Over-Ambition: a Banned Substance

We sports experts are secretly pleased that the Olympics are over for another year. All right - not very funny, everyone knows it's a biannual event. But with most of us absolutely knackered physically and emotionally, particularly after Saturday's Soniathon, we should take time out now for a look at the whole odd business of athletic ambition.

Ambition and sporting achievement would seem to go hand in hand, and this notion is generally fostered by the sporting media. Once Sonia had won silver in one event, no one expressed any doubts that she should go for gold in another. However, the coverage of Marion Jones's achievements was rather odd in this regard. Prior to her victory in the 100 metres, the media could not get enough of the American. When she won the race, leaving a gap of about 99 metres between herself and the runner-up, coverage was hugely enthusiastic. But when she went on to win the 200 metres, again leaving everyone else miles behind, and then spoke of her hopes for three further medals, media unease began to show. This woman wasn't ambitious: she was over-ambitious.

Of course we knew this already. Marion Jones had already told us all about her "Drive for Five" campaign, her hopes of winning five gold medals. The media thought it a fine story at the time, and a brave ambition, in the weeks leading up to the Games. At the time of writing, this "Drive for Five" ambition has already failed, with Jones taking "only" the bronze in the long jump, but this hardly proves that her ambition was unrealisable, or in any way foolish.

After the press conference the media decided that Jones needed taking down a peg or two. It was decided that her attitude was unseemly, her dreams unreal, her confidence and gummy smile no longer so charming. In the London Times next morning, therefore, Jones was accused of "rushing through the Olympics like a fraught housewife on a supermarket trolley dash".

We will leave aside the Olympics-standard sexism apparent in this comment, and also the interesting notion that the supermarket trolley dash might prove quite an exciting Olympic sport, certainly more so than synchronised swimming or double-trap shooting.

The idea affronting the media was that Jones was not sparing time to relish her victories. She was not savouring the gold medals already in her possession.

But the whole point of the Olympics is athletes in a hurry. The "slow" sports, apart from weightlifting, are not worth watching. And Marion Jones has a claim to be the fastest woman on the planet. The truth of this consuming interest in speed is highlighted by the enormous media delight taken in the exploits of Eric Moussambani, the amateur swimmer from Equitorial Guinea who was left so far behind in his 100 metres freestyle heat that his slowness made him famous.

So if Marion Jones was in a hurry, she had a right to be.

We were further told that Jones had "created her own monster by turning her gluttony for gold into a cause celebre", thereby putting massive pressure on herself. But surely competing in the Olympics is all about putting massive pressure on oneself, without of course going so far as to marry C.J. Hunter. And as for "gluttony for gold", did we ever hear such a phrase in the glory days of Mark Spitz, or even the unmentionable Michelle de Bruin, when they were going for as many gold medals as possible?

Meanwhile, the Times also told us, more refreshingly, about the strategy of Daniel Caines, the British 400m runner drafted in at the last minute: "His tactics were just to run really fast from the gun, giving himself a lead that he would then try and hold on to for as long as possible." Even after analysis for irony, this held up very well. So did the tactics: interviewed after the race, Caines said: "I just ran as fast as I could, then I realised I was out in front and I thought - what's going on?"

What was going on was a bit of speed, and a bit of relatively modest ambition. Sometimes that can be enough, even at the Olympics. As John Walker remarked, "There is no secret to running - run hard, have a beer, have a pizza. But today we've got podiatrists, doctors, physios, physiologists, psychologists, all these support networks around you. If an athlete has a bad day they go off to a psychologist. We are trying to make it too complicated."

Walker, a New Zealander, was a popular winner of the 1500m gold medal at the Montreal games in 1976. A famously determined runner, he was probably no less ambitious than Marion Jones today - he just kept it hidden a bit better.

bglacken@irish-times.ie