[I LOVE THIS - STREET TRACK, RATHER THAN STREET HOOPS. THIS COULD BE LINFORD CHRISTIE’S BIGGEST CONTRIBUTION TO SPORT. HE’S DONE PRECIOUS LITTLE ELSE FOR ANYONE THAT DIDN’T DIRECTLY BENEFIT HIMSELF. kk]
The Times October 16, 2006
Playground potential starting to be explored
By John Goodbody
Our correspondent says the race is on to turn street athletes into medal-winners
THE weeds and grass are growing through the cracks in the playground of the old Lillian Baylis School, not much more than a javelin throw across the River Thames from the House of Commons. The school has been abandoned and is largely boarded up, its classrooms deserted and the buildings mostly dilapidated. Academic subjects are now being taught at a new location.
However, the site still serves as a training centre for local youngsters in sports including athletics, boxing and judo. And it is in this unpromising setting that nuggets of talent are being mined as Britain strives to unearth potential medal-winners for the 2012 Olympic Games.
The Positive Futures programme, backed by the Home Office, seeks not only to provide recreational opportunities but also to encourage the development of promising youngsters . The strategy is to use the most basic but convenient facilities for training, to take sport out to the youth of the area rather than ask them to come to the sport.
In street athletics, this has led to a national 60 metres sprint competition, the brainchild of Olympic champions Linford Christie and Darren Campbell. The races are staged not on standard facilities but on rolled-down tracks on playgrounds and side-streets. They are handy. They are cheap. But they can help instill a love of sport.
When north Lambeth and north Southwark staged a competition in July, 312 young hopefuls turned up at the Lillian Baylis School to take part.
Brian Dickens, the director of the local Sports Action Zone, said: “Competing in events such as these can not only boost the confidence of many, it can also help them academically.” The top boys and girls in each age category, from under-13s to under-20s, then received coaching from Christie and Campbell before travelling to Manchester to meet the best sprinters from Liverpool, Bristol and Manchester.
Among the winners of the 60 metres dash was Rorie Robinson, first in the boys’ under-13 event in a highly impressive 7.52sec, 0.08sec ahead of another South London competitior, Ali Linton. Rorie was so laid-back about the event that he had to be woken up for the semi-final. “I think everyone could have done better,” he said. “Certainly I could have done. It was a long coach journey up there and we left at 3am.”
Latoya Bailey, second in the girls’ 60 metres in 8.06sec, is a gifted footballer, having had a trial with Arsenal Ladies. However, she said: “I like athletics. It is more enjoyable. I would like to be in the Olympic Games because it is fun and in athletics I could earn money and look after my family.”
Both have been rewarded by a year’s sponsorship from Reebok and will continue to get coaching from Christie and Campbell.
However, below the top tier, there are other athletes of immense potential, such as Juliet Esiorho, who came sixth in the under-13 60 metres race in Manchester. She was taking part in only the second race of her life. “I am now going to continue running and join a club,” she said.
Ian Hodge, a leading athletics statistician, points to the absence of convenient tracks in many inner-city areas.
“There are literally dozens of unrecognised talents in athletics and initiatives such as this are the only way to find them, especially in the sprints,” he said. “These are exactly the sort of people we are trying to find for 2012.”