The 2023 Indoor Europeans

Although 2022 has been a "normal" year competition-wise, I was impatiently waiting this year's indoor Europeans. And I was not disappointed. While the competitions leading to the championships were so-so, despite the presence on non-Europeans, the quality of the Istanbul competition was great. I wrote already about the fabulous women's pentathlon and in my post on men's combined event, where I explore the idea of a men's pentathlon, I talk about the heptathlon competition in Istanbul. So, let us focus on the remaining events

The spring favourites met with different fortunes. World indoor and Olympic champion L. Jacobs had to content himself with the silver medal this time, the victory going to his compatriot, S. Ceccarelli, who won with 6.48 s (6.47 s in the semis). Seeing the acceleration of Jacobs after 40 m I am really confident for his summer season (baring injuries, of course). World Indoor champion M. Kambundji, on the other hand, dominated the women's 60 m winning in 7.05 s, ahead of D. Neita, 7.07 s, and E. Swoboda, 7.10 s. It is funny to see Kambundji, who is considered quite deservedly a 200 m specialist, excel at the short sprint.

Klaver and Bol

The 400 m race saw two great hurdle specialists win the title, albeit in different style. K. Warholm won in 45.35 after a suicidal first 200 m covered in 20.84 s. Reigning european champion O. Husillos could do not better than fourth, while J. Watrin broke the record of Belgium with 45.44 s for silver. F. Bol, fresh from her 49.26 s world record (where she erased the name of J. Kratochvilova from the tablets) won the european title with 49.85 s. Contrary to Warholm she had a fast but prudent first 200 m in 23.78 s. I was very pleased to see L. Klaver running at long last at her full potential. After a personal best of 50.34 s two weeks before the championships, she followed Bol all the way to the finish line obtaining silver with 50.57 s.

Hodgkinson winning the 800 m

While the woman's 800 m was a quite predictable one, the men's race was not decided until the finish line. B. Robert led the race from the start up to, practically, the finish but A. Ben being a tad faster managed to pass him on the line and win for just 3 milliseconds, both athletes having the official time of 1:47.34. Once more I was disappointed by A. Kramer who could do no better than 5th. K. Hodgkinson led from start to finish and when she crossed the line, in 1:58.66, she was more than 10 m ahead of the remaining runners. It is really amazing how Hodgkinson makes running a race as exhausting as the 800 m look so easy.

J. Ingebrigtsen was the favourite for the men's 1500 m and he dominated the race imposing his rhythm from the get-go, winning in 3:33.95. And then he went on to win the  3000 m in 7:40.32 taking the command of the race after the first three laps. In the women's race L. Muir won rather easily in a race paced by C. Bobocea up to the last 100 m. They finished in 4:03.40 and 4:03.76 respectively, the podium being completed by S. Ennaoui in 4:04.06, ahead of E. Guerrero. The women's 3000 m race was a most interesting one, where the two german runners took the command after the first kilometre with Klosterhalfen leading and Klein following just behind her. On the finish line the order was reversed, the victory going to the fast-finishing Klein with 8:65.87.

Llopis unconscious on the ground

The 60 m hurdles was a moment of pure anguish when in the final one of the favourites, spanish hurdler E. Llopis, crashed into the last hurdle, fell hitting his head on the ground and remained unconscious. Fortunately, back to Spain he sent a message that he is OK and pursues his recovery. The winner of the final J. Joseph, 7.41 s, was severely criticised for not checking on Llopis and had to issue a public apology. Ex indoor European champion M. Trajkovic could not progress beyond the semi-final. In the women's 60 m hurdles, N. Visser could not obtain a third european gold medal and had to content herself with silver. The race was won by R. Hurske with 7.79 s, ahead of Visser's 7.84 s while D. Kambundji, 7.91 s, obtained an indoors bronze to go with the outdoors one she won last year in Münich.

Amels winning the high jump

The unexpected winner of the men's high jump was D. Amels. From the beginning of the competition I liked his style but I was really surprised when, after jumping a personal best of 2.29 m, he went on to pass 2.31 m beating Protsenko, who had one unsuccessful attempt at 2.33 m. Everyone was expecting Y. Mahuchikh to win the women's high jump. And she did indeed. But it was not easy in particular in the qualification. She started by fouling twice at 1.87 m and had to leave her third attempt for 1.91 m (she passed, phew!). She won the final with 1.98 m and went directly to 2.03 m but could not make it. B. Weerman, with 1.96 m, secured the silver medal for the Netherlands. And, together with Amels, they brought back to their country two national records. A. Topic lost the bronze medal on count-back jumping 1.94 m, just like the two ukrainian jumpers, Tabashnyk, 3rd, and Levchenko, 5th.

The three greek medalists

Tentoglou hates competing in the morning. So he won with "just" 8.30 m. He is just 25 years old and has already won almost everything. The only gold medal missing in his collection is the World's one but there are World Championships this summer, so... Usually I am unhappy whenever I. Spanovic/Vuleta does not win. Well, not this time. In Istanbul it was another long jumper that I follow who won gold: J. Sawyers. 

Sawyers just after her 7 m jump

And she did it in a masterful way, joining the 7 m club on her 5th attempt. Vuleta  could do no better than 6.91 m and that was only enough for 3rd place, since L. Iapicchino (for those who do not follow, she is Fiona May's daughter) jumped an indoor national record of 6.97 m on her last attempt. The 4th place of M. Mihambo, 6.83 m, was a minor surprise. And I was somewhat disappointed by M. Gardasevic, who had recently jumped 6.91 m but could not qualify for the final.

The pole vault brought mixed feelings to the greek fans. Olympic, World and European champion K. Stefanidi could go no higher than 4.60 m and finished 4th in a match won by W. Murto with 4.80 m (who needed three attempts at 4.75 m). On the men's side E. Karalis got his redemption (after his near miss at the Olympics where he finished 4th) finishing 2nd, ex-aequo with P. Lisek, both jumping 5.80 m, just like the winner, S. Guttormsen (but also Blech who ended at the 4th position on count-back). One week later Guttormsen, competing at the NCAA championships, became a 6 m vaulter.

The third greek medal came at the men's triple jump. P. Pichardo was untouchable and with 17.60 m at his third attempt clinched the gold medal. Behind him there were five athletes separated by less than 20 cm. And finally it was N. Andrikopoulos who obtained silver with 16.58 m, beating M. Hess by just a cm. The women's triple jump saw the victory of a turkish athlete T. Danismaz. She had already announced her intentions in the qualifiers where she had the longest jump together with reigning champion P. Mamona. In the final she killed the opposition with a first jump at 14.31 m. Mamona could do no better than 14.16 m and was pushed to third place by D. Derkach with 14.20 m.

Men's shot put is dominated by spinners: today the only ones who throw in the glider style are the combined event athletes. I had prophesied this in an article of mine just after the Rio Olympics and it is now becoming true. And the level is getting higher by the day. Z. Weir won with 22.06 m and B. Bertemes with 21.00 m could do no better than 5th. To say nothing of L. Fabbri who fouled all of his throws but had some very long ones (and who threw 21.17 m in the qualifiers). 

More and more women are throwing in the spinning style but not the first two of the championships. A. Dongmo won with 19.76 m. Measuring 1.83 m she is more at ease in the gliding style (just like the great V. Adams, but who was 10 cm taller than Dongmo). European champion J. Schidler, who threw 19.18 m in the qualifiers, could do no better than 18.29 m in the final and finished 5th.

The great belgian 4x400 m relay

In the men's 4x400 m Spain got an early lead thanks to a 45.96 s relay by Husillos, while D. Borlée ran a lacklustre 47.54 for 4th place. But from then onwards the situation did improve for Belgium and thanks also to a great third relay by K. Borlée and the anchor of J. Watrin they won in 3:05.83. France and the Netherlands managed to pass the flagging spanish anchorman obtaining silver and bronze. The Netherlands, reigning champion since 2021, were the favourite for the women's title but the presence of two great 400 m runners in the team made the whole thing look particularly easy. L. Klaver took command of the race with 50.67 s and the dutch team stayed at the head of the race up to the last relay and F. Bol. With a 49.58 s anchor Bol finished, in 3:25.66, more than 20 m ahead of the second team, a surprising Italy who managed to beat Poland, winner of the 2015, 2017 and 2019 titles.

Believe me, I did not lie when I said that I was not disappointed by the 2023 European Indoors.

Men's pentathlon: what could have happened

In my post on women's combined events where I repeat my mantra that women's heptathlon should disappear in favour of the decathlon I pointed out that I did not like the men's indoor heptathlon either. In fact I do like the women's pentathlon although it does not include any technically challenging event besides the hurdles. Having all five events concentrated in just one day is great and I would prefer to see men's indoor combined event reduced to a single-day pentathlon. Of course, people will argue that the pole vault does make a difference and we have seen many a favourites drop out of the competition after having fouled out their initial height in pole vault. 

Still my preference goes to the pentathlon and I decide to do a small experiment in order to see what would have happened in the last indoor Europeans if the athletes were competing in just five events. Quite admittedly the study I propose is somehow flawed because the event was organised as a heptathlon, over two days, the athletes had to run the 60 m and participate in the pole vault and the order was not exactly that of the women's pentathlon. But let us ignore this and find out what would have been the classification over the pentathlon events: 60 m hurdles, long jump, shot put, high jump and 1000 m. (The women are running a 800 m and one can wonder whether it would have been preferable that the men's pentathlon include the shorter distance, but, after all men jump over higher hurdles and throw a heavier shot, so having to run one more round at the end is not crucial, and in any case the only available results are the ones over 1000 m).

So, here is the classification over the five pentathlon events (in parentheses their heptathlon rank).

1 (2)    Skotheim    4543
2 (1)    Mayer    4408
3 (3)    Lillemets    4273
4 (4)    Eitel    4247
5 (9)    Gletty    4236
6 (5)    Ureña    4220
7 (7)    Nowak    4153
8 (6)    Kopecky    4092
9 (10)    Hausenberg    4059
10 (8)    Nilsson    3987

Skotheim would have won that hypothetical pentathlon, with Mayer obtaining the second place while Lillemets would have conserved his bronze medal. What is interesting is that while Gletty and Hausenberg fouled out in the pole vault, both ran the 1000 m (although for Hausenberg it was more of a token participation). So they could obtain a place in the pentathlon, with Gletty placing 5th.

One of the favourites for the heptathlon, S. Ehammer fouled out in his specialty event, the long jump and dropped out of the competition. This is not the first time Ehammer fouls out from a heptathlon: the same scenario took place in the 2021 Europeans' only on that occasion Ehammer no-heighted at the pole vault. He did not participate in the 1000 m but I decided to obtain his pentathlon scoring taking his personal best over the distance (2:51.14). Contrary to what I was thinking the pentathlon performance of Ehammer was not really exceptional. He would have scored 4344 points, obtaining just the fourth place. (Mayer won the heptathlon with 6392 points and scored 4487 points in the pentathlon. Ureña was second overall with 6158 points and 4406 at the heptathlon, while heptathlon 4th placing Taam, with 4358 points in the pentathlon, would still beat Ehammer). 

Ehammer had a better pentathlon score in the 2022 indoor World's with 4438 points. D. Warner who won the heptathlon competition with 6489 points on that occasion had a pentathlon scoring of 4610 points, which is his personal best. Mayer's pentathlon personal best was obtained at the 2017 World championships where he won the heptathlon with 6479 points and scored 4544 points in the pentathlon. 

The world heptathlon record at this date belongs to A. Eaton, from 2012, with 6645 points. The corresponding pentathlon performance was 4715. It was the best performance over the five events till the recent indoor NCAA championships. On that occasion K. Garland came within a breath of Eaton's record, scoring 6639 points. His pentathlon score is the unofficial world best with 4750 points (7.74, 7.96, 16.45, 2.12, 2:41.36) topping the one of Eaton. And what is really impressive is that in the same competition Owens-Delerme was second with 6518 points in the heptathlon (which is the third all-time performance) and scored 4654 points in the pentathlon (again the third-best performance). Next summer's decathlon world championships will really be awesome.

A fabulous pentathlon

When Adriana Sulek crossed the finish line of the 800 m she was during six and a half second the world record-woman of the indoor pentathlon. 

I know, I know. The results are not valid before the end of the race and once it was over Nafi Thiam was the overall winner of the pentathlon and the new world record holder. But I like the idea that for a few fleeting seconds Sulek had the best performance ever recorded in that discipline. 

But let us start at the beginning. Coming at the Ataköy Arena the world record stood at 5013 points, established in the same venue by Natalia Dobrynska 11 years before. At the end of a great fight with Jessica Ennis-Hill, Dobrynska managed to erase Belova's 20-years old 4991 points record. (Ennis-Hill on the other hand did not manage the same feat as Sulek, despite beating Dobrynska in the 800 m, essentially due to her slightly below-par jumps, obtaining "just" 4965 points).

Dpbrynska's record got a scare in February, when during the US indoors Anna Hall broke the 5000 barrier with 5004 points, becoming at the time the second performer ever. Hall ran a superb 2:05.70 800 m (but as I pointed out in my "Facing the calvary" article the record of the indoor pentathlon 800 m is still held by Ester Goosens with 2:04.42). Hall's time is not a freak performance. In fact during the same US championships she won the 400 m title with 51.03 s and her outdoors 800 m best is an impressive 2:03.11.

Coming into the championships, Sulek did not hide her ambition to aim at a world record. And with personal bests in the jumps and the shot put she was on the right path. Meanwhile Thiam is a double olympic, world and european champion, and was vying for a third european indoor title. She took control of the event with a personal best of 15.54 m in the shot put and a lead of 144 points. Still, I think that her 1.92 m high jump was a tad below her usual performances. Sulek excelled in the long jump with a PB of 6.62 m but Thiam minimised the point loss with 6.59 m, entering the 800 m 134 points ahead of Sulek. 

In the 800 m Sulek went all-out finishing practically stumbling from exhaustion and a superb 2:07.17 which gave her a total of 5014, one point more than Dobrynska. Prior to that race Thiam had a personal best of 2:18. Had she run in that time she would have obtained 851 points instead of 913, bringing down her total below 5000 and losing the title. But Thiam is always Thiam. She smashed her personal record with 2:13.60, obtaining the title and a world record with 5055 points. 

The only competitor who could follow Thiam and Sulek was the reigning world indoor champion, and Thiam's compatriot, Noor Vidts. She had won the title last year in Belgrade with 4929 points. This year she had to content herself with 4823 points, having lost some 80 points, with respect to last year's performance, in the 800 m. But she has definitely a 5000 points potential.

The amateurism myth (part one)

Or how the social marketing of de Coubertin led to a century-long dictatorship in sports

I have written on several occasions about our beloved Baron and how, in the quest of self-aggrandisement, he deformed the olympic ideals. In a recent article of mine I told the story of de Coubertin's successor, the Comte Baillet-Latour, and how, under his presidency, the amateurism obsession reached new heights. While researching the Baillet-Latour article, I came across publications that were dealing with the amateurism question. I dug deeper and finally I decided to write a short series on the question.

De Coubertin and Baillet-Latour are definitely to blame for the harm of amateurism to sports. Both were old-school aristocrats and one can understand (but certainly not condone) their attitude. And to tell the truth, during the years of their presidency, the finances of the International Olympic Committee were more than shaky. With the advent of television in the 60s things did change and the IOC started making money out of the Olympics. But A. Brundage, who held the president's position at that time, insisted on imposing his anachronistic ideas of a sport reserved to amateurs. I told the story of Brundage in an article of mine and so I am not going to repeat it here. I will just, once more, mention the injustice to one of the greatest athletes of all times, J. Thorpe, in which Brundage played an important role.

In my article on Brundage I wrote 

There is no indication that Brundage had played a role in that initial disqualification of Thorpe. However where he did indeed play a major role was in refusing vehemently, throughout his stint as IOC president, the rehabilitation of Thorpe. 

But let us tell the story of Jim Thorpe, immolated at the altar of the false-god of amateurism. 

Thorpe won the pentathlon and the decathlon in the Stockholm 1912 Olympics dominating both events like nobody had done before (or has since). Thorpe had been a student at the Carlisle Indian Industrial School from 1904 to 1913 (although not continuously). After his victory in Stockholm he went back to the school to play football. That was the beginning of the end. 

In a post-season demonstration tour, a chance remark by one of Thorpe’s former coaches, C. A. Clancy, revealed to a local reporter, R. Johnson, that Thorpe had played two summers in the league, in 1909 and 1910, earning a few dollars per game. Johnson printed the story in a local newspaper in January 1913. Clancy denied the facts but, a few weeks later, the story made the national newspapers. And the president of the American Amateur Athletic Union, J. E. Sullivan, decided to personally oversee the handling of the affair. Those who follow closely my blog may remember that Sullivan figures prominently in the Gallery of Shame, for his misogynistic attitude. Llewellyn and Gleaves in their book on Olympic Amateurism point out that Sullivan had earned a small fortune peddling Spalding sporting goods. 

Sullivan on the same tribune with Spalding during the Paris, 1900, Games

The Thorpe case offered Sullivan a chance to restore his reputation and counter longstanding allegations that the AAU openly sponsored professionalism. Sullivan promised to leave no stone unturned in investigating the allegations. Well, it took him all of one day. There was no trial, no investigation, and no hearing. Thorpe had no money, no lawyer, and no opportunity to mount a defence.

Sullivan had already showed his hand in an interview. “If Thorpe is found guilty,” he told to the New York Tribune, “the trophies will have to be returned and his records erased from the books”. With the help of Thorpe's coach, G. Warner, Sullivan coerced Thorpe into writing a, rather scripted, confession. And the AAU, without further ado, wrote to the Swedish Committee that had organised the Olympics that Thorpe “is deserving of the severest condemnation for concealing the fact that he had professionalized himself by receiving money for playing baseball”. This is really shocking coming from the man who, while organising the 1904 Olympics, had included openly professional events for cyclists.

The situation became somewhat embarrassing for the IOC, since the deadline for the validation of the results of the Olympics was long past. (In fact that was the hypocritical argument for the reinstatement of Thorpe in the 80s). But Warner presented them with a fait accompli: he went to Thorpe's house, took the medals and shipped them back to Stockholm.

A 2018 dollar coin featuring Jim Thorpe

Stripped of his titles, Thorpe turned professional and had brilliant careers in baseball, american football and basketball. Over the years the supporters of Thorpe fought to have him cleared. The IOC systematically refused, with A. Brundage rebuffing several attempts, claiming that "ignorance is no excuse". In fact, the disqualification of Thorpe had been quite convenient for Brundage. With Thorpe removed from the amateur ranks, Brundage became national all-around champion, a standing that he later admitted helped open doors to his construction business. A self-righteous, vindictive personality, Brundage, although, most probably not involved in the original disqualification of Thorpe, played a major role in the dismissal of the pro-Thorpe petitions. Is it curious that the AAU voted to reinstate Thorpe’s amateur status, in 1973, just after Brundage retired? 

In 1982 the IOC relented and reinstated Thorpe, but only as co-winner(!) of the two combined events. And it was only in 2022 that justice was finally done and Thorpe was declared sole winner of the two events. So except for his two Olympic titles, Thorpe earned another, totally unenviable, title, that of being the first athlete charged, convicted, and punished for violating the IOC’s amateur regulations. What regulations we are talking about, that is far from clear. In fact, de Coubertin was rather embarrassed by the situation and declared that it was time to revise the regulations on amateurism. After several attempts at a coherent formulation of rules (de Coubertin floated also the idea of an amateur oath) and the creation of an international amateur license, the IOC threw in the towel and in 1914 voted to empower the international federations with the task of governing amateur eligibility.

The amateurism farce was just beginning.