LEWIS BLASTS THE COACHES FOR AMERICAN RELAY LOSSES

August 29, 2004
by William C. Rhoden

 
ATHENS, Aug. 28 - A day after watching the United States women be disqualified in the 4x100-meter relay, and hours after watching the men finish second in their 4x100 relay, the three-time Olympian Carl Lewis criticized the coaches and the leadership of USA Track and Field.

"The total organization needs to be restructured," he said. "They need to be decertified and start over. If it doesn't happen, the sport is going to continue to decline. They can sit up there and prop it up like it's improving and we're doing all this, but the cracks are showing fast."

Lewis criticized the order of the runners in the men's relay and the composition of the women's relay. "If you look at it, Gatlin had the best start in the 100, and the best turn in the 200; he should have led off," Lewis said,
referring to Justin Gatlin, the 100-meter gold medal winner.

"Maurice should have run second, Coby Miller third, and the strongest finisher of all of them was Crawford, he should have anchored,'' Lewis said, referring to Shawn Crawford. "The order was wrong. And that's flat out the coaching, and it goes right back to the same thing, the leadership."

The sprint coordinator for the United States men and women is Brooks Johnson.

"It's the same thing on the women's side," Lewis said. "It was a mistake. Allyson Felix should have been on that team. The two girls that got medals in the sprints should have been on that team. Period. End of discussion."

In a telephone interview on Saturday night, Felix, who won the silver in the 200, said she wanted to run the relay. "I was very much available," she said. "I was disappointed, but I'll be patient. My time will come."

Lewis said Marion Jones should not have been on the relay team because she had to compete in the long jump just before the race.

Lauryn Williams accepted the blame for the botched handoff in the relay.

"They gave Lauryn the fall because Lauryn was young," Lewis said. "But Marion made the mistake. It's not a matter of dogging Marion out, but knowing the middle legs takes time. Time to get used to knowing that even though you're coming on them, you have to keep running hard. It was strictly the
coaches' problems on both relays.

"USA Track and Field pays the relay coach over $100,000 that they have not announced to have this relay team set up, and we didn't win one gold medal. That's a problem."

George Williams, the head track coach for the United States, said he understood why Lewis was angry at the relay results.

"He's not as angry as me," Williams said. "I don't think the guys were truthful with me, don't think they were really ready to go. They weren't injured, they were just tired."

The United States track and field team has won more gold medals in Athens than it did in Sydney or Atlanta. But Lewis said: "We did not win a single medal above 400 meters. Makes no sense."

(reprinted from the New York Times)

click here for other archive articles

click here for current articles