GBR right / wrong?

[Gross]

Well WOC is gone for 2006 - well done to the athleyes involved. I'm sure they gave thier best on the days. Highlight must be Jamie's medal on 'home ground'. Lowlight must be the relay runs with the men finishing 14th after such a long hard week...

I'd be interested in thoughts on selection policy... not individual athletes but the fact that GB took 7 men to WOC, 3 of who ran only the sprint on Tuesday and for the rest of the week were basically travelling reserves. In total the sprint runners ran about 100 mins through the week. The 3 guys that ran the relay ran for almost 1000 mins in total, 10 times as much?

Is it GB's aim to specilise in sprint running as (JS apart) that's where our best results came from and where we can show the sports council's a number of top 20's? or maybe we should lessen the load on the top guys and not ask them to run miiddle, long and relay?

Is a top 10 position in the sprint worth more than a top 15 position in the relay??

I'm not sure of my own thoughts here.......... right or wrong???

[DIDSCO]

Overall as a WOC, it was definatly a success for the British team. Jamie got a well deserved medal,Helen and GG got great top 10 results, and everybody qualified for everything (apart from Oli on a technicality). When I was down there visiting in the middle of the week there seemed to be a good feeling within the team, good spirits and a good atmosphere.

Gross makes a good point about the relays. I watched the whole thing at home on tv and was suprised by just how tough the area was. The guys won't be happy with their result but how much more could we expect of them, they must have been totally knackered. The girls did their job on the first 2 legs, and should be very happy. Helen had the toughest job and a very difficult pressure situation, a little more experience of these situations will no doubt give her the extra confidence and focus needed for these relays.

Going back to Gross's point. Is it too much of a sacrifice to have 3 british runners only running the sprint event in the world champs when you've only got places for 7 runners. Maybe it isn't a sacrifice if that is where our best chance of medals is. Apart from Jamies amazing middle race, this WOC proved that our best medal chances are in the Sprint. Helen was 6th, GG 9th (but was on the podium until the very end), pippa 12th, sarah 16th, bj 17th, and remember Jamies last international medal was silver at Euro champs sprint earlier this year. I think perhaps Britain should play to its strengths and try hard to become the worlds best Sprint nation.

....by the way I've heard Hanny Allstons got a British passport.......

[mharky]

Is a top 10 position in the sprint worth more than a top 15 position in the relay??

...yes. Because in the sprint you are running against 44 other guys/girls who have qualified to be there.

Top 15 in the relay means nothing. Top 10 in relay should be the minimum, the podium should be the aim and a medal should be the dream.

However, is Sprint more important than relay? No.

Should we concentrate on becoming a sprint nation? No.

Should we concentrate on getting better at everything (especially real disciplines like middle, long and relay)? Yes.

[DIDSCO]

Mharky > from my point of view an individual medal is of much higher worth than a relay medal, and it doesn't matter whether its won in sprint, middle, or classic.

I agree with you that we should try to improve in all disciplines but I still think we should play to our strengths and try and become the best sprint nation. For example when was the last time you saw an ethiopian win a 100m race, or a nigerian a 10000m race. They know what they're best at, and thats what they train for. Britain has the perfect environment for sprint/park racing but very few places you can train that suit 2 hour technical and physical classic races.

When you say the 'real' disciplines are middle, long, and relay, I presume you're just being a cock and trying to stir up a debate, or that you're not very good at sprint racing yourself perhaps....?

[harry]

I'd be interested in thoughts on selection policy... not individual athletes but the fact that GB took 7 men to WOC, 3 of who ran only the sprint on Tuesday and for the rest of the week were basically travelling reserves. In total the sprint runners ran about 100 mins through the week. The 3 guys that ran the relay ran for almost 1000 mins in total, 10 times as much?

I think it was the athletes themselves that chose to run middle long and relay. Jon and Jamie were running the best in the selection races and they wanted to run all three. Should the selectors have not let them? eg. Norweigen selectors took Holger out of the frame for the relay with a few weeks to go. http://www.hottjohansen.com/holger/artikler.php?nId=41

[Gross]

Rather this discussion didn't include 'named' athletes but overall priinciples.... so Harry's questions is.... should the athletes decide themselves what they run or should our selectors have an overall policy & make the decisions???

I'd throw another question in... should there be a selection committee of 4 people or should it be 1 person selecting the teams i.e. the head coach?? I've always been in favour of the last approach....

[DIDSCO]

I've never understood why a group of people, who often barely know the athletes get to select british teams, be it junior or senior.

Dave Peel should select the mens team
The womens coach (Jenny Peel) should select the women.

These are the 2 people that know the athletes best and know where every athletes strengths are in relation too each discipline. Of course people will critcise their decisions, because everyone wants to think they or their family is good enough and can't handle the fact they're not (I know I've moaned plenty myself when I've not made it, and looking back I was wrong - i wasn't quite good enough).

If the person is good enough to get the job as Head Coach, not an easy job, then Im pretty sure they're good enough to select the best team for major championships without favouritism. I actually think the Head Coach would be less likely to show favouritism than anyone else because the level of success of the team directly determines how good the Head Coach is, then he or she would be pretty stupid not to select the best possible team.

[harry]

Just to clarify, i wasn't criticising any athletes. I meant Jon & Jamie were the best so they should be allowed to choose to run what they want. After all if jamie had been forced to choose, GB might not have had any medals.

Maybe if Norway hadn't dropped Holger from the relay they would have done better. Who knows?

Saying the head coach understands all the athletes the best is very naive! In a perfect world maybe..

A committee with a mix of people is fairer.

[johnloguk]

I think I would be in favour of selection by one person, probably the head coach. I would hope that one of the qualifications of the head coach would be knowing the runners and their current form etc. I know this is a bit idealistic, but if we are to be the best then you have to be idealistic and do things right. The trouble with committees is that by definition they tend to come up with compromises. This is great in many aspects of life, but not selecting the best team. Imaging the rows if a committee selected a national football team rather than the head coach.

Now I realise that after Sven's dodgy selections for the World Cup my argument might look a bit thin here, but you know what I mean.

I read somewhere that Hanny Allston wasn't "allowed" to run the middle race, was that a selection decision so as not to overstretch her? If so it made for a storming last relay leg and podium place, but might have lost them a medal in the middle? Would she have been better missing the classic? Mute point I know, hindsight (and talking b****x from miles) away is always easy!

[wonderboy]

Given that we are a sprint nation, should there be more sprint races in the calendar in Britain? And middle races for that matter? Is it any wonder that the long remains our worst event in terms of places and medals when elite courses in Britain are not long enough. Even the selection race was won in 77 mins.
On the subject of picking people just for Sprint, the results were good this time so it seems worth it, and I do believe that now all 3 disciplines carry equal cudos.
Looking at the selection race results you would have picked that team as JS, JD, and OJ were the 3 most consistent performers, and it would have taken a brave committee/coach not to have picked them.
Is there an argument for selecting the relay team on form during the week (this may create bad team vibes I guess)
I think the team demonstrated a good ability to qualify and this should be the aim at all WOCs. With only 3 per event per country GBR should always have a 95% qualification rate.
Overall a good WOC for the team I think.

[BJesus]

Are we a Sprint Nation? yeah that is where we did best, but i dont think i would say sprint nation quite yet. If i had to pick the best result before WOC it would have been Jamie winning a medal in the classic and a top 6 for the men in the relay. If that had happened would we be a classic and relay nation? i think some people pick to much from individual performances not from the team performance. This was my first WOC with GBR, and although im unbelievably dissapointed with my own pathetic effort this year, i think the team as a whole was remarkable. Everyone qualifying (well you know what i mean) countless PB's and i think about 9 top 20's. I think we put many other teams to shame with our results, and i think many a team, would be very jealous of how well the GBR team, management and coaching works. I think at this years WOC, it was the results of people like Helen, Pippa and Graham that were remarkable. Im not saying Jamies bronze wasnt, but we all knew he was capable of it. We should be trying to get are whole team to that level, so that once the races start anything can happen.
About the one selector rule, i think this can work quite well, and i think Dids made a good point, saying that Peel would pick the right team, cos its his balls on the line if he didnt. In australia, the head coach is not even a selector, and that has had disastrous results in the past.
As for people running a few distances, i think that is a lot up to the runners, people like Jamie and Jon, should have a lot of say in what they want to run. For a person like Jamie, he knows what his body can handle and he knew the Danish forests, if he thought he could handle the 5 races he ran, we have no reason to doubt him. If you have medals, you should have say in what you can do. In the end its the athlete running not the coach or a selector.

Anyway thats enough of me babbling on, but i would like to say a big thankyou to the team management and runners for letting me fit into the GBR team with so much ease. To the coaches and physios you made it all work at WOC, and to Dave Rollins, the GBR team relies on you, im sure you work too much for not enough pay, but you make our lives so much easier

[bendover]

interesting point about the long selection race being won in only 77. i think there is definitely a case for making a couple of races a year tougher and longer in the UK.

the Nowegian/Swedish long selection races were won (for the guys) in approx 98 + 103 minutes respectively. The long final was won in 105mins. Thats almost 30 mins more time in the forest than our selection race!!

by making a couple of races a year this length each year in the UK, sure you might see a few people (me?!) struggling big time, but the top guys would probably reap the benefits in the long run.

[Kitch]

Well said BJ.

agree the point about domestic races not being long enough.
So have started a new thread