Athens Olympics 2004

[nnipp]

Did Manjeet try to qualify for the 400m individual? How did she not make it?

[BSharma]

The Indian relay team for the finals will consist of:

BEENAMOL K Mathews - first leg
KAUR Rajwinder -second leg
GEETHA Satti - third leg
SOMAN Chitra K - last leg

What happened to Manjit?

[BSharma]

Did Manjeet try to qualify for the 400m individual? How did she not make it?

She did not participate in the 400m race in Athens.

[Red_Indian]

To bring some perspective about Manjit's performance, her time would have earned her the bronze medal in the 400m race in the Olympics.

WOW!!!

[BSharma]

India finishes 7th in the women's 4x400m relay. (3:28.51)

1. USA 3:19.01
2. Russia 3:20.16
3. Jamaica 3:22.00
4. Great Britain 3:25.12
5. Poland 3:25.22
6. Romania 3:26.81
7. India 3:28.51
8. Greece 3:45.70

[PKBasu]

I just watched the 4X400m women's relay final, in which India finished seventh with a timing of 3:28.51. Manjit Kaur did not run, and Satthi Geeta ran the first leg -- at the end of which we were already out of contention around 7th/8th. The Greek team effectively fell out of contention in the third leg when one of their sprinters stamped on the next runner causing the latter to lose a shoe. Otherwise we might have finished last! Without Manjit it was always going to be tough. But congratulations to the team for making the final.

[PKBasu]

The Americans ran an inspired race in the final, and had a 10m lead at the start of the third leg. It seemed that this team was determined to atone for the sins of all the other relay teams: Marion Jones' bad baton change caused the women's 4X100m team to not win a medal, while the men's 4X100m team were pipped to the gold (by Britain) because of a bad final baton change. Here the Americans were astonishingly dominant, with the live commentator suggesting that each ran inside 50 sec (I don't think that is true, although of course the average would be inside 50s for each runner).

[PKBasu]

Again, there was confusion among the Indians during the final baton change -- but this is to be expected when you are 7th or 8th. There is always a bit of a melee in the last two baton changes.

[BSharma]

The US TV is showing basketball and did not show the 4x100m men's relay or the 4x400m women's relay live. They will be shown later in the evening . (Today isSaturday and people are at home watching TV and who wants to see events once the results are already known. NBC people, are you listening?)

The Indian team changed the order of the runners after it was posted on the Athens Olympics web site. Without Manjit India had no chance today, and a 7th place is better than the 8th place that was expected.

Indian women should be congratulated for making the finals, and setting a new national record in the semifinals was outstanding.

[PKBasu]

There is still very little news about why Manjit Kaur did not run in the final. Perhaps we will need to wait for the ever-reliable mugu to enlighten us...

[mugu]

To bring some perspective about Manjit's performance, her time would have earned her the bronze medal in the 400m race in the Olympics.

WOW!!!

We have to take Manjit's personal best and National record clocked back home (51.05s) as the yardstick rather than her relay leg of 49.85 when we assess her chances in the individual 400 metres. For, in the relay there is a flying start and moreover every runner will be running slightly different distances, not exactly 400 metres. Manjit's best of 51.05 or even slightly better would not have helped her cross the second round in Athens in the 400m.
Manjit and Chitra K. Soman had qualified for the Olympics in the 400 metres while Beenamol had a `B' standard. It was decided from the beginning that no one will run the individual event since no one stood any chance. Beenamol was considered towards the final stages since she had steadily improved through July through to August first week, but I think that was also given up at the last moment. Not to have run Manjit or Chitra in the individual was the right decision as it turned out if you look at the performance of the girls in two days.

[mugu]

There is still very little news about why Manjit Kaur did not run in the final. Perhaps we will need to wait for the ever-reliable mugu to enlighten us...

Have been trying to find that out. This is what I got from Athens: Manjit had a bout of vomiting last night after the heats. She continued to be very sick through the day. But she was given medicines and brought to the ground. Since she was very weak, there was no chance of her running despite the attempts to get her back into shape.
I normally am wary of such last-minute illnesses and developments. I will have to trust this information since it came from athletics sources.
I will wait till tomorrow morning to see whether the daily reports say the same thing or not. As I said earlier, I will reserve my comments on this team till well after the Games. Or maybe not say anything at all.
The splits tonight were:
Geetha 52.91
Beenamol 51.52
Soman 52.55
Rajwinder 51.53

[PKBasu]

It was terrific to see Hicham el-Gerrouj win his second gold at Athens, taking the 5000m after racing past Kenenisa Bekele in the final 200m stretch. I had not watched his big 1500m gold (which helped him end his life-long Olympic gold drought), but his performance in the 5000m was truly thrilling. So, indeed, was Kelly Holmes' in the women's 1500m final; she was around 6th with 300m to go, before she made her move -- running in the third lane at the bend (implying she was running much more than 1500m!) -- and sprinted through to take her second gold. The BBC was full of talk about Paula Radcliffe (who ultimately failed to win a medal in either the marathon or 10000m) but ignored Kelly Holmes until now (race must have had something to do with this: Radcliffe is lily-white, Holmes black). Holmes must now be accepted by the Brits as an authentic Olympic heroine, who has done what Coe, Ovett and Cram couldn't do -- win both 800m and 1500m at the same Olympics.

[BSharma]

mugu wrote: We have to take Manjit's personal best and National record clocked back home (51.05s) as the yardstick rather than her relay leg of 49.85 when we assess her chances in the individual 400 metres. For, in the relay there is a flying start and moreover every runner will be running slightly different distances, not exactly 400 metres. Manjit's best of 51.05 or even slightly better would not have helped her cross the second round in Athens in the 400m.

As mugu wrote, relay times and individual 400m race times cannot be compared.

The 4x400m relay does not afford a flying start as much as the 4x100m relay does. Basically the 4x400m relay runners start from a standing start except for the lead-off runners who get the benefit of the starting blocks. Hence a sub-50 second time is very creditable for an Indian runner.

Semi-final and final timings are not totally comparable because the weather conditions can be different but Manjit's time was beaten by only 6 runners in the finals.

I am not saying that Manjit would have won the bronze medal if she had run the 400m race but it was just to compare her time with the 400m runners and with the other relay runners.

[jayakris]

mugu at his best in couching his words .. OK, I will just congratulate the India team for reaching the final.

Jay