The gold that lost its glitter

When it is possible for something to go wrong, it almost always will. I think that is how one version of Murphy’s Law goes. And this is no more so than when you work in a National Tourism Organisation (NTO). The bane for me has always been sports telecast. Whether it is World Cup soccer, the Olympics, the Asian Games or even the SEA Games. When the main events are being held, rest assured that I am always away from Kuala Lumpur and probably nowhere near a TV as well.

Take the opening game of the World Cup Finals staged for the first time in Asia when Senegal beat world champions France. I was somewhere on the Thai-Myanmar border. However, this time thanks to satellite and modern technology, I was able to catch the game at restaurant in a town called Maesot.

However, not so for most of the events at the last Olympic Games. Missed the 100m, 200m and all the metre events that mattered. Only consolation was that I did manage to catch some field events. Wasn’t the Russian pole vaulter nice to look at, by Russian women athlete standards or any standards for that matter. And to top it off, she could pole vault as well. Somewhere between her second jump and the medal presentation, I was head over heels in love. Well, actually the heels over the head part was hers. I was just madly in love.

I don’t know which was sadder. Not seeing her anymore or missing the marathon. Rushing back to the hotel room somewhere in north Thailand, after making sure a group of journalists on a familiarisation trip have had their dinner, I managed to catch the tail end of the event. And something was not quite right the way the commentators were going on and on. Only much later was I to discover what had happened.

Usually by the time the marathon was held, much of the excitement would have died down. After all we would have known which country would likely be the overall champion after a haul of gold medals.

However, somehow the marathon had always held a strange fascination for me. Maybe because out of all the events at the Olympics, the one that seem to test the limit of human endurance the most is the marathon. (The cute ones just pole vaults). But having never been a long distance runner even in much younger days, I must admit that the deduction does not come from first hand experience but more from acquaintances who have been brave enough to attempt running the marathon when we still have such a thing as the KL International Marathon locally.

Still, I have always enjoyed watching the marathon. There is nothing like seeing a marathon runner coming into the stadium to complete his race to bring a lump to my throat, regardless of whether he is coming in first or last. This scene of an injured marathon runner in a long forgotten race, literally hobbling in to thunderous applause from a whole stadium some hours after the others have completed, has always haunted me. For the race is not over until the last man has crossed the finish line. I do not remember the runner’s name, nor do I remember which country he represented. But I remembered shedding a tear for this man’s courage and sportsmanship.

But not so after watching parts of the replay of the marathon at the last Olympics, which was to bring the curtain down on the Athens Games. I could not help feeling cheated because of one deranged act of a defrocked priest. Without him rushing out of the crowd and pushing race leader Vanderlei de Lima off the road, it can still be argued that eventual winner Stefano Baldini of Italy may eventually overtake the Brazilian. But the disruption certainly meant that his rhythm was upset and he finally would not win gold and had to settle for just the bronze after being overtaken not just by the Italian but also by American Meb Keflezighi.

The International Olympic Committee was quick to correct any perceived injustice by presenting de Lima with the Pierre de Coubertin Medal “for exceptional demonstration of fair play and Olympic values”. Good for them.

As for Mr Baldini, I could not help feeling a little sorry for him. He may have won the gold medal, but he will never be a true champion in at least one person’s eyes. In an age where some sportsmen and sportswomen cheat just to get their hands on a gold medal, maybe it was too much to ask him to give up his gold medal. After all, he did win it squarely even if it was debatable whether it was fairly. The IOC deemed it unnecessary to give a duplicate gold medal to de Lima despite the fact that the Brazilian Olympic Committee put forward a strong case about the lack of security on the streets where the marathon was run. That, of course, is for the Court of Arbitration for Sports to decide.

What no committee could have done to right any injustice could have been done by Mr Baldini himself. He could have learned a thing or two about true sportsmanship from his countryman, the late Olympian and bobsled driver, Eugenio Monti.

Here permit me to quote an article that appeared some two years ago in the USA Today:

When the 1964 Olympic Winter Games in Innsbruck opened, the clear favorites in the four-man Bobsled event were the hometown Austrians and the Italians. Experts gave the Canadians an outside chance. But something magical happened. Canada 1 broke the Olympic record in the first heat and had a half-second lead on the rest of the field. But on that record setting first run there had been a problem. The Canadians went into the last turn too fast and the sled hit the ice wall and went up on two runners. The accident damaged the sled axle. If it were not fixed the Canadians would be disqualified.Eugenio Monti and his Italian team did not want to win unless they raced against the best and the best were competing on equal terms. Fifteen minutes before Canada's next run, Victor Emery reached the top of the track to find his sled upside down. The Italians had it torn apart. The collision with the wall had caused Canada 1's axle to seize. Monti's mechanics were doing their best to fix it. With Monti's help, Canada 1 was able to race and hold on to its lead. By the fourth and final run, they were so far ahead only a disaster would keep them from the gold medal. When the Canadians came to a stop, it was clear no one was going to catch them. The gold medal was theirs. In the end, Italy's Eugenio Monti and his team received the bronze medal.This is only the beginning of a great story.In the two-man Bobsled event, Tony Nash of Great Britain, after his first run, recorded the fastest time. A bolt attaching the runners to the shell had sheared.

Eugenio Monti, who was about to steer the Italian number one sled down the track said, "Get an Englishman and a spanner to the finish and they can have my bolt."

True to his word and ignoring inquiries from mystified Italian journalists, the bolt was ferried back up to the start and quickly attached to the British bobsled. In the end, Tony Nash and Robin Dixon of Great Britain took home the gold and Eugenio Monti again had to settle for just the bronze. But in the process he became the first recipient of the "Pierre de Coubertin" Award for Fair Play.Monti was viciously criticized in the Italian press but he was steadfast.

"Nash didn't win because I gave him the bolt," he said. "He won because he had the fastest run.

"Every real competitor wants to win but Olympic medallist John Naber says, "A true sportsman, who understands the Olympic ideal, wants to win against his best opponent on his best day. So the sportsman is not elated but disappointed when top competitors are injured or disqualified.”

As a follow up, Eugenio Monti won the gold medal at the 1968 Winter Olympics in BOTH the two-man and four-man Bobsled events. But it was his willingness to lose that earned him a prominent place in Olympic history. His act represents sportsmanship at its best: the pursuit of victory with zeal and passion, recognising that there is no true victory without honor.

Today, parents and coaches should be teaching youngsters that the real glory of sport is in the striving, not the winning. With so many athletes willing to cheat or behave badly just to win, we need reminders of the noble potential of sport. Eugenio Monti and his Italian team represent everything that is important in life. We must not only give the best of ourselves, but also give the best to everyone around us.

No one in our competitive world tries to lose intentionally. Nor do we take pleasure in giving away our chance for success to someone else. It’s the rare person who will help another if it means they have to decelerate their own upward climb.

Yes, go for the gold. But on your climb to the top, take a moment and seize any opportunity to applaude your rival. Who knows? Your encouragement could spark your challenger to improve their skills and set their sights on higher goals.

If he was in Mr Baldini’s shoes, I think there would have been very little doubt what Mr Monti would have done. But as it is, Mr Baldini is just another sportsman making up the statistics of gold medal winners in the history of the Olympic Games. Sadly, he was a step away from greatness but failed to take the final leap and will only be remembered if he is ever remembered at all, as the man who won gold through the misguided hands of a fallen angel.