Jon wrote:Do you mean Asha Phillip?Speedster wrote:Does anyone know how Ashlee Nelson's knee is going? Brits seem to have a good stock of juniors behind the women who did pretty well in Beijing.
Yes, apologies, I did mean Asha.
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Time Britain Had another Great Female Sprinter
Yes, apologies, I did mean Asha.
Phew, for a moment there I thought Nelson might have picked up an injury too! Not heard much about Philip, although I know she was out in Beijing with a group of 'up-and-coming' 2012 Olympic hopefuls, so hopefully her interest in T&F isn't waning.
Hi its Jodie Williams here did u know that 4 of the top 8 ALL TIME 100m U17 girls are all still running and getting better, 1 of the others is Katherine Merry and I think Sonia L did well too so that's 6. Its not true we all keep dropping out when it starts to get tough. Bye the way I love athletics too much to give up, win or loose !!!
Cool Jodie. That's great to hear. Stick at it, keep working hard and enjoy it- you've got London and beyond to look forward to. All the very best for the future 
Hi Jodie. I'm really sorry to use you as an example and it really wasn't meant as anything personal against you, so please don't take it that way. I really didn't mean to imply that you would give up or anything like that. I love your attitude - it's fantastic! You're an amazing talent and please understand that I really would love to see you reach your potential. Katharine Merry is a really good role model I think 'cos she kept going despite having so many injuries and she really was our most talented sprinter since Kathy Cook and Sonia Lannaman. Britain's got so much talent like yourself, we're really lucky. So I apologise if I've offended you 'cos I didn't mean to. Some old farts like myself just know it's really tough to make it to world class and not everyone gets there. I had to stop running when I was 14 'cos I'd done too much mileage and couldn't run a mile without being in pain in one leg or another and I still can't. Shit happens that gets in the way.
Britain's Shaunna Thompson yesterday won the Commonwealth Youth 100m title with a time of 11.46 (+0.6m/s), adding to the select group of promising young female sprinters. At the moment, we have:
Asha Philip (born 1990) - World youth 100m champion, PB of 11.37 Ashlee Nelson (born 1991) - World junior 100m silver medallist, PB of 11.37 Shaunna Thompson (born 1992) - Commonwealth youth 100m champion, PB of 11.46 Jodie Williams (born 1993) - Second fastest 14-year-old ever, PB of 11.56 (-1.2m/s) I really hope Asha Philip can bounce back from her knee injury next year, because this foursome could smash the British junior 4x100m record (44.16).
I see what you are saying but I just don't think its a good enough reason, as many other athletes from poorer countries have to deal with much more than that and still manage to perform better. Some of these also come out of less organised NAOs and still thrive. The problem with using Juinor performances particularly with females is mainly owing to the dynamics of the female body and form and adjustment as they age. This is not just a problem with Britain, Carrie Russel for instance who got 3rd in 2006 for 11.42 when she was 16 has had major problems this year as a more mature looking 18 year old with a different physique and had major problems making the rounds at champs didn't even make final in some meets. So much so that unheard of girls from lower classes are tearing her apart. Me thinks Britain sholud place major emphasis on nurturing home grown talent rather than awaiting windfall migrant talent to emerge. This has certainly worked with the various football clubs should work for tracks too. Remember your brightest stars were 100% home grown. I say these because I do believe there lies a whole host of untapped talent in Britain that might be largely ignored due to coaches' tendencies to go for the easy wayout and look for the young black girl with jamaican or nigerian parents. And I am prepared to stand corrected here but from where I'm sitting; this what I see.
Britain must have a good gene pool for sprinters, especially women, if you consider the history of Australian athletics meaningful in this context. [did I just type a sentence worthy of utterance in front of Katie Couric?]
You could probably say this about boys as well I should imagine, although I'm no expert. If my friend's kid and his mates are anything to go by though, Usain Bolt is a total hero to the Afro-Caribbean population of the UK and a great inspiration and he's put athletics (or sprinting at least) on the map for previously football-mad lads. I wonder if VCB's a similar role model for the laydeez? I hope so as I'm a big fan of hers and I hope others are too.
Of course, because from all those millions of pounds that is invested in British athletes, most of it just goes to a bunch of people who sit and wait around for the next 'import' to come in, and whatever is left of the money goes towards developing the home grown talent... er.. yeh 
Just because Germaine Mason won a silver for Britain in Beijing, it hardly makes a trend. His medal is one of around 180+ championship medals won by British athletes in the past 10 years - all the rest coming from 'home grown' athletes.
You clearly need to examine the current front runners of the british track team and the fact that Ialso mentioned NGR. Iam giving you the chance to correct yourself . ..and yeah..thanks for also helping my point that GBR infact invests heavily in their T&F programme. I didn't even remember germain. I was mainly thinking of big O. As I said from a cursary glance, this the trend the world sees examine the proportion of medals won by GBR and see what percentage came from persons with JAM or NGR heritage. Plus the comments of one poster intimated that some female athletes have to work fulltime and are not supported while I know for fact people like Germain got a big incentive to change over so we need thrash this out . Let's get Athleticsinbritain and Smoke's views on this.
Paul, I don't know if TBO was born in Brtain to Nigerian parents, or arrived here with them. I do know that she grew up and was educated here, so I think of her as 'home-grown' talent. The medals were: TBO, Germaine Mason, Phillips Idowu and Tasha D. So, two of Caribbean ancestry and two of West African ancestry.
I really, really couldn't give a flying proverbial about ancestry. This type of discussion really comes down to semantics and is easily lost in confusion. Some of the athletes of afro-caribbean descent are 2nd, 3rd or even 4th generation British born, whereas you also have others like Mo Farah who arrived here from Somalia before they were 10. What do you class as "home grown"? Both Germaine Mason and Tasha D do most of their training and live mostly outside the UK as I understand it. You're probably asking the wrong person, as I see someone like Farah, who was trained and coached here all through his career as an athlete, as British as Paula Radcliffe. So even though he's not competing for the country of his birth, I see him as "home grown".
if you'd done the most basic research & bothered to look in the archives, you wouda known that ~ $70 million has been pumped into athletics in past few years from lottery funding to aim for peking, but obviously research isn't your forte if you believe this amount of money was pumped primarily towards a handful of ethnic sprinters then clearly you have no clue on the matter
TBO was born in Britain. Her parents and family might have originally come from Nigeria, but TBO was born here, raised here, educated here and trained here. Beyond my parents, all of my family came from Ireland, so I am just as British as TBO is. If we're going to trace back the ancestry of British athletes and say that GBR's success is all thanks to JAM and NGR, the same could apply to pretty much every country. In fact, let's go the whole hog and trace everyone back to Africa and say thank you to them for EVERY country's T&F success!
Jon I don't disagree with you. Let's get that off our chests so dont get emotional and eccentric. (...but boy if only your point of view were carried right across the board in matters of diplomacy like when these same persons are guilty of crimes and then deported , to their "homelands" , or try to get into colleges but that is another issue for another board) One needs not trace to find out that big O is nigerian in origin. The point which doesn't change is that these athletes are children of pioneering to1st generation settlers (and dont limit your analysis of this to being historical). There is an apparent issue with a false premise held by coaches that athletes with these demographics are the way to go and pay less attention to the fact that there lies a strong performance potential in the genetic pool of those children juniors from the established demographies (anglo-saxons and children of the Vikings) from which we got persons like Sandy Gunnel (loved her) and Sir Coe the great. The striking reality is that these are the talents being heralded as the front runners of Brtish T&F as per backing and the accomplishment, particularly in this year and last. It just seems that junior coaches salivate when they see a young JAM or NGR on the track team with a small bit of talent and turn their backs on the others. This might be a reason why the there might be a stall in the turnover of good talent...not being proberly scoped out.
Jon remember I am not trying state who is more British than who. Lord knows that's not my aim. I am merely pointing out that I hope it isn't a case where athletes are interested and are not given the training and attention they need by the coaches. Imagine if a young stephan holm were not suppoted because he didn't look the part by his junior coach.
Ditto - coaches work with what they've got. Sometimes, the athletes are great and grow into world class (Katharine Merry, e.g.), others will be great juniors and leave it there (Vernicha James - though there's still time...) Any suggestion that we pick and choose based on colour of skin / ancestry is ridiculous and borderline insane! 
until yours came along.
So you are saying there is no such thing as "SCOUTING" and all coaches take what they have (BULLS@#T). You need to internalize that pointless commentary statement.
No one is saying anything about rasim Jack. So dont lead me down that alley. Notice I did use the example Holm being a short guy Vs the norm of taller guys. Its in an effort to state that coaches need to extend themselves and think outside the box. The fact is athletics Britain had been there about 5-10 years ago, today there is a bit of a lull. The face of athletics in Britain (front runners) we are seeing is largely afro-carib or afro. There must be something other than luck of the draw that pushing this. Afterall, one british poster highlighted that some girls drop out because of lack of support while Germaine is getting grants? Lets make a deal: If u accept that your head was in the sand when u made that statement and u were only talking for yourself, I accept that mine was pointless.
Paul - I think there is a difference between scouting and "salivating when they see a young JAM or NGR on the track team with a small bit of talent and turn their backs on the others" - I'm sure you're exaggerating to make the point, but I really don't think Junior coaches (in GBR at least - in JAM it would appear a different story!) can afford to be quite so choosy
From my experience, it's harder for girls maturing into adult athletics than boys, as their bodies can change more than boys - hence they may need more support than boys. Many (most) athletics events require women to do some sort of strength work that will see them bulking up, making them feel less feminine (unless they naturally have the body shape of say Allyson Felix or Nicola Sanders). Add to this the need to work harder at a time when they are studying harder (and, historically, girls are more work-conscious than their sport-loving male counterparts) and I think you see the reason for the dropout rates.
WELL SAID MY MAN. I follow you 100%. Thank you for having insight and sense of balance. As i said from where i sat I could easily get the impression I had. I even made that same point about the maturing body female sprinters (see my earlier posts) before I went off on the tangent of over representing. I just want guys linked to British track to give me some good reasons why we are not seeing signs of the next sandy gunnell and realize that junior girls take a lot of work like roses. But I still think there are those odd coches out who once they see the young JAM or NGR with a little turnover its like an NCAA basketball scout seeing a 14yr. 6'9" kid for the first .
There wasn't a first "Sandy Gunnell", so maybe that's why we're not seeing the "next" one... 
You got me on that one. No comebacks in that accord.
Might I suggest the reason we're not seeing another Sally (
) Gunnell is because of her (and others) success. Strange, I know, but I can't help thinking GBR's response to the growing success of other countries is to blame. Instead of allowing young athletes to enjoy athletics for the sake of the sport - and then finding their 'best' event (take a look at the backgrounds of the vast majority of successful GBR women - e.g. Gunnell, Merry, Sotherton, even Sanderson and Whitbread and see where they started) - we're trying to find the next... and force them down a route - ultimately leading to athletes either being in the wrong event and so not progressing or not enjoying it, so dropping out.
In many cases, this may be their best event, but I am glad to see the likes of Meghan Beesley doing lots of events and the odd hep too. Multis keep people interested in the sport as they offer a variety that also allows kids to try something new. At my school, we've recently introduced a one-day pentathlon at school level against other schools, and it's hugely successful, as well as encouraging parents to watch, and is run as both a team and individual event.
this discussion is ridic
it hadn't even crossed my mind that UK OG medallists were black !!! and certainly never thought that it was because UK athletics has a policy of promoting black athletes over white ones !!! it woud seem to me that anyone who comes up with such nonsense has ulterior motives
I dont think UKA promotes black athletes over white at all, that would be ridiculous, but there is a cultural belief that black = fast in the UK.
I think that the fact that non-whites make up around 10% of the UK population, yet all the athletics medalists were non white is interesting but nothing sensational. We're aware that some sports tend to have a certain demographic (rowing, swimming, sailing tend to me more middle class and 'white') but I think in athletics it goes down to actual events, so sprinters tend to be black, long distance runners and throwers tend to be white, and jumpers are pretty mixed - as in white and black, not 'mixed race'
However, the fact that our medalists were black is actually just incidental, because Sayers could so nearly have medalled (had the Russian not come out of nowhere...) a fully fit Radcliffe should have medalled and Sanders would have been in contention had she not got another early season injury. Next year we may see all white medallists and no black medalists!
only the most hyped british male sprinter right now is craig pickering despite simeon and tyrone being faster !!! it could be true that all medallists next year would be white but TBO always medals
Simeon & Tyrone may be faster but Craig's way ahead on head-to-heads so far.
But I understand what point Paul Henry was groping towards and that Brettboy made - the stereotype pf the Caribbean sprinter/East African distance runner, and the point someone made on different thread about coaches subconsciously moving white people up to 400m and longer distances, just like they shove the big, fat, slow people (this is a gross generalisation) towards the throws. Still, if you're fast and you win, you're in the team, regardless. Ability still counts for the most.
Jodie improved to 7.38 last weekend in her first competition of the year.
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