Orville Taylor | Champions and hope for the future

It is neither science nor ‘sciance’. Yet, my predictions were close, both in regard to the general election and of course the World Athletics Championships. It ends today, and I am sticking my neck out that we will medal in at least three relays and bet you, we win at least win one.

At the time of writing, the results of the men’s discus throw were not in. Nevertheless, I am still saying that we will medal here, Fedrick Dacres will find something from his sociology notes and throw a season’s best. But, Ralford Mullings, carrying a name more appropriate to his grandfather, has more form than an insurance office, and the medal is his to lose.

On target for my minimum 10 medals forecast, if we should place in both 4x100s; there is a bit of smugness, despite some obvious disappointments. Not as many gold medals as in 2009 but we have done well. Form book apart, we are going to have to leave it all on the track in all four relays, because hungry athletes do not follow ‘experts’ scripts. In the 4x400, for men, unless something as strange as Letsile Tebogo false starting on the opening leg in the 100 metres, occurs, Botswana will run the fastest time in 30 years.

Having come close in last year’s Olympics, with a frustrated Tebogo, still without a medal, the only way they should lose the gold, is if they invest in a Ponzi scheme.

History was made, and we must congratulate the young Motswana, Collen Kebinatshipi, a young man around the same age as the Clayton twins, who stole the 400 metres in a nippy 43.53, with his compatriot Bayapo Ndori, breaking the hearts of Jamaicans, mine included, pipping Rusheen McDonald by eight hundredths of a second.

Most remarkable, is that the last place runner Lee Eppie, another Motswana ran 44.77. Only one American was in the final and he placed seventh, just seven hundredths of a second ahead of Eppie.

Given the traditional strength of the Americans, it will be a challenge to beat them. Therefore, Jamaica with four sub-45 men, should be good for the bronze. Also, there is absolutely no reason for three teams not named Jamaica to finish ahead of us in the women’s race.

Back to the 4X100; both teams will produce the fastest post-COVID times of any Jamaican squad.

Interestingly, these Championships are not completely different from the recent general election. Certainly the Jamaica Labour Party and its devoted Labourites, are doing ‘puppalick’, and rightfully enjoying the victory. Like Noah Lyles, having suffered a double blow in the 100 metres, taking a stomach punch in the local government elections, one cannot begrudge them their victory. Winning back-to-back titles, in a race that some predicted would have resulted in a loss, is simply a matter of calling a spade a spade, and giving to Caesar what truly is his.

But in all of this, one major win is a shifting demographic. Some 19 of the 63 Members of Parliament are women. It is a big deal. Most important, apart from the returnees, on both sides of the aisle, there is still a core of veterans.

In another column an evaluation will be done, putting numbers to the impact of the youthful members. In increasing the robustness of our democracy, small channels of succession are imperative.

True, the succession chain seems to be alive and well in the Houses of Parliament. Still, we have seen the return of several oldsters, who fought perhaps their last fight, and giving politics the final hurrah. It is not that different in athletics. In order to keep something successful going, or to improve upon an existing product, which may have taken a dip; the baton change has to be smooth as a baby’s derrière.

Returning to the track and field conversation, the baton is in good hands. A chasm was created with the departure of Usain Bolt and Asafa Powell and the unfortunate injury to Yohan Blake. Water always fills empty spaces, and the Americans, though not completely, found a new hero in Noah Lyles.

Apart from the fact that he chats too much, and I am not speaking about his braggadocio or overconfidence, but despite having a Jamaican fiancée, he seems not to know that Jamaican men do not celebrate looseness of tongue or its misplacement. There is a lot of wisdom in the Jamaican adage ‘is not everything good fi talk, is good fi eat!’ or something like that.

Both Kenny Bednarek and Lyles will turn 30 before the next Olympics. All four of our top sprinters, Kishane Thompson, Oblique Seville, Bryan Levelle and Ackeem Blake are younger than 25.

It will be a long time before Jamaica relinquishes its hold on the ‘bills’, because for certain, none of these two, or any of the current crop of American male sprinters will beat our two in their flagship event for the foreseeable future.

Speaking of Levell, in his biggest test of his life, he demonstrated to the doubters that he was not a flash in the pan or a fluke. In the 200 metres, truthfully Lyles has nothing else to prove, with four consecutive championship wins, he is in the conversation as one of the greatest 200 metres runner as ever. Second best like Bednarek, in terms of being the greatest of all time, we can call him the ‘Silver Surfer’; Bolt being the unreachable gold standard.

He is a nice kid; so, I resist the temptation to sing, “Keep us free from weevil Noah!” Jamaica land we love!

Orville Taylor is senior lecturer at Department of Sociology at The University of the West Indies, a radio talk-show host, and author of ‘Broken Promises, Hearts and Pockets’. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com and tayloronblackline@hotmail.com