photo credit: rich115

What a day it was for Jamaican athletics, as the increased dominance of the world by the tiny 4,411 square miles island continued. The twelve year old 200 meter record seemed so impregnable, but Usain turned the doubters into believers today as he broke the 19.32 seconds record previously held by Michael Johnson in easily winning the event in 19.30 seconds ahead of Churandy Martina of the Netherland Antilles and Wallace Spearmon of the USA. Martin and Spearmon were both disqualified for running out of lane and the Americans Shane Crawford and Dix Walter were handed silver and bronze in 19.96 and 19.98 respectively.

This has been the single greatest sprinting achievement in the history of the sport as he became the first person to set World Records in the two events (having previously done 9.69 in the 100m) at the Olympic games and the first person since Karl Lewis in 1984 to win the double (100m and 200m). Not even the great Jesse Owens accomplished that double world record feat. after the race Bolt did his version of the popular Jamaican dance, “Gully Creeper”. After the 100 meters record, he did the dance called “No Linger”, which means “don’t waste any time”.

Melanie Walker

Fifteen minutes later, Melanie Walker continued in the footsteps of fellow countrywoman Deon Hemmings by taking the 400 meters hurdles in a National and Olympic Record of 52.64 seconds. Walker, unbeaten in the event this year, executed her race perfectly by accelerating in the last 100 meters to win by over a second over Tosta Sheena of the USA in 53.70 and Tasha Danvers of Great Britain in 53.84.

Melanie, is from Gordon Lane off Maxfield Avenue, located in a tough, violent, gang plagued area in East Central St. Andrew. Like 100 meters silver medallist Kerron Stewart, she went to  high school at St.Jago High where at various times in her school career she ran 100 meters, 200 meters, 400 meters and 110 meters hurdles. That made her a rounded athlete and her considerable sprinting speed helped her in the last 100 meters when she won moving away from the field.

Melanie’s victory was very special to Jamaicans as Usain was expected to win, but people were wondering if she would fold under the pressure. she did not disapoint and had the entire nation in a frenzy. Before the race she gave a small demo of the Jamaican dance called “Dutty Wine”, thereby underlying the importance of dancehall reggae to the athletes.

Coach Stephen Francis

Her winning performance underlined the success of Coach Stephen Francis and the MVP club located at the High Performance center in Kingston. Coach Francis needs to be given his credit as the greatest coach in the entire world today, having his athletes cop the following medals:

1. Shelly-Ann Fraser - 100 meters women: gold.
2. Sherone Simpson - 100 meters women: silver.
3. Sherika Williams - 400 meters women: silver.
4. Melanie Walker - 400m hurdles women: gold.
5. Jerome Mason (Great Britain) - High Jump men: silver.

He is also the coach of 100 meter 5th placed finalists Asafa Powell (former world record holder) and 6th place Michael Frater; Markino Buckley (7th place in 400 meters hurdles men final)  along with seven other top class athletes.

Melanie Walker

Coach Francis started the MVP track club after being tired of seeing Jamaica lose talent in the tough collegiate system in the USA. Many of our most talented athletes over the years gave up the sport due to various problems caused by the relocation. It is now reaping rich benefits as more and more of our athletes are staying or coming back home, thereby realizing their true potential.

The double victory sparked wild celebrations and a huge green, gold and black motorcade in Trelawny.

Jamaican Lips -celebrating Jamaica's Olympic victories in Falmouth ,Trelawny on Wednesday

Little Jamaica, the poor developing country of less than 2.7 million people is now leading the athletics medal table with strong medal contending performances expected to come in the women’s 200 meters in which we have 3 ladies who have the potential to win (Veronica Campbell, Kerone Stewart and Sherone Simpson) , men’s decathlon (Maurice Smith), men and women’s 4×100 meters relay and to a lesser extent, women’s 4×400 meters relay.

Scorpion disco will be playing in Sherwood Content tonight to celebrate Usain’s 22nd birthday after Jamaica plays Canada in World Cup Football qualifying against Canada in Canada. Photos of the motorcade and celebration in his hometown can be found here and the full set is available on my photo blog.

photo credit: Lim CK

When 21 year old Shelly-Ann Fraser won the Women’s 100 meter title at the Olympic Games in Beijing on Sunday morning (Jamaica time), it was a huge slap in the face of many Jamaicans who were advocating bumping her from the 100 meters to make space for (as they said) the more experienced Veronica Campbell-Brown, the reigning World Championship gold medalist in the event.

They conveniently chose to ignore the fact that Campbell-Brown was beaten into fourth place at the qualifying National Trials by Kerone Stewart (the winner), Sherone Simpson (second placed) and Shelly-Ann (third). They also chose to ignore the rules of the Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) that stated that the first three will qualify for the event and the fourth placed runner will be an alternate (in case one of the others cannot compete). Fourth placed will also be the 4th person to make the relay team.

There were debates all over the country and the sports talk shows were abuzz with the topic. It was a dreadful flashback to the 2000 Olympics in Sydney when public pressure was brought to bear on the JAAA to replace Peter Gaye Dowdie with Merlene Ottey for the 100 meters event. Peter Gaye placed third at the National championship in Kingston and Merlene placed fourth, They bowed to the pressure and Ottey was brought in for the Olympics and this of course devastated Peter Gaye Dowdie. What was the result? Merlene placed 4th (now third with the subsequent disqualification of Marion Jones on the grounds of using performance enhancing drugs). Not long after, Merlene complained bitterly about her treatment by the JAAA and switched nationality to Slovenia.

We are a Third World country with aspirations of moving up to first world status in the next 2-3 decades.This is a fleeting dream and it is our mentality which will force us to remain in the Third World for a long time. There are some extremely selfish people among us who generally think wherever they go, someone must pull out all the stops to make way for them. This has gotten progressively worse over the last 20 years and works hand in hand with the increasing corruption. Jamaicans call it a “bligh” which literally means “give me a break even though I have a deficiency, fault or am not qualified.” All rules, systems and order are ignored to get this bligh and they have progressed to a level of severe indiscipline with the thinking that anywhere they go, anything they do, provision must be made to get a break, no matter at whose or what expense.  Jamaicans were asking the JAAA to give Veronica a “bligh” at the expense of Shelly Ann and even Sherone who placed second at the trials. These girls booked their places through discipline, hard work, dedication and performance when it mattered most; all pre-requsite traits of a champion.

Another problem which relates to this victory is our propensity to think with our hearts and not our brains. Many  of us tend make decisions based on what or who we like; rationale, performance and ability take a really distant back burner. We have gotten to love Veronica as she gave us a gold in the 200m and anchored the 4×100m team to victory at the 2004 Olympics in Athens. She is the darling of women’s track & field in Jamaica. This should not form the basis of our judgment. The fact that we love her for what she did in 2004, does not give us reason to break all the rules and destroy another person’s career and dreams to include her.

There are several lessons to be learnt from this victory:

1. Respect rules and regulations and stop trying to find your way around them for your own selfish reasons.
2. No one person is bigger than the system that governs it.
3. Do not stifle our young talents.
4. Do not make decisions based on sentimental feelings, rather make decisions on reasoning and rationale.
5. With discipline and hard work, you can achieve anything.
6. No matter what the odds against us, never give up.
7. Don’t let the negatives that people say get you down, rather use it as motivation to attain higher goals.
8. It is more important if you have confidence in yourself than if someone has confidence in you.

“Big up” Shelly-Ann. Your victory to me is more than a gold medal. It is the lessons learnt from your hard work, tenacity, dedication, focus, dilligence and strength of character. You are only 21 and i only heard of you in April, but I have nothing but respect for you, having proved your detractors wrong and hopefully taught your nation a lesson.

Although he was not the first person to execute the Fosbury flop (Bruce Quande from Montana was photographed using the technique in 1963), Dick Fosbury’s introduction of the style in the Olympic competition in Mexico City 1968 and his ultimate victory in the event, has totally revolutionized the high jump event.

Prior to this, most jumpers used the Straddle technique, Western Roll, Eastern cut-off or even Scissors-Jump to clear the bar.
photo credit: Ambrosio Photography

Given that landing surfaces had previously been sandpits or low piles of matting, high jumpers of earlier years had to land on their feet or at least land carefully to prevent injury. With the advent of deep foam matting high jumpers were able to be more adventurous in their landing styles and hence experiment with styles of jumping.

The method used is to sprint diagonally towards the bar, jump off the outside foot, then curve and leap head-first, back-downwards over the bar in a rolling motion keeping as much of the body as possible below the bar. When high jumpers perform this jump, they bend their body in such a way that it is possible for the athlete to clear the bar while his or her center of mass does not. In fact, the body’s center of mass can be kept as much as 20 cm under the pole.

By 1980, 13 of the 16 Olympic finalists were using the Fosbury flop. Watching the Beijing Olympics competition yesterday, all the high jumpers use the technique. I cannot recall seeing someone in major competition use any other technique in recent memory. The high jump is my favorite field event as I competed in it at high school using the Fosbury flop, after experimenting with other styles. I jumped much higher than I could with the other styles and it just looked cooler.

The high jump event has come a long way from 1968 when Dick Fosbury of the United States jumped 2.24 meters (7 feet 4 and 1/4 inches) and broke the old Olympic record of 2.18 meters (7 feet 1 and 3/4 inches) held by Valery Brumel of Russia. The WR at the time was 2.28 meters (7 feet 5 and 3/4 inches) set Brumel in 1963. The fosbury flop has taken the record all the way to 2.45m (8 feet 1/2 inch) held by Javier Sotomayor of Cuba.

In honor of this great technical revolution in the sport and in keeping with the Olympic spirit, here is the video of that momentous high jump event at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City along with a collection of other interesting jumping videos.

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Bernie Mac and Isaac Hayes, two great African-American entertainers died within a day of each other last weekend.

Bernie Mac, the accomplished comedian and movie star who starred in over 50 films including his feature role in the 2004 hit, “Mr 3000″ died on August 9th of Pneumonia. He was 50 years old.  In honor of his memory, here is a clip from one of his stand-up comedy shows.

Isaac Hayes, the bald headed, baritone-voiced soul singer and actor who laid the groundwork for disco and whose “Theme From Shaft” won both Academy and Grammy awards, died Sunday afternoon, August 10th after he collapsed in his home at the age of 65. I would like to remember him with his most famous song. “Theme From Shaft.”

I started writing this at 11.37 pm on the 5th of August; by the time I am done, it will be Wednesday, the 6th of August, Jamaica’s Independence Day. It is a time to reflect on where we are coming from, where we are now 46 years later, and where we’re going in the future,

Jamaica was a British colony before gaining independence and it is a regular debate as to whether we would be better off still being a colony.

For the independence, I decided to write a  top ten list of what is right and another top 10 about what is wrong. I’ll start with what’s right so that if you get tired of reading, at least you will be left with only positive thoughts about this small country.

Best Things About Jamaica (Top 10)

1. Music: A natural number one. We have been musically inclined even before the days of Mento then Ska in the 1960’s then Rock Steady (late 1960’s) then Reggae (1970’s to the present) then Dancehall (1980’s to the present). Bob Marley is known the world over and his music still lives on after his death from cancer in 1981. His album “Exodus” is described by Time Magazine as the “Album of the 20th Century” and his single “One Love” was voted “Song of the Millennium” by the BBC.
more about “Bob Marley “One Love”“, posted with vodpod
2. Sports: Jamaica is one of the powerhouses in world Track & Field sprinting boasting the two fastest men ever over the 100 meters (Usain Bolt & Asafa Powell). We just keep getting better and are expected to give our best performance ever this Olympics. This little island of 2.7 million people with an area of only 4,411 square miles, consistently beats countries several times our area, wealth and population in the Olympics and World Championships medals table. Our Reggae Boyz football (soccer) team became the first team from the English speaking Caribbean to qualify for a World Cup Tournament in 1998, defeating Japan 2-0 and in the process also became the first (and still only) one to win a game at the tournament. Our netball team is ranked 3rd in the World, only behind Australia & New Zealand.
3. Food: Jamaica has it’s own unique dishes and there are Jamaican restaurants all over the world. Our original Jerk Chicken (grilled in a used oil drum) is world famous.
4. Culture: We have a unique culture which includes the food, music, language, dress., etc.
5. Beauty: There is a thriving tourism industry here, all because of the island’s beauty. It has drawn millions to our shores and many just can’t stop coming back. Whether it is the beautiful Dunn’s River Falls the green ferns of Fern Gully or the 7 miles of endless white sand beaches of Negril, it is truly a beautiful country.
   
6. Friendly People; We are known for our friendliness to strangers and our hospitality towards visitors is one of our greatest assets. We still haven’t found a way to tolerate each other, though, so we keep killing one another sometimes for little or no reason.
7. Democracy: We are a very democratic country and although you cannot go into certain areas and express opposing political views, our transfer of power from one party to the next has always been smooth and without incident or dissent.
8. Climate: although totally natural, this is what has contributed to our strong tourism industry (along with the islands beauty and the friendliness of the people).
9. Press Freedom: Our press enjoys a total freedom that would be envied by most countries. Government generally stays out of the media houses and they (the media) are free to crucify whoever they want (as long as they abide by the Libel Laws).
10. Rastafarianism: the idea of a black god as the second coming of Christ on earth (in the person of His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Selassie I of Ethiopia) was born and bred in Jamaica.
    photo credit: max_thinks_sees

Honorary mention has to be made of Marcus Mosiah Garvey, that great black power leader who from his base in Harlem, USA, taught negroes the world over to take pride in themselves and stand up for their rights

Read the rest of this entry »

I bought a copy of “Kundalini Yoga - for beginners and beyond” on Amazon last year and to date, I haven’t used it. The DVD is highly rated, but I am a bit lazy to sit through it and follow step by step instructions. The video shown here, however, is simple, short and contains only a few stretches to make facing a hard day that much easier. If, like me. you sometimes feel lousy, tired and listless :-(  getting out of bed in the morning, this one’s for you!

Want to stop smoking? If this video doesn’t motivate you then nothing will! Here are some reminders and things you didn’t know about how smoking destroys your body and ultimately your life.

Here is an entertaining video of of a guy using his football (soccer) skills to create mischief in the streets of London.

This video was shot at the recent Jamaica national trials, evaluating the Jamaican testing programme and gives a brief history of drugs in track & field.