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Jere Longman has an excellent piece on track and field in Ethiopia in this morning's NY Times:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/11/sport ... html?8hpib
Here are the first few sentences:
Even blank cartridges for a starter's pistol were not to be used extravagantly at the national track and field championships here in one of the world's poorest nations. Until the concluding session of the five-day meet Saturday, races began with an official standing behind the runners, where they could not see him, holding a flag aloft and yelling, "Go."
Sometimes the competitors heard the command. Frequently, they did not or grew uncertain, starting, stopping and starting again. False starts were declared regularly.
Ethiopia's national stadium lacks a working scoreboard, sophisticated timing devices, computerized results and starting blocks for each of the eight lanes. Competitors shared one javelin and one unyielding pole in the pole vault; the winning jump fell a quarter-inch short of 11 feet - more than nine feet short of the world record.
A number of athletes wore no shoes, and many had never before run on the stadium's rubberized track, the only all-weather oval in a country of 66 million people. This paucity of equipment and expertise, though, did not dampen the celebratory mood
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/05/11/sport ... html?8hpib
Here are the first few sentences:
Even blank cartridges for a starter's pistol were not to be used extravagantly at the national track and field championships here in one of the world's poorest nations. Until the concluding session of the five-day meet Saturday, races began with an official standing behind the runners, where they could not see him, holding a flag aloft and yelling, "Go."
Sometimes the competitors heard the command. Frequently, they did not or grew uncertain, starting, stopping and starting again. False starts were declared regularly.
Ethiopia's national stadium lacks a working scoreboard, sophisticated timing devices, computerized results and starting blocks for each of the eight lanes. Competitors shared one javelin and one unyielding pole in the pole vault; the winning jump fell a quarter-inch short of 11 feet - more than nine feet short of the world record.
A number of athletes wore no shoes, and many had never before run on the stadium's rubberized track, the only all-weather oval in a country of 66 million people. This paucity of equipment and expertise, though, did not dampen the celebratory mood
Registration required.
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