With no meets in sight, World Athletics presents another Garden Clash...
Decathlon world record holder Kevin Mayer of France, reigning world champion Niklas Kaul of Germany and last year's runner-up Maicel Uibo (left/photo by Paul Merca) of Estonia will square off in a triathlon from their training bases in Montpellier, France, Mainz, Germany, and Clermont, Florida.
The hour long event will be broadcast on World Athletics' YouTube channel, Twitter feed and Facebook page.
The competition will begin with the pole vault where the athletes will attempt to clear 13-1.5 (4.00m) as many times as possible during a 10-minute period. They'll then move on to the shot put where the challenge is to send the 16-pound iron ball beyond a 12-meter (39-4.5) line as often as possible, again during a 10-minute period. The triathlon concludes with a shuttle run competition in which two cones are placed 20 meters apart, with the athletes collecting points for each completed back-and-forth shuttle over the course of five minutes. The points scored in each event will be tallied to crown the overall winner.
Decathlon greats Ashton Eaton and Daley Thompson will join commentator Rob Walker to provide their insights into the combined-event challenge.
"I'm very excited to watch the upcoming combined-event version of the Ultimate Garden Clash," said Eaton, a two-time world and Olympic champion and former world record-holder in the decathlon.
World Athletics' release is available here.
NOTES OF INTEREST...
World 400 meter champion Salwa Eid Naser of Bahrain has been provisionally suspended by World Athletics for missing three drug tests in a 12-month period.
Naser ran 48.18 in Doha last October to win the world title in the fastest time in 35 years, with only East Germany's Marita Koch and Czechoslovakia's Jarmila Kratochvilova having run faster.
The link to the story is here.
If you've been following my Twitter feed, I've tweeted & retweeted posts by 2016 Olympian Gwen Berry, who got herself in hot water with the US Olympic & Paralympic Committee for raising a fist on the podium at the end of the national anthem at the Pan Am Games in Lima, Peru, after winning the hammer throw.
U.S. hammer thrower Gwen Berry raises her fist at the end of the national anthem at the Pan Am Games today. (h/t @sergeta) pic.twitter.com/gnBCEEDN1m— Nick Zaccardi (@nzaccardi) August 11, 2019
For her efforts, Berry received a letter from USOPC CEO Sarah Hirshland stating that she was on probation from the organization for the next 12 months, and subject to further punitive actions.
But what really got Berry and her supporters riled up was an open letter to Team USA athletes on social justice published Tuesday June 2nd condemning "the systemic inequality that disproportionately impacts Black Americans in the United States," the exact reason for Berry's silent protest on the podium in Lima.
Sports Illustrated's Chris Chavez interviewed Berry to get her thoughts on what happened in Lima and the subsequent loss of sponsorship money; her thoughts on growing up in Ferguson, Missouri, where Michael Brown was shot and killed by former police officer Darren Wilson, who was never prosecuted.
Chavez' story is available here.
Berry tweeted out a four-page open letter on "Sport, Politics, Protest...and the Olympics", where she outlines the IOC & the USOPC's sponsors and broadcast partners.
Two paragraphs jump out:
One is her objection that "any pretense that the athletes, and their rights, come first. I'd respect the IOC, the USOPC and major corporations, who have been saying how much they care about civil rights, to be real and admit they're primarily acting in the interests of their sponsors and/or shareholders first and that's the way it is. Then we can accept reality, start to build trust and talk about each other's agenda and find solutions."
The other is her observation that, "The last few weeks have shown the issues of poverty and race are the same, if not worse, than they were in 1968 and the IOC's stance on athletes rights is confusing at best and outright hypocritical at worst."
You can access Berry's tweet here:
— Gwen Berry (@MzBerryThrows) June 5, 2020
NOTE: World Athletics contributed to this report.
paulmerca.blogspot.com may receive a commission for any purchases made from links clicked. Please support our sponsors by clicking on the links.
Comments