (wind) previously.

[Brian]

Re: Men's Performance Of The Year

So the question is, if you had a vote, would it be for Bolt's 100 or 200?

The 200m.

You never honor a performance that was incomplete. If someone shuts it down, they haven't given their all and the perfomance is left open-ended. Think of the message.

And look at the destruction in his wake: all the DQ's of those trying to keep up with him.



["It's not that I finished the race, but that I had the courage to start."]

[eldrick]

Re: Men's Performance Of The Year

You never honor a performance that was incomplete. If someone shuts it down, they haven't given their all and the perfomance is left open-ended. Think of the message

err...

he won gold with it in a 9.69wr

that not worth honouring ?!

[Rog]

Re: Men's Performance Of The Year

So the question is, if you had a vote, would it be for Bolt's 100 or 200?

The 200, as he broke what I considered to be the greatest record in athletics.

The exciting thing though is that Usain is still at the start of his career. Theoretically he can go on to improve considerably - to 9.4x and 18.9x - which would be astonishing. Then we'll get a different perspective on his performances, but only he can give us that perspective.

By the time of the next Olympics he could already have established himself as the greatest athlete of all time - certainly he appears to be the most talented.

[eldrick]

19.32 may have been greatest wr in the book, but don't forget, the situation is dynamic

looking at iaaf tables ( good for discussion ) :

http://www.iaaf.org/mm/Document/Competi ... 08_742.pdf

19.32 = 9.68+

when 100m wr was 9.77 = 19.53, the 200m record was far superior

when safa got it down to 9.74 last year, it = 19.47, the 200 record was still superior, but the situation was getting "interesting"

then this year, bolt goes 9.72 = 19.41

then in peking he goes 9.69 = 19.34

now, we are not fools around here & we know his celebrating cost him a few 0.01s & we are not being ungenerous in claiming that it was at worst 9.65 without it

this = 19.25

so, it coud be argued, his 100m wr was an intrinsically superior performance to the existing 200m wr

[mump boy]

200

I wonder if they didn't give it to Bolt as a show of disapproval of his celebrations? I only say that because there id no way Robles, as amazing as his year was, holds a candle to the brilliance of those two performances.

IAAF have a rule thet athlere and performace can;t go to the same person so take bolt out of the equation for performance of the year and we're left with Robles !!

[steve]

[quote=mump boy]

200

I wonder if they didn't give it to Bolt as a show of disapproval of his celebrations? I only say that because there id no way Robles, as amazing as his year was, holds a candle to the brilliance of those two performances.

IAAF have a rule thet athlere and performace can;t go to the same person so take bolt out of the equation for performance of the year and we're left with Robles !![/quotew4vm4r1]

Thanks for the clarification. In that case, Robles was a good choice.

[dfmonti]

Re: Men's Performance Of The Year

One suspects the IAAF was guilty of a little "spread the wealth around" thinking when it gave POY to Robles's WR in the hurdles.

So the question is, if you had a vote, would it be for Bolt's 100 or 200? (or would you go for Robles? Or even something completely different...)

I was lucky enough to see both of Bolt's 100m WR's this year, plus the 200m, plus the relay. The 100 in Beijing was the most memorable of those performances, given the margin of victory and how he didn't actually push all the way to the line. That's your POY.

Although it may not rise to the level of Bolt's 100 or 200, Sammy Wanjiru's Olympic Games marathon victory was one of the greatest athletics performances I've ever seen, when viewed in context. Given the army of pacemakers now used at most of the major marathons (not New York or Boston, thank God), the magnitude of what Wanjiru did to both break the field single handedly with repeated surges then take down the OG record by nearly three minutes in hot conditions cannot be understated. At 21, we was also the youngest male marathon gold medalist since 1932.

David Monti, Editor & Publisher
Race Results Weekly
Since 1994

[SQUACKEE]

Even after he won the 100m in a world record many felt he might get the 200 someday but not at the Olympics after all the rounds. I vote for the 200 because unlike the 100 it was a great performance, run all freakin out and in a less then idea situation!

And Sammy's marathon win is more impressive to me than the hurdle record but im a distance runner so......as is 2:03.59.

[Dave]

I would say the 200 is more impressive since it was a much older record. The 100 record has been dropping every year for a while which makes it more expected. The 200 record had survived a generation or two of sprinters.

[Mighty Favog]

I've got a Google Doc online with the all-time Performances of the Year compiled five deep per year (those in italics are my choices to fill out top 5s). Since the modern system of voting was put into place in 1973, these are the multi-in-a-year:

Kenenisa Bekele, 2004: #2 (26:20.31) and #4 (12:37.35)
Sebastian Coe, 1981: #1 (1:41.73) and #3 (3:47.33)
Haile Gebrselassie, 1998: #2 (26:22.75) and #3 (12:39.36)
Michael Johnson, 1990: #2 (19.85) and #4 (43.5 split)
Alberto Juantorena, 1977: #3 (1:43.4) and #5 (tie)(1:44.0)
Roger Kingdom, 1989: #3 (12.92) and #5 (12.87w)
Carl Lewis, 1982: #2 (8.76m) and #5(tie) (9m+ foul)
Lewis, 1983: #2 (19.75) and #4 (8.79m)
Lewis, 1991: #2 (9.86) and #4 (8.87m)
Renaldo Nehemiah, 1979: #1 (13.00) and #4 (tie)(12.91w)
Asafa Powell, 2006: #2 (9.77) and #4 (9.77)
Henry Rono, 1978: #2 (13:08.4), #3 (8:05.4), #4 (27:22.5) and #5 (7:32.1)
Ulf Timmerman, 1988: #2 (23.06m) and #5 (22.47m)
Rick Wohlhuter, 1974: #4 (2:13.9) and #5 (1:44.1)

Also, in "67 Ryun had the POY (3:33.1) and his 3:51.1 probably also deserved a top-5 ranking had they been that deep. In '64 I figure Bob Hayes' 10.06 and OG anchor leg both should have been top 5.

Obviously, Rono's '78 campaign is the standard. But no one else has ever taken three of the top five spots in the POY. That we're even talking about it for Bolt says a lot about his place in history.

I haven't compiled women...yet.

[rabalac]

[quoteIAAF have a rule thet athlere and performace can;t go to the same person so take bolt out of the equation for performance of the year and we're left with Robles !![/quote]

That's the dumbest rule I've ever heard. There is no way Robles' performance is on par with Bolt.

But on to the original question, I am happy to cast a vote as dead even, regarding choosing between the 100 and the 200. But if you really really push me for an answer, I'd reluctantly say the 200.

[eldrick]

i'm not sure there is any rule precluding someone winning both POY & AOY as bolt was shortlisted for both ( you can't shortlist someone if they are not allowed to win ) :

http://www.iaaf.org/athletes/gala/newsid=48250.html

http://www.iaaf.org/athletes/gala/newsid=48337.html

dayron came a derisory 5th in shortlist voting, but it says internet fans only had 30% weighting whereas the iaaf "family" ( is that like sicilian "family" ? :P ) have 70%

they are of course the iaaf's own awards & they pay for it, so they are entitled to give it to who they want & have orchestrated voting