V 9 N. 35 The Shoe Race

The Guardian: Oct 21, 2019 No Record Safe As IAAF Poised to Allow Shoe Race to Continue

This article appeared today in The Guardian.  I suppose we should weigh in a bit on technology and its effect on sport.  The claims on  shoes are 4-5% improvement in times in a marathon. That's a few minutes and implies that tech is responsible for Nike alphaFLYs and  Eliud Kipchoge's sub 2 hour effort.  It ignores all the other 'aid' that went into that effort.  And we all know that it will never be a world best until a sub 2 hour is run under race condtions.  Now they may give the women's world best to Brigid Kosgei even though she had men pacers helping her along to her destruction of Paula Radcliffe's record.  It all comes down to what was too much help.  Every Diamond League meet has pacers in the 800 and longer races.  They are designated, there is no mystery.  Only the World Championships and the Olympics are pacer free, unless Kenya or Ethiopia decide to sacrifice one of their many individuals to the national interest.  I have to ask myself as an average marathon runner 40 years ago if I would have anted up the hundreds of dollars for a shoe that would give me a couple of minutes off my time.  Maybe I would if it took me under a ten minute barrier, say from the 2hr 30s into the 2 hr 20s.  We buy all kinds of products to look better than we really are.  If we didn't the cosmetics industry would be nonexistant. Skinny jeans wouldn't be necessary.   If you remember back in 1972,  Bob Seagren had to give up his vaulting pole (thank you Adrian Paulsen), during competition, because it was not readily available to all competitors.  There had been a leap in technology and it was deemed too much of a leap to be fair to the other jumpers.  So a foregone conclusion of a victory for the US, instead went to an East German.  Talk about irony with the East Germans being some of the biggest cheats of all time.  Dick Fosbury was never in danger of being banned, because he did nothing artificial when he decided to go head first on his back over the high jump bar.  People laughed but then they bought into it.

 There was less said when pole vaulters began transitioning from steel and aluminum to fiberglass in the early 1960s, because the early fiberglass was heavy and hard to handle.  When they started making lighter poles, they also were breaking all the time, making for some spectacular photos and incredible full gainers over the pit, so that we weren't quite sure if fiberglass was a good idea. A number of vaulters had the scars to prove it.  Even modern vaulters still have some risk with fiberglass that a metal pole would not allow.  Jason Scott, a former NAIA vault champion got an end into his abdomen on a broken pole.  Nowdays, pole tech not an issue.  Eventually New Balance, Brooks and Adidas will catch up to Nike,  and the playing field will again be equal, and we will forget there was ever a disparity in shoes.  Life goes on.  We travel in jets instead of turbo props these days, and we'll even begin risking our necks again in the Boeing 737 Max or whatever it is called, and we'll just hope that the pilots will be trained to handle them.    George

Late entry:  John Bork Jr. has provided some great clarification to my statement above about the pole vault controversy at the 1972 Olympics.

Dear George:

Please forward to Arian Paulson as well.

RE; Bob Seagren did not have to give up his advantageous fiberglass pole in Munich at the 1972 Games,

because not all of the vaulters had one.

As the Athletic Diretor of the S. Cal. Striders with Bob Seagren, John Pennel and Bill Toomey and then

as  the Athletic Shoe Rep for Onitsuka Tiger at the '72 games, I became very aware of the pole vault "manipulation" by the Russians and the Entire Eastern Block of Counties.

In the 2 Years Prior to the '72 Games" every world class vaulter was provided with more than adequate supply of poles in order for them to  adjust to the new poles. Every world Class vaulter, save Wolfgang Nordwig of East Germany improved their height significantly, on the new poles. Thus, the Communist block worked to get these poles banned.  (They were produced from the the newer stronger "S" Glass" that became mainstay in the boat industry.)

THE USA and most of the Western Block Countries lobbied hard to get the poles approved.

About a year before the '72 Games they were, in fact approved for International Competition.

But, the Eastern Block Communist Countries lobbied hard to get the poles banned in an effort to improve Nordwig's chances of winning.

And, they were again successful. - Making specious claims.

Then about a month or 2 before Munich the US Olympic Technical committee along with the US Maker were successful in making the new poles legal & acceptable 

for the Munich Games.

Now all of us in the US breathed a sigh of relief that the poles were available to virtually every world class vaulter in the world, save Nordwig of East Germany.

Shockingly, in the last days before the pole vault competition the Eastern Block Communist nations were able to get a final ban on the new Poles.

We were stunned. But, we had a stock of the "old poles" and most every vaulter had at  least 1-2 old poles that were broken in and worked best for the vaulters.

But, the communists were not done yet.  Now the Rules committee moved in and confiscated the Americans Poles on the specious assertion that they could not be sure that

the old brown (black poles?) were not really the New S Glass Poles in Disguise.

Now Bob Seagren, young Steve Smith and our 3rd. vaulter ?? had to compete on unfamiliar poles that were not broken in.

I remember vividly the frustration and disgust shown by Steve Smith as he started down the runway on a practice run designed to get his

steps; take his pole and sling it down the runway careening into the pit.

And so it was that the Pole Vault was won by Wolfgang Nordwig of East Germany with the silver going to Bob Seagren.

John Bork Jr.

Sorry John, I don't have Paulsen's email.   George

George,

the third vaulter in the 72' olympics was ku's jan johnson.

placed 3rd.

Mike Solomon

Sports Reference.com's version is as follows.

The two best jumpers in 1972 were defending champion [Bob Seagren] and Sweden’s [Kjell Isaksson]. But also highly considered was 1968 bronze medalist [Wolfgang Nordwig] (GDR), who had won the 1966, 1969, and 1971 European Championships. Seagren and Isaksson were using the new Cata-Pole. But on 25 July the IAAF declared that pole to be illegal. The protest against the pole was lodged by the East Germans – Nordwig did not use that pole – based on the fact that it contained carbon fibers. When it was pointed out that the pole did not contain carbon fibers, and that IAAF rules did not specify any material prohibitions on poles, the IAAF banned it anyway because the equipment had not been available to all competitors for the past 12 months. It was also noted to the IAAF that their rules had no such requirement. Then on 27 August, the ban on the poles was lifted and it was announced they would be allowed. However, three days later, the IAAF again reversed itself and reinstated the ban on the poles, confiscating them from the pole vaulters rooms in the Olympic Village. (Obviously, Olympic officials in 1972 were more concerned with what was in the rooms of the Olympic Village than providing security for the place.)

In the competition, Isaksson was severely hampered by the rule change and did not clear a height in qualifying. At 5.30 (17-4½), four vaulters were left in the competition – Nordwig and Reinhard Kuretzky (FRG) clearing that height, while Seagren and [Jan Johnson] passed to 5.35 (17-6½). Kuretzky went out at 5.35, with Nordwig and Seagren getting first attempt clearances. Johnson went over on his third effort and would do no better, winning the bronze medal. At 5.40 (17-8½), Nordwig cleared on his second attempt and Seagren on his third. But Seagren missed 5.45 (17-10½) while Nordwig won the gold medal at that height, and went on to get over 5.50 (18-0½) as well. Seagren’s world record was 5.63 (18-5½) and he was incensed by how he had been manipulated by the officials. After his last vault, he took the pole he had been forced to vault with and handed it back to IAAF President Adriaan Paulen.

Final Round

Rank	Athlete	Age	Team	NOC	BHC	MBHC	TMBHC	TABHC
1	Wolfgang Nordwig	28	East Germany	GDR	5.50	2	4	10	OR
2	Bob Seagren	25	United States	USA	5.40	2	2	5	=OR
3	Jan Johnson	21	United States	USA	5.35	1	2	4
4	Reinhard Kuretzky	24	West Germany	FRG	5.30	0	4	9
5	Bruce Simpson	22	Canada	CAN	5.20	0	2	5
6	Volker Ohl	22	West Germany	FRG	5.20	1	2	4
7	Hans Lagerqvist	32	Sweden	SWE	5.20	2	3	6
8	François Tracanelli	21	France	FRA	5.10	0	0	1
9	Ingemar Jernberg	21	Sweden	SWE	5.10	1	3	5
10	Wojciech Buciarski	22	Poland	POL	5.00	0	0	1
11	Khristos Papanikolaou	30	Greece	GRE	5.00	0	0	2
AC	Antti Kalliomäki	25	Finland	FIN	NH	0	0	0	NH
AC	Hervé d'Encausse	28	France	FRA	NH	0	0	0	NH
AC	Tadeusz Åšlusarski	22	Poland	POL	NH	0	0	0	NH

 John Bork's explanation as well as the one which followed helped us remember the 1972 pole vault debacle.  The Communist Bloc countries were the ones who usually had the advantages but on this occasion it was the Americans who invented the superior pole and had the advantage.  I suspect the East Germans made the last-minute appeals because an earlier appeal would have given the entire world an opportunity to buy the superior Cat-a-Poles.  But mostly the IAAF caved into their threats to do something extreme.  The Eastern countries had a lot of power at that time, evidently more than the Americans.  I suspect the West Germans, rather than side with their friends, the Americans, opted to side with their former countrymen, the East Germans, to diminish the already-tense political rivalry between the two countries.  They also opted to present a more relaxed security atmosphere in the 1972 Munich games, attempting to purge themselves of the Nazi-era reputation of over policing.  Neither the pole vault nor the security plan worked, once again proving that it is best to do the right thing in the first place so you don't have to compensate with unnatural acts later on.

   Bill Schnier

George,
Thanks for commenting about "what is too much?"  Actually nobody knows even though Kipchoge must have set a WR in too much assistance.  So many people point to all his advantages but forget that many other world record holders had the most advantages available during their time.  His advantage was not that he had pacers but 6-7 teams of 7 fresh pacers block the wind and do everything else.  That is not available to anybody in an actual race.  The technology is supposed to help you, otherwise why would they make it?  Bill Schnier

   It is definitely the shoes, but then it has always been the shoes.  It is the job of shoe companies to produce better shoes.  When I switched from Chuck Taylor Converse All-Stars to Adidas kangaroo-skin spikes, I definitely sped up.  It was clearly the shoes.  Not mostly the shoes but partly the shoes.  The only trouble with these most recent shoes is they were available only to one person and after that would be sold to the general public at a very high price.  All the more reason to personally boycott Nike, which I do.

   But is it only the shoes?  Definitely not!  Is it only living in altitude for generations like we formally thought?  No, but it is partly the altitude.  Maybe it's also the culture of running in a few African countries which provides training groups, coaches, great roads, dry and warm but not too warm a climate, but mostly motivation to run.  Kipchoge thanked the greatest athletes in the world for pacing him but no American would have considered those guys to be the greatest athletes in the world.  Maybe the greatest runners in the world but not the greatest athletes in the world, but then he was speaking as a Kenyan.

   Was it any one thing?  Definitely not!  But it was many things such as a Kenyan diet, European supplements, and American money.  Even Elihud Kipchoge doesn't just go out and run 1:59.40.  There is always an explanation for everything.

   Bill