What is Edwin thinking, can he really come back in the 400H next year? Do you think that he is hurting his legacey? Or do you think he can actually qualify? This seems like a big joke to me, what does everybody else think?
PARIS (AFP) - Two-time Olympic champion Edwin Moses confirmed he is making a comeback to the 400 metres hurdles at the age of 48 with an initial aim of qualifying to run in the trials for the US team for next year’s Olympics in Athens.
The former world record holder held a press conference to officially announce his decision on the day of his 48th birthday and the anniversary of his last world record of 47.02sec in 1983.
The American said his first aim was to achieve a time more than three seconds slower - 50.55sec - which would qualify him to run in next year’s US Olympic trials.
"If it is possible for me to appear at the Olympic trials that would be fantastic as I am an old man.
“In terms of going to Athens, if things happen they happen. But realistically I can’t believe it will but just to be there would serve as an inspiration,” Moses said on the sidelines of the World Championships which end here on Sunday.
"Without doing 50.55 seconds you don’t get to the Olympic trials. If you don’t get in the first three places you don’t go to Athens.
“I’m not going to sit here and tell you I’m going to Athens to look like a jerk.”
Fifteen years have passed since his last competitive race, in the 1988 Olympic final in Seoul where he won the bronze medal, but Moses said he was “in good shape” and “on the same diet I was on when I was competing”.
“A lot of my friends who were athletes at my time are now coaching top-class athletes and they have encouraged me to return,” he said.
The man who at his peak went unbeaten for 122 races over nine years insisted he would not fail spectacularly like multiple Olympic swimming (news - web sites) gold medallist Mark Spitz (news - web sites), who flopped in his attempted comeback for the 1992 Olympics.
"I’ll be running faster than 53 seconds, so the girls won’t beat me.
“I think Spitz started too late, I don’t know if he was serious or not. But for me I’m using it as a motivating force for others.”
He rejected suggestions that his comeback was financially motivated.
“I have no money problems,” he said before joking about his travel arrangements to get to his training track. "I have a bicycle so it’s no problem to get there.
“Anyway, in 1976 my school had no track I learned by jumping fences.”
The man who is 22 years older than the recently crowned world champion Felix Sanchez said he was now free of the disc problems that forced him to retire in 1988.
“I have the power mentally to succeed, the question is physical. It is the mind that drives the body,” he said.
“Sanchez will make me look what I used to make others look. I will be rooting for him. Not from the viewpoint of looking at his backside but from the sidelines,” Moses added.
He will face intense competition to fill one of the US team places for Athens.
Despite the fact no-one has approached the world record set by Kevin Young in the 1992 Barcelona Olympics of 46.78sec - breaking Moses’s mark - the Americans have youngsters like Bershawn Jackson coming through while veteran Joey Woody took silver behind Sanchez in the World Championships.
Moses is a member of the International Olympic Committee (news - web sites) ethics committee and has been involved in the battle against doping.
Don’t people know when to say when or what?
That is what i am wondering, It might be good for the sport though! I grew up watching Edwin, he is my idol. I think this could bring a lot more attention to track and field over the next year, but i am still a little unsure about this whole thing. The first time Michael Jordan came back it was cool, maybe this will work out! Who knows?
Moses should have started this comeback a year ago. He will need more than one season to return to a semblance of form.
I have heard that Mark Spitz didn’t take his comeback too seriously. Perhaps Moses will.
no. 48 is ridiculous
on another note, felix sanchez looked awesome in the WC hes extremely strong.