Gault would have had hands full with Kingdom
As great a race as Sunday’s masters 110 hurdles event was, with Willie Gault winning in a wind-aided 13.87 at Carson nationals, how much better could it have been with the addition of American record holder Roger Kingdom, the Olympic champion? In his Washington Times column Sunday, Steve Nearman mentions Kingdom’s interest in that masters exhibition race.
Nearman writes:
Kingdom sits out — Elite Masters track competitors were invited to compete in the USA Outdoor Track & Field Championships this weekend at Carson, Calif. The women are scheduled to run today at 1,500 meters and the men in 110-meter hurdles as four days of competition end.
One notable name will be missing from the latter event.
I would have loved to have been out there competing, but they only gave me three weeks’ notice, and that’s not enough to get into shape,” said former world record holder and two-time Olympic gold medalist Roger Kingdom from his office at California University of Pennsylvania, where he is the new coach of men’s and women’s cross country and track and field. “Last year I was able to get into shape in four weeks, but I am not in as good a shape now as I was back then.”
Still tied for No. 3 on the all-time world list, Kingdom, 42, said he was looking forward to future opportunities to compete against the nation’s top hurdlers, this time as a masters athlete.
Let’s hope this short-notice problem isn’t repeated in the future.
3 Responses
Mr Stone,
I think you are doing Willie Gault and everyone else a disservice with this article. Coincidentally, I received the same amount of notice that Roger did. And in fact, almost decided not to run in this race. Then it occurred to me that this race could probably be a piece of history in the making, and I wanted to be a part of it.
Your title says, “Gault would have had hands full with Kingdom”; I think the same could be said for Roger as well. If I’m not mistaken, that 13.87 would have been a single-age world record had it not been wind-aided.
I truly hope Roger does consider running with us. In fact, I personally invited him to consider doing so a couple of months back. It would be a boon to Masters Track & Field.
However, I think what’s important to remember is 1) the great race that Willie ran and 2) the historical significance of what was accomplished last Sunday.
Dexter….first off congratulations on your third place finish at the Nationals…it was really nice to see Masters athletes on TV.in the middle of a world class event. I must disagree with your comments to Ken Stone…how Kingdom would have done agaisnt Gault is just speculation..i do agree with that. Track races are decided on the TRACK not in newspaper articles or Blogs…BUT the VERY important factor Ken focuses on is the Kingdom was given only 3 weeks notice…for most of us in the “adult world” ie: with family/kids/work responsibilities that is NOT enought time to make it to the starting line…this is a continual problem with the exhibition program..and guess who suffers?? the athletes. Cleary has stated that USATF and “approves” the event “at the last minute” so he lets the athletes know “as soon as possible”. Clearly this is a FLAW that needs to be addressed. You who ran the race, and ran well, did a great job. Feedback and comments that are directed to Cleary are generally not accepted and treated in a defensive manner….If we want the strongest fields in these events we need to give athletes PLENTY of time to set up there respective schedules…if we dont give them the time we will get what we get…and honestly in your race that was pretty damm good!! Congratulations and stay healthy
Well, I don’t want to get into the position of defending Mark; I think he’s more than capable of that. But, if I’m not mistaken, he is simply the Chairman of the committee that handles these events. Perhaps we (meaning the athletes and general Masters Community) should raise this issue with George Matthews and John Chaplin. My take on this is that “they” don’t think that there is any interest from he general public in Masters track & field. Hopefully, events like last weekends race will help to erase that notion!
Thanks
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