Remember our post on the Kingston sprinters’ summer training camp in Lignano Sabbiadoro, right before Rio? Three weeks’ training and Human Tecar to “do our best” at the Games, as Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce declared at the time.
The Olympics over, we can safely say the promise was kept: Jamaican athletics’ medal table is amazing – number three in the world, behind the US and just behind Kenya. 11 medals, 6 of them gold; out of every proportion when you think of the Caribbean nation’s relative size... The just reward to these extraordinary athletes’ efforts and the close collaboration between Vincent “Stephen” Francis’ protégés and Human Tecar.
There have been some surprises: 29-year-old Fraser-Pryce did not manage to win her third consecutive Olympic gold in the 100m – the title went to sensational team-mate Elaine Thompson (24). The latter is the first woman since Florence Griffith Joyner at the Seoul Games in ’88 to win the sprint double at the Olympics; on top of a silver medal in the 4 x 100m relay. At any rate, we have all seen, on TV if not in person, Elaine (10.71 seconds) and Shelly-Ann (10.86s, bronze) embracing and smiling beneath the Jamaican flag, after the 100m race: smiles and embraces that show how patriotism and team spirit get the upper hand over personal ambition. Fraser-Pryce, incidentally, has declared the bronze medal in Rio was her “greatest medal ever” after a year interrupted by injury; twelve months of really hard work and “sacrifices” that closed on a happy note – all the happier for having overcome so many difficulties. In the Human Tecar spirit, after all!
Then there’s the well known, all-golden jackpot for Usain Bolt, who placed first both in the men’s 200 meters and 100m and won a third gold in the 4 x 100m relay, with Asafa Powell, Yohan Blake and Nickel Ashmeade, all in great shape.
The fastest man in the world (and the fastest treatment?) never disappoint.
