To the point comments there… 
http://eurosport.yahoo.com/video/19082009/58/itw-foster.html
How he was getting backstabbed by others who wanted to wrestle Bolt away from him.
As aggrivating as it no doubt was for him, he needs to play the game now to keep the position that lets him do his job.
It is the JAAA who have brought the sport into disrepute, either through their own stupidity, arrogance, misdirection (either accidentally or god forbid, intentionally). Put yourselves on trial, but I suspect the jury of public opinion has already concluded their verdict: death by duplicity.
While we’re on the subject of training camps, I remember the Jamaican training camp in London during the 1980 Olympic year. The athletes were dumped into a youth hostile and fed stale spagetti for breakfast. Of course the JAAA types were at the Queen’s Hotel down the road. Don Quarrie showed up, and was quickly spirited away to the Queen’s. The Trinidadian athletes were stuck there as well until Hasley Crawford showed up. When the Brit officials tried to move him the the Queens, he said: “I’m not going anywhere till you move everyone out of here. I stay or we all go.”
So Hasley got everyone moved including the Jamaicans but DQ didn’t lift a finger.
I won’t even get into all the rip-offs Merlene Ottey endured that first European season beyond saying that she called Angella Taylor to ask if she could get her some shoes. This was AFTER her first Bronze in Moscow.
I called around on her behalf and discovered that shoe companies had been sending tons of shoes to the federation for her but she never got any (she was at Nebraska by then). I was the one who called Nike and set up her first shoe contract.
I guess Campbell-Brown has something to say as well concerning management of the JA contingent.
http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/sports/html/20090822T230000-0500_158071_OBS_VC__I_D_NEVER_WALK_OUT_ON_MY_COUNTRY_.asp
It appears the JAAA is the best thing USA sprinters have going for them right now, Allyson Felix excepted.
VCB is not part of MVP yet she has the same story about the training camp and notification abd whether it was mandatory or not. Hmmm.
Unfortunately, Franno has given away some of his ground by getting into a mudslinging match with JAAA. This can go nowhere but down for all concerned. If he just let his results do the talking, he would have put JAAA in a very difficult position to come after MVP. Now the door is open and JAA will use his comments as justification- and then more comments, and then… you get the idea.
Doesn’t add much if anything to what has already been posted here, but perhaps fills out the picture somewhat
TrackAlerts had reported…
Campbell-Brown walks out on Jamaica’s team in Berlin
BERLIN – World Championships 200m silver medalist Veronica Campbell-Brown has walked out on Jamaica’s team ahead of today’s 4×100m final.
TrackAlerts.com was reliably informed that after Campbell-Brown was told she would not be allowed to run the anchor leg, she decided to pack her bags and leave the warm-up area.
Campbell-Brown, who was rested for the heats, won her third straight silver medal on Friday, running 22.35 seconds to finish second behind American Allyson Felix.
“She stormed out of the meeting where they were discussing the relay set-up and said she is not running any 3rd leg,” we were told…
However, Neville Myton, Campbell-Brown’s mentor in an interview with TVJ, conveyed her decision to pull out of the team.
“She said she told them the team is running well and all she practised at the camp (in Nuremberg) was running the anchor leg…so she did not see any reason now to disrupt the team.”
Without Campbell-Brown, the quartet of Simone Facey, Shelly-Ann Fraser, Aleen Bailey and Kerron Stewart ran 42.06 to win gold ahead of the Bahamas (42.29).
Why all track federations around the world are run by stupid people??I cannot believe what VCB affirmed on the interview!
Don Quarrie really showed how totally he’s gone over to the “other side”. He is JAAA through and through.
Imagine an official in his position having a tantrum and airing dirty laundry in public and it’s just this kind of thinking that will be employed against MVP very shortly.
Its money for Jam.
You see it in corporate world all the time. One day, your working beside joe blow who is a decient guy, and who even complains about management and how they treat the workers, but he is generally pretty quiet. Then one day, he gets a temporary management position - for awhile, he seems like the perfect guy. Once he gets a TASTE for the new position, things slowly change - and before you know it, He soon realizes, that to get a permanent position in this new role, “sucking up” to the “workers” doesn’t get him anywhere. Its his Fellow Managers in other departments, people higher up than he who he needs to “suck up to”. Before you know it, that guy has become a “hatted manager” by the workers and a loved manager by the other managers.
Its a system that just breeds within itself.
Latest commentary about the MVP group is by Danny McFarlane.
He said they need to punish the ringleader (Franno) and not the athletes cause JAAA has to do something cause he heard from alot of athletes that if nothing happens to these people, they sure as hell wouldn’t show up next time!
Some defence of JAAA!
Translation:
The JAAA camp was such shit, every one there felt victimized and NO ONE would go unless threatened.
We already know that the relays weren’t sorted out there because VCB was at the camp but didn’t know she wasn’t on anchor till right before the finals! (she wasn’t notified that the camp was mandatory either)
That leaves only one point for the camp: For JAAA to claim credit for the success of others and generate a trip for cronies and hangers-on.
BY KAYON RAYNOR Senior staff reporter raynork@jamaicaobserver.com
Saturday, September 05, 2009
THE Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) yesterday hosted a press conference at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel intended to clarify, inform and redefine its own image after the anarchy which rocked the country’s record-breaking team at the just-concluded 12th IAAF World Championships of Athletics in Berlin, Germany.
However, after the nearly two-hour-long press conference, the general view was that there was no further clarity or information on the substantive issues relating to any written proof that the six athletes of the MVP track club who missed Jamaica’s mandatory six-day pre-World Championships camp in Nuremberg, Germany were duly notified.
Under pic: President of the Jamaica Amateur Athletics Association (JAAA) Howard Aris (left) points to a copy of a communiqué which was exchanged between the IAAF and the JAAA’s dealing with Whereabouts Information for all team members ahead of the World Championships in Berlin, during a press conference yesterday at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston. Grace Jackson, the 200m silver medallist from the 1988 Olympic Games, now first vice-president of the JAAA, looks on. (Photo: Bryan Cummings)
“We are here for several reasons… one is to clarify, to inform and the other is to try to redefine our own image because people have sought to redefine us and we can’t allow that to happen,” Howard Aris, president of the JAAA, said.
Aris supplied a press kit comprising five documents said to be correspondence between his organisation, uniform sponsors PUMA and newspaper articles referring to the camp being mandatory. A copy of the JAAA’s selection criteria was also supplied.
But no evidence was presented concerning MVP’s head coach Stephen Francis and/or the athletes concerned being notified in writing by the JAAA’s that the camp was indeed mandatory.
“You’re referring to the e-mail that was sent by Cathy Rattray. You’d like a copy of that. I don’t have one,” answered Aris after being quizzed by journalists.
“I’ll tell you why it may not have been here and I didn’t prepare for it, but let me tell you a possibility. You have something called a document of relevance and in the historical build-up of camps going back to when I was one of the coaches in Munich in 1972 at the Olympic Games, camps had been a standard for the Olympic Games and World Championships, from ever since, and therefore the possible assumption was that it was not necessary to produce that because that would only be a reminder,” Aris added.
The Observer was later yesterday furnished with two e-mailed communiqués, dated July 27 and July 30, from the JAAA’s Rattray to athletes, informing them of the date, time and address of the mandatory camp in Nuremberg, as well as seeking from the athletes their travel arrangements to Nuremberg, so that transportation to the camp could be arranged.
However, there was no evidence of this e-mail to specific athletes.
The six athletes who missed the camp were Shelly-Ann Fraser, Melaine Walker, Brigitte Foster-Hylton, Asafa Powell, Shericka Williams and Kaleise Spencer. Their absence prompted Aris and the JAAA to take steps to have them withdrawn from the championships.
However, the IAAF intervened and the athletes were allowed to compete by the national association, which indicated at the time that sanctions could follow after the championships.
Jamaica ended the championships with a record 13 medals, comprising seven gold, four silver and two bronze. All of the six athletes in question contributed to the nation’s medal tally. Fraser won the 100m and shared in the 4x100 gold, Walker won the 400m hurdles, Foster-Hylton won the 100m hurdles, Powell won bronze in the 100m and shared in the 4x100 gold, Williams won silver in the 400m and shared in the 4x400 relay silver, while Spencer also shared in the mile-relay silver.
Yesterday, Aris reiterated that his executive was awaiting the report from the management team, which in turn could be forwarded to the JAAA’s independent disciplinary panel. The three-member panel, which was chosen in January, is chaired by former Chief Justice Lensley Wolfe. The other members are former Attorney General Winston Spaulding and former Chief of Staff of the Jamaica Defence Force Major General John Simmonds.
“As is customary, it depends on when the team comes back and when the management has some time to consult the other team members and coaches, because coaches sometimes are involved in the preparation of it. So traditionally, it usually takes about two to three weeks before returning to Jamaica and having it ready for the executive,” Aris offered yesterday.
“Once it goes to the executive, the executive will look at it and take a decision, and if it is necessary for it to go to the (disciplinary) panel, it will then go,” he added.
Pressed to disclose the possible sanctions that the panel could impose on the athletes, Aris replied: “They (disciplinary panel) are being guided by the rules of the IAAF and the JAAA’s constitution. That’s their guide.”
So you hold a press conference to say nothing because the only pertinent document- if there ever was one- just isn’t there.
Aris fumbled around, ducking and dodging press questions by talking about when he was a coach in 1972. (Say what??)
1: If the Cathy Rattray doc was sent out to the athletes (July 27th??), it should be easy to produce a copy with the e-mail address of ONE SINGLE ATHLETE which could be verified.
Aris held a press conference but didn’t produce what he says was done. What does that say about his credibility?
2: There IS proof the Franno’s camp worked for the MVP medallists. There is NO PROOF that the results could have been duplicated at the JAAA camp. In fact, there is every likelihood that the results would have been worse.
3: Aris trotted out a whereabouts document to cast doping aspersions on MVP, once again ducking the fact that only JAA athletes have tested positive-- so far.
Already, Nick Davies of the IAAF has released a statement, putting a lie to this, and making it clear that the whereabouts of the MVP athletes was in the IAAF’s possession at all times this year.
Aris has tried again, no doubt to try to deflect attention from the doping hearings there, and I guess the IAAF will now have to re-release its statement.
well he’ll struggle now that Yohan Blake, Marvin Anderson, Allodin Fothergill and Lansford Spence have fessed up!
There is a great article in the Jamaica Gleaner by AW Sangster (Officialdom and the Athletes)on the JAA and it’s long history of cronyism and incompetence over decades. Can someone post it here??
It is massive, but:
Officialdom and the athletes
Published: Sunday | September 6, 2009
A. W. Sangster, Contributor
There has been a series of incidents at the recently concluded IAAF World Championships in Berlin which are very disturbing. The continued poor relationship between the Jamaica Amateur Athletic Association (JAAA) and the MVP Club continues, and in the long run the athletes suffer. There is a long history in Jamaican track and field athletics of athletes suffering at the hands of officials through inefficiency, poor administration, injustice, plain vindictiveness and eventual cover-up.
The following are some examples.
1968 Mexico Olympics. The games started off on the wrong foot with the national flag being carried by Herbert McDonald, the president of the Jamaica Olympic Association (JOA). Many athletes, including Michael Fray, protested in the stands and did not join the parade. Team captain Clifton Forbes was left to try and settle the upset. The sprint relay team of Forbes, Fray, Miller and Stewart broke the world record in the heats though they did not medal. No recognition came their way from the Machado/Carreras Sports Foundation until this was corrected many years later.
1976 Montreal Olympics. Michael Fray qualified and was selected to go but head coach Herb McKenley let it be known that if Fray went he would not go. JAAA president Richard Ashenheim surrendered to the ultimatum, arguing that Jamaica’s chances of a sprint relay medal were poor. This was very surprising with a team of Quarrie (100 and 200m medallist), Miller, Fray and Bradford.
1980 Moscow Olympics. The experience of Anthony Davis, who was one of two locally trained athletes to make the team, was documented in a report by a number of athletes at the games when he was bypassed for an ailing Bertland Cameron, who broke down shortly after starting the relay. It was all about the recognition of sponsors. Nothing came of the protest letter signed by several members of the team.
1984 Los Angeles. After the games the papers were full of the ‘Shoe War’ at the games in which the women’s relay team was changed on the basis of whose sponsor’s shoes were being worn. There were many protests at the time, including that of Grace Jackson, and the media called for an enquiry. The Minister of Sport at the time, Ed Bartlett, called for an enquiry and a howl went up about politics interfering in sport. No enquiry was held by either the JAAA or the JOA. One result was an attempt by one of the officials at the LA Games to organise a slate to contest the next JAAA elections. The upstarts were wiped out and the old guard remained.
2000 Sydney Olympics. The move to replace Peta-Gay Dowdie by Merlene Ottey brought forth placard-bearing protest by Jamaican athletes, which led to the threatened banning of the team by the organisers. We never did hear: was Peta -Gay sick or was she just being ‘replaced’ by the Merlene Ottey star?
2008 Beijing Olympics. The issue of the ‘camp’ surfaced for the first time in recent history and it was the intervention of a leading Jamaican banker which helped to keep the team together. A new name had come on the scene. The athletes of the MVP Club with coach Stephen Francis performed in spectacular fashion, along with Usain Bolt, coached by Glen Mills.
Before turning to the Berlin IAAF Championships some comment needs to be made on the quite fundamental changes that have taken place in athletics. Essentially, the rules of the game have changed and there is a new operational paradigm. Some of the historical changes are the following.
The amateur status of athletes: Initially, athletes competed for individual glory and for the country that they represented. Prizes could be awarded but no money was to be paid to the winners in the early days of track and field athletics.
The move to professionalism meant that winners gained handsome rewards and there were, in some cases gold bars to be won for a series of events. Million-dollar rewards are now in the offing.
The role of agents, managers and professional coaches: These positions have all come about with the professionalism of the athletes. The complexity of the athletics calendar requires a battery of support persons who organise schedules for athletes, make contact with the various meet directors to get their athletes into a particular event and help to manage their money.
With the greater knowledge of the science and technology of the sport, the coach’s role has also changed dramatically. The coach has been elevated to playing the role of a highly trained individual who is knowledgeable about anatomy and physiology, the care of injuries, the science and technology of each sport, diet, biochemistry and energy, on doping rules and the use of drugs. He or she has also to be a psychiatrist and counsellor and with extensive international connections.
The role of the sponsors: Sport is a billion-dollar business and the various sporting sponsors - Nike, Adidas, Puma, etc - all wish to have a particular successful athlete in their fold. Many athletes have made a successful career in the world of athletics through sponsorship. In fact, the new reality is that success with sponsorship is critical to survival.
The world governing bodies. With a great deal at stake in the holding of these international events, the successful planning and organisation is critical. Television stations vie for the right to carry the programme. Sponsors are at hand to support and have their names emblazoned on the sports venues and fields. The world body wants a good show with the best of performers.
We can now understand the role of the IAAF President Lamine Diack in “persuading” JAAA President Howard Aris and IAAF regional representative Teddy McCook to withdraw the banning of the MVP athletes from the Berlin Games. He read them a multimillion-dollar balance sheet. To quote IAAF general secretary, Pierre Weiss, “We want to assure the quality of the Championships.”
This raises another matter: The pre-event camp and the Athletes Village. An understanding of these two items is important.
The pre-event camp which stirred the controversy in Berlin is a pre-event place for the athletes to mix and mingle before the village opens. The camp is selected on the basis of bids by cities and towns for the privilege of hosting the national team. The camp was held in the city of Nuremberg. Jamaica, which has become more famous in recent times, would be a prime country to have in your town or city. There are, of course, perks to the country whose athletes go to the city. Then there are the questions of the overall suitability of the camp and the facilities available for the last days before the competition, and the national requirement for all athletes to attend the camp.
There is also the question of these critical days before the event being under the care of the individual coach. This has been the issue raised by Francis, who has been using a site in Italy with first-class facilities for the past several years, which is perfect for him and his athletes. The question that has now to be raised is the statement that Birmingham has been selected by the JAAA for the pre-London Olympics in 2012. Are those facilities ideal, and what have the terms been for the selection?
The Games Village, which opens some days before the event, is a fully equipped facility provided by the IAAF through its national (German) partner in the games. There is adequate time for mixing and mingling and for relay practice. Francis’ athletes were there.
We return to Berlin and the JAAA performance. The JAAA operation and management at the 2009 IAAF Championships, Berlin. The JAAA performance has left a lot to be desired as far as the athletes were concerned, and Tony Becca in his column in The Gleaner on August 30 described the JAAA leadership in Berlin as being weak and unprofessional. Some of the concerns are:
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The positive drug test of the five athletes. The long delays in processing the test and the appeal by the JADCO have complicated the matter in the public’s minds. The statement by Professor Errol Morrison, the head of JADCO, that it was for the benefit of the athletes that the process was challenged indicates serious flaws in the overall review process. There was a great deal of confusion in the public’s minds, and the decision by the JAAA to send the athletes who had this question mark over their drug status was at best unfortunate. It is obvious that the JAAA were clearly hoping that they would have been able to take part in Berlin. The four local athletes were all members of a local track club.
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The men’s sprint relay team. Relay teams are allowed substitutes and it is clear that the planning for this event left a lot to be desired. It is also clear that the team management obviously hoped that some of the drug-tested group would be able to run. With both Bolt and Powell being rested and the drug-test group not being able to participate, the team for the heats was a shaky second eleven. The stark reality is that had the German team not dropped the baton the Jamaican team would not likely have made the final. Bolt would have been denied his third gold medal!
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Steve Mullings missed the medal ceremony. First, we were told that Mullings was ill, and subsequently the story was told that he missed the bus and was late. Which do we believe?
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There has been a great deal of controversy on Veronica Campbell-Brown’s withdrawing from the sprint relay. There are several issues to consider:
The team management has the right and authority to assign the team members and the positions and the legs that they will run. Veronica, as a veteran curve runner, had no authority to state that she would only run the anchor leg which had been practised at the camp. The situation had changed with the team members and it was sad that she “walked away”. She ended up by accusing the JAAA of being “unprofessional”.
Shelly-Ann Fraser (local of MVP) and Kerron Stewart (overseas university) both were recovering from injury problems and would be better placed in the straights rather than the curve legs (1 and 3).
Where the JAAA erred is in failing to communicate in sympathetic terms with Veronica in spite of an offer which was made to try and heal the breach. It was again an arrogant take-it-or-leave-it position and, according to Veronica, a decision communicated to her 90 minutes before the race.
It is to Veronica’s credit that she said that the team was doing well and that since she was not going to run the anchor leg she did not want to upset their chances.
- The threat to exclude the MVP athletes. The camp issue has already been discussed and, by extension, the question has to be asked: Who would have been hurt by the exclusion of the MVP athletes? Clearly the athletes and, by extension, Jamaica’s performance. It is interesting to note the following quite remarkable performances of these athletes.
Individually: 3 gold, 1 silver and 1 bronze medals.
In relays having: Members of the teams that won 2 gold and 1 silver medal.
Winning 50 per cent of the individual medals won by Jamaicans.
It is also clear that the inner-city communities of Waterhouse with Shelly-Ann Fraser, and Maxfield Avenue with Melaine Walker, would have viewed the elimination of ‘their’ athlete with great disfavour.
It is said that an enquiry is to be held on the coach and the athletes. This should be welcomed, provided it is a public enquiry and not some hidden in camera event.
THE WAY FORWARD
Jamaica missed out on a glorious opportunity to do Jamaican business and promotion at the games. First, ministers Ed Bartlett and ‘Babsy’ Grange and tourism mogul John Lynch missed out on the potential for serious promotion of Jamaican products and Destination Jamaica. This was to capitalise on the Bolt phenomenon and the Jamaica performance in coming second in the medals table. It is not too late to capitalise on the Bolt mania and use ‘Butch’ Stewart’s suggestion of asking Usain to be the spokesman in a commercial about Jamaica.
Second, the JAAA administration, dominated by the KC old boys, has proved itself to be a self-serving organisation with crowds of delegates being accredited as friends and hangers-on to the KC label. In seeking to discredit Stephen Francis, it embarrassed itself and Jamaica, and Francis has in turn viewed their attitude with contempt and simply ignored them. In addition, there have been serious errors listed above. There has to be a way forward.
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The JAAA has to recognise that there is a new game in town, as outlined above. The arrogant attitude of not recognising the new paradigm has no constructive future. There needs to be greater flexibility in the national interest on issues such as camp requirements, registration, etc. The JAAA is also due for serious house-cleaning.
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Government and the sponsoring private sector have to recognise the significant shift that has occurred in the training of athletes. Seventy per cent of the gold medal-winning athletes were locally trained. This is where the support should now be directed.
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There is need for healing and reconciliation of those who have been hurt in Berlin.
Perhaps the two coaching giants - Francis and Mills - could begin the forward movement as it is clear that new blood and new attitudes are needed.
So we have come full circle: from Michael Fray in Mexico and Montreal, Peta-Gay Dowdie in Sydney, Anthony Davis in Moscow and Veronica Campbell-Brown in Berlin - the saga continues.
It’s a shame a nice article like the above to have a subject like that as its ‘inspiration’…