Lewis greater than Bolt

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Lewis shades Bolt, says former coach

Dan Silkstone
October 4, 2009

IT HAS been the favourite parlour game of the track and field world these past few weeks after Usain Bolt added world championship domination to his Olympic exploits, continuing to smash world records and push our understanding of how fast a human being can run.

Is Bolt the greatest of all time and is he greater than Carl Lewis?

Bolt says he wants to be the best ever; the man he must overtake to get there is Lewis. So what, says Tom Tellez, the legendary coach who guided Lewis to nine Olympic gold medals?

‘‘I think it’s hard to go past Carl really, as someone who dominated the sport for 18 years and had so much versatility,’’ he said. ‘‘Carl didn’t run for times, that’s not how we coached him. He was a competitor and he ran to beat the man, not the clock. It’s what we always focused on.’’

Bolt’s triple Olympic gold and triple gold in Berlin came with five world records. Nobody has beaten the clock with such dismissive ease in sprint history. But Tellez does not think Bolt’s outright times should place him ahead of Lewis - the man who dominated sprinting for a much longer span, claiming three consecutive 100 metres world titles and also owned the long jump, winning gold at four consecutive Olympics.

‘‘I definitely know Carl could have run faster if he was just sprinting,’’ he says. ''The way he combined sprinting and long jump, I don’t think we’ll see anyone do that again in a hurry. You’d think it would happen more often, you need great speed for long jump, but most coaches now don’t want their sprinters jumping; they worry about injuries.

‘‘It did take a lot out of him as well. I have no doubt he could have run faster times at some of those big meets if he wasn’t jumping as well.’’

Between 1984 and 1996, seven American sprinters won Olympic gold. Tellez coached six of them.

The semi-retired coach is a massive Bolt fan who gets a wistful tone in his voice when asked about a hypothetical match race between the two greatest sprinters the world has seen. ‘‘I know that Carl could have run faster. I always felt he didn’t reach his full potential as a sprinter,’’ he says. ‘‘If Carl was running today he would be running faster.’’

Lewis himself questioned whether Bolt was clean after his exploits in Beijing, pointing to the less than stringent Jamaican drug-testing regime. But Tellez says the 1.96-metre Jamaican’s times can be made sense of without suspecting his methods.

‘‘He has the perfect body for it; he’s so tall. His stride means he takes less steps than the other guys but his technique is excellent,’’ he says. ‘‘I don’t look at him and wonder because it makes perfect sense to me that he can run that fast with that technique.’’

This weekend Tellez is lending his expertise to Australia’s top mentors at a coaching conference in Melbourne.

Tellez says the biggest challenge for Australia is convincing the most talented natural athletes to try the sport and stick with it, as well as providing meaningful and regular competition for junior athletes and showing them a pathway to the elite level to keep them interested.

‘‘The pool you can draw from is much smaller; it’s all about getting the best talents into your sport and getting them early,’’ he said.

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Get a grip!! It would have been tougher for Bolt if he divided his talents with long jump, singing, playing the Cello, and wearing high heels - but he doesn’t and why should he!
For anyone to claim that Carl could have run faster if he’d only wanted to- when he was getting his ass kicked in the sport’s no 1 event for years is such bullshit- oh! I forgot, history has already been re-written for him on that score, so I guess why not re-write some more … Carl’s faster than Bolt, Carl’s cleaner…well, enough already.

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Does he mean Carl would be running faster as in like 9.85 or faster as in 9.58?

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Here’s the worst part about all of that:

“I think it’s hard to go past Carl really, as someone who dominated the sport for 18 years…”

Dominated for 18 years? Is he talking about the sport of screwing up national anthems or something?

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Such a contrast to D Bailey and Ato, this is one reason they get TV commentator jobs.

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This is like saying Fox Trot could have run a faster 5000m then Steve Prefontaine

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we all know Fox Trot. Who is Steve Prefontaine?

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I’m surprised to read the Silkstone article on Tom Tellez suggesting Lewis is ‘greater’ than Bolt, because having attended the AT&FCA conference, I heard Tellez speak glowingly of Bolt & Tyson Gay.

Of course Carl got mentioned often but never in respect to comparison to Bolt. it was all about the coaching of Lewis and what type of competitor he was.

He said that Lewis helped make him a coach as Lewis was that good, he would have made anyone look a great coach.

In the conference he said Lewis was at the top for 18 years, which Lewis was. Not necessarily THE top but was thereabouts. I don’t recall him saying he was dominant for 18 years.

Tellez was very impressive on a number of fronts, (especially his own physical condition -amazingly fit for a man in his 70’s) and well worth the trip over to Melbourne to attend the conference.

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I still think Carl was one of the greatest ever. He was often criticized throughout his career, and he also, criticized many others. The only track people he ever seemed to get on with were his santa-monica team mates and Dennis Mitcell.
That being said, I doubt Usain Bolt could win four olympic long jump titles. Usain hinted in a recent interview that he would like to try long jump before he retires. But this was mere conjecture on his part, as journalists want hinm to try what Carl Lewis did, and he was only answering their questions and keeping his sponsors happy. But Usain wore his heart on his sleeve when he said he “didn’t plan on taking up the long jump any time soon.”
So in all reality, he aint taking up the long jump. Most wouldn’t dare to if they’re allready good at something else. Carl Lewis was bold enough to try it and he was one of the few that have ever succeeded at it, and I don’t think anyone else had as much potential at the combination as Carl Lewis did.

Carls stats don’t show his true incredible athleticism untill further inspection.

In 1982 Carl jumped so far, that it looked like he went over 9 meters. It is in his biography and the same story has been told by others elsewhere. The referee put up a red flag so the jump was never measured. But there was no dent in the plastacine, it was to the millimeter. The fact is, it was his one perfect jump, and the computer graphic lines super imposed over the pit, suggested a jump of 9.28 meters.

The proof that Carl was so good is that a lot of people wont believe what I’ve just said. Every long jumper has their Beamon’esque moment, (Mike Powel in 1991) and Carl had his in 1982. 9.28meters is the unofficial greatest leap ever, whether you believe it or not.

Now on top of that, Carl was the first guy to go regularly under 10 seconds for 100 meters at low altitude. The first to go regularly under 20 secs for 200 meters at low altitude. He was the guy that had a supreme top end speed. If he was to come out of a time machine and compete today at his peak, he would still be a threat on the anchor leg of a relay race at olympic final level.

He ran 19.80 secs in 200meters, whilst showboating and putting the breaks on 20 meters before the finish line. He ran 19.75 or 19.80 in to an extreemly strong headwind. He definately could have run 19.6 for 200 meters.

Had he have competed on the ultra high tech Berlin track, he would have run slightly faster than his 9.86 pb for 100 meters.

Carl was great and I still look at videos of his sprints, and marvel at his relaxation even over the final 20 meters.

I got no problem with some people still calling him the greatest, and no problem with Usain Bolt being called the greatest either, as they’re both awesome.

Carls’ one slight glitch, is that he couldn’t understand how it was possible that he could be beaten. He didn’t understand that there were other ‘mega-athletes’ with as much intestinal fortitude as himself, and that he would eventually meet his match. There were other athletes and coaches with plenty of dreams of their own, and with there own wonderful scripts.
Ben beat him, and Carl didn’t know how to claw back his number one position, untill Ben was removed from the sport.

I’m not a Carl basher though, he helped the sport become more professional (yes money had allways been involved) but Carl helped it become more open and official. His glory and flambouyance and hype made his events more important than before. And really, only Ben, Michael Johnson and Usain Bolt have given such auras to their events.
(I’d also say Surgey Bubka in pole vault - but the vault isn’t a main event. Daley Thompson in decathlon for UK followers of the sport, and the British middle distance rivalry in the 80’s.)

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Carl Lewis was a ridiculously good long jumper in high school. He wasn’t ‘bold enough to try it’, as he was already a jumper/sprinter before he got to the top.

In 1982 Carl jumped so far, that it looked like he went over 9 meters. It is in his biography and the same story has been told by others elsewhere. The referee put up a red flag so the jump was never measured. But there was no dent in the plastacine, it was to the millimeter. The fact is, it was his one perfect jump, and the computer graphic lines super imposed over the pit, suggested a jump of 9.28 meters.

The proof that Carl was so good is that a lot of people wont believe what I’ve just said. Every long jumper has their Beamon’esque moment, (Mike Powel in 1991) and Carl had his in 1982. 9.28meters is the unofficial greatest leap ever, whether you believe it or not.

I don’t believe 9.28m. Can you please point me to an article with verifiable & justified evidence of this? My not believing is not proof that Carl is that good. It’s proof I don’t believe he jumped 9.28m. Not every jumper has a Beamon-esque moment. Non of Lewis, Saladino, Pedroso, or Myricks had any legal mark that was considerably further than their next best.

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I was told by witnesses that it was over 30 ft (James has my calculator so you translate it to metric!)
No doubt Lewis was/is the greatest long jumper but Bolt is the greatest sprinter.

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30 feet rounds down to 9.14m (from 9.144m).
9.28m is just under 30 feet, 5 3/8 inches.

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Tom Tellez said (at the AT&FCA conference) that Carl could never be a coach as he hasn’t the temperment for it, and would be lucky to last two weeks.

Like Goose said, Tellez confirmed that Lewis was that good and such a perfectionist that he often got frustrated with others and was difficult to get along with.

I tend to agree with Goose as an athlete who was at one stage clearly was the best in the world at 100, 200 and the long jump, and over such a long period of time, in several major championships, Lewis was one of the greatest T&F athletes of all time.

If I was pressed to name my top ten T&F athletes of all time I’d probably have Lewis at number one.

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I thought Hay (biomechanist) got ahold of the Lewis jump video and claimed it was like 8.80 or something. He scoffed at the 30’ claim. I think it’s on youtube somewhere. I will find it if you send me cupcakes. Anyway, there are plenty of guys who hammered 9m+ jumps either slight fouls or wind aided or both. There is a jump where Pedroso is clearly well beyond 9m but it’s a foul…again on youtube.

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Who would you choose to coach Ben or Carl ?

My view is that Carl had the levers and elastic strength to run faster than his pbs. Toms methods are good but I think in terms of developing acceleration and max vel there are deficiencies in his approach.

No doubt Carl could of run faster but so could of Ben.

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He was running and jumping in to a sand pit in his back garden at the age of four. I have read his auto-biography and probably know even more about him than you do. He was ‘bold’ from the age of four, five or six, is what I meant. I didn’t mean that he suddenly got the idea as an adult, to try both events. i eman he was bold enough and self-believing enough even as a young child to know exactly what path he wanted. But his path was very focused. By the time of his high school years, he got a tape measure, and measured 8.90 meters in his back garden, just to see what it looked like. he also sowed the numbers: “27 feet” or something on the back of his jacket which he wore to school every day. when classmates asked him what it meant, he told them he’d be the high school kid that would jump over 27 feet in the long jump. Nobody believed he’d do it, but himself.
For you to suggest he discovered his talent, and was “allready” this and that is wrong, because no matter how good he was in his teens, he’d allways planned everything before-hand, long before he started prooving it on the field. I’d say he was bold, the epitomy of “reaching goals” is Carl Lewis. He’s not the ‘fell out of the womb and broke the junior record’ kind of athlete. He was just very driven. He was running and jumping in to a sand pit at age four, and actually visualizing the track & field version of the long jump.
He was bold all his life, which is why he became a very good jumper early on in his life. He didn’t discover his talent by “accident” as so many other sprinters claim of their own talents. Carl was driven, his elder brothers and sisters were more athletic than he was (for a while) and his parents were ofcourse, track coaches. Eventually, after 12 years of training, he starting getting very good, by the time he was 16 years old.

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It doesn’t matter that you don’t believe it. Also, I can’t be arsed to fax you a copy of the literature from a sports biography (and even if I were to, you could Claim Carl lewis was biased.)

It’ll be easier if you just dissagree and don’t believe me, instead of me going and finding the articles and sources.

You probably also wouldn’t believe that one of my basketball team mates triple jumped 17 meters (without a full-time training schedule) , of the back of very little triple jump training, and when he was about twenty years old, because I can’t proove it.

You may also disbelieve that Deion Saunders was out-running the adults in weakend football games, when he was eight years old, because I can’t proove it.

I also can’t proove to you that a personal experiment in self hypnosis, pulled a muscle (without contracting the muscle). Admittedly, I was not aiming for a ‘pulled’ muscle.

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Yes, that’s the problem with not getting credit for the LJ. You have no proof of what you could have done regardless of the reality.
The other point here is you can’t have it both ways. Carl started training at age 4 and according to Steve Davis, a Clemson guy who went to his HS, he ran 9.3y ht at 16. Carl then claimed Ben had no talent because he wasn’t that fast at a young age yet Ben didn’t start training- or growing till- almost 15 and had a lot of catching up to do on a 10 year head start. Of course Ben was behind initially but improved to 10.21m E by the end of HS.

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Ah, I see - that makes more sense than how I interpreted it.

I’m not sure I understand the purpose of your second post, but let’s not worry about it.

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I mean, you have been known to outright make-up stuff on this forum and you have never seen video of the jump, nor have most of the people claiming it was 9.28m, hence the reason why people don’t believe it.