Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

[scottmitchell74]

Besides the obvious "he didn't run fast enough".

Yesterday or the day before I was watching something that once again recapped the Olympics. This time the view of the 100m was from directly overhead and I noticed that in his drive phase Gay's steps were side to side. He got a great start, but seemed (to me) to blow it by stepping side to side way more then the medalists did. I wonder what others think of this.

[repmujhgih]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

I had always thought that one of Gay's main strengths was the amount of time he stayed in his drive phase. Given that he is not driving as well from the beginning, as you stated going side to side, he seems to be coming up too fast in an effort to try and straighten his run out. If he can get back to driving through towards the finish line for longer, which is a hard skill to master, I think he will work back towards his old ways.

Given his injury, I also don't think he fully trust his range of motion, or has lost some, which is a big factor in leading to stepping side to side in hopes of gaining stride length.

[sprintzfan]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

Interesting. Thanks to both of you for the insight.

[gh]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

After he won his heat in London I turned to my announcing partner and said, "That didn't look right."

Hard to put in words—and maybe he has always looked that way and I was just trying too had to find something to analyze—but the best way I can describe it is that he wasn't running "square" in the closing stages. Sort of like a car that has been in an accident and the body has been knocked off the chassis mounts by a few degrees.

I chalked it up to his now having a different range of motion in the hip in which he had surgery.

[lonewolf]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

This doesn't apply to Gay but has anyone else observed that many/most footballers playing at sprinting come out of the blocks with a wide stance, low profile and side to side foot placement in the drive phase?

[repmujhgih]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

A lot of Novice sprinters do this, even in the college Track and field ranks. I've always chalked it it to them obtaining a false sense of stride length. Although the space between their feet is great, in relation to the finish line it is less so. Not too mention all the poor physiological elements that come from improper alignment of the hips...

[cladthin]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

I've always referred to this as "skating"-the side to side action. From a biomechanical perspective, years ago Canadian hurdles coach Brent McFarlane (and head coach of the Canadian 2000 Sydney team) mentioned that if the athlete will lift the forearm forward/up at the initiation of the start rather than tucking the elbow in it helps to "absorb (or cancel out) some of the torque" caused by the high forces and the body's resistance to inertia-clearly some of the forces must be lateral instead of completely as linearly as would be intended.

Since Gay had the hip surgery, it undoubtedly left Brauman/Drummond without many options for strengthening his lower body or at the very least they had to be very conservative in their loading approach in moving from rehab into training. It's very likely that Gay's relative weakness (start/acceleration) was tough for the coaches to address in training with a general approach of improving this aspect (mostly with weights, mb throws, single jumps, or more specific: sleds/hills) when the demands of strength are the highest (start and acceleration). They probably did these but did not have nearly as much time to do so as they would have liked. All told, it was very impressive for him to have done as well as he did considering the physical contraints he was under for a good portion of the last year.

[repmujhgih]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

well said! Give him Time and I think he will be back to form.

[user4]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

The guy is a 100m finalist within a few hundredths of a medal, he is a silver medalist and AR holder. That is very rarefied air.

[Marlow]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

I seem to remember a guy in 1964 who had LOTS of side-to-side action . . . even had a gallop in his stride . . . a very inelegant looking runner . . . his name was Bob something.

I remember another guy, injury-prone, probably because he ran so dog-gone UPRIGHT, a bio-mechanical nightmare. Micheal somebody.

Then then was this Czech distance guy, in the 50s, what a hot mess he was! All hunched over, constantly in pain, lots of obviously wasted motion. Can't remember his name at all, started with a Z maybe?

Oh, and this American marathoner in the 80s, might even be a coach now, absolutely SHUFFLED when he ran . . . :roll:

[Davidokun]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

"Missed it by that much."

Suppose, after an injury, the gallop changed to a canter, and the bullet failed to medal...

Suppose, after an injury, the upright posture changed to a backward lean, and the future commentator failed to medal...

Suppose, after an injury, the Z-man added a hitch to his giddyup, and failed to medal...

Suppose, after an injury, the shuffle changed to a skate, and he lost the "Duel in the Sun"...

Wouldn't that be worthy of discussion?

[ZELLGADISS]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

Umm in my opinion because Bolt is impossible defeat him if he is in good shape(although he was "only" at 90-95%),because Blake is a great level and because Gatlin was incredible this year, like in his best years...(included doping)
If in adittion Gay was "only" at 90-95% is the difference.
A little bit better he could defeat to Gatlin, although i see very hard to defeat to Blake.
And hardly Gay with many injuries in the last years will can to get to be at 100%.

Well if he is better the next year and at 95% minimum, i see him bronze medal after of Bolt and Blake :wink:

[bignate88]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

Umm in my opinion because Bolt is impossible defeat him if he is in good shape(although he was "only" at 90-95%),because Blake is a great level and because Gatlin was incredible this year, like in his best years...(included doping)
If in adittion Gay was "only" at 90-95% is the difference.
A little bit better he could defeat to Gatlin, although i see very hard to defeat to Blake.
And hardly Gay with many injuries in the last years will can to get to be at 100%.

Well if he is better the next year and at 95% minimum, i see him bronze medal after of Bolt and Blake :wink:

At this point, I don't see how Gay couldn't AT LEAST match and/or defeat Blake if he were to gain full fitness again(as far as the 100m goes). Blake is not that much beyond Gay, that all of a sudden he's so untouchable. (I mean, I don't even buy into the whole thing about "Bolt being in another stratosphere".) IMO, Tyson Gay at 100% is a true 9.6 runner. But taking into account his oft-injured career, the evidence of that is yet to be seen and can only be conjecture at best. Nonetheless, I wouldn't be surprised if his best season(s) were in the year(s) to come

[zidan]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

Umm in my opinion because Bolt is impossible defeat him if he is in good shape(although he was "only" at 90-95%),because Blake is a great level and because Gatlin was incredible this year, like in his best years...(included doping)
If in adittion Gay was "only" at 90-95% is the difference.
A little bit better he could defeat to Gatlin, although i see very hard to defeat to Blake.
And hardly Gay with many injuries in the last years will can to get to be at 100%.

Well if he is better the next year and at 95% minimum, i see him bronze medal after of Bolt and Blake :wink:

At this point, I don't see how Gay couldn't AT LEAST match and/or defeat Blake if he were to gain full fitness again(as far as the 100m goes). Blake is not that much beyond Gay, that all of a sudden he's so untouchable. (I mean, I don't even buy into the whole thing about "Bolt being in another stratosphere".) IMO, Tyson Gay at 100% is a true 9.6 runner. But taking into account his oft-injured career, the evidence of that is yet to be seen and can only be conjecture at best. Nonetheless, I wouldn't be surprised if his best season(s) were in the year(s) to come

Realy? If you dont think Bolt is in a different stratosphere, then maybe you need to be in a different Hemispere. Tyson at 9.69 was full tilt with max wind. Bolt at 9.69 galivanting meters out with 0wind....Huh and in that 9.58 was looking around for Gay too....Err and 9.63, not being at 100% looks like 9.5 territory to me.

[Davidokun]

Re: Why I think Gay failed to medal in London

In my opinion, for comparison between Bolt and Gay, the is no better source than Berlin 2009. At the time, a peak performance for the two fastest men in history.

Splits:

       RT      20 m   20-40 m   40-60 m   60-80 m   80-100 m   100 m
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Bolt   0.146   2.89   1.75      1.67      1.61      1.66       9.58
Gay    0.144   2.92   1.78      1.69      1.63      1.69       9.71

(Source)

Other than reaction time, Bolt is slightly better than Gay in each segment. They are both in the stratosphere, and Bolt is one layer above Gay.