Jamaica Observer newspaper
Sports
Book seeks answers to Ja’s sprint legacy
BY PAUL BURROWES Observer writer
Sunday, December 19, 2010
A ground-breaking book entitled Jamaican Gold: Jamaican Sprinters, which explores the genetic, nutritional, environmental and other elements of the country’s elite sprinters, hit bookstores worldwide earlier this month and is being snapped up in the Caribbean and North America, according to Jamaican scientist Dr Rachael Irving and Olympian Vilma Charlton, editors of the 140-page publication.
Jamaican Gold delves into the sought-after question of why Jamaicans run so fast. Olympic and world champions Usain Bolt and Shelly-Ann Fraser, it asserts, “stand on the shoulders of giants of both genders, heirs to a pedigree that goes back at least a hundred years to the teenaged Norman Manley and before”.
Dr Cynthia Thompson (left) flips through the pages of Jamaican Gold at the Jamaica Olympic Association offices last Wednesday with editors Dr Rachael Irving and Olympian Vilma Charlton (right). (Photo: Paul Burrowes)
Dr Cynthia Thompson (left) flips through the pages of Jamaican Gold at the Jamaica Olympic Association offices last Wednesday with editors Dr Rachael Irving and Olympian Vilma Charlton (right). (Photo: Paul Burrowes) 1/1
Before the “explosion of Lightning Bolt”, the book says, "the consistent speediness of men and women from this small island had been the subject of serious and humorous speculation, pride, and ‘su-su’.
“What is the ‘gold’ that is mined so consistently by Jamaican sprinters that permits this little country to claim a place among the top five countries, measured in terms of medals per capita of population, in almost every Olympics since the Second World War — and all on the basis of athletics, mostly the sprints (400 metres and under)?”
Jamaican Gold uses science to determine whether a Jamaican ‘race’, born in the Americas, descendants of slaves of West African heritage, provides answers for the male world record-holders for sprints for the past 50 or so years.
Is running fast in the blood, in the 22 varieties of yam on the hills of Jamaica? Jamaican Gold draws on biochemistry to physiology, genetics to psychiatry, history and biography, to put the puzzle together in the easy-to-read book.
Published by the University of West Indies Press, Jamaican Gold has already been translated into many languages, and is sold locally at all major bookshops for just over $2,000.
Dr Irving described the book as a “tremendous achievement” with 14 persons involved in its compilation, including professor of biochemistry Helen Asemota; psychiatrist and Bellevue Hospital senior medical officer Aggrey Irons; president of UTech Professor Errol Morrison; senior lecturer in pathology Donovan McGrowder; sports historian and commentator, the late Jimmy Carnegie; renowned broadcaster and journalist Bobby Fray, and past UWI sports director and general secretary of high school sports, Fred Green.
The publication also includes two writers from overseas, namely Yannis Pitsiladis, reader in exercise physiology at the University of Glasgow, and Robert Scott, career development fellow of Medical Research Council Epidemiology Unit, Cambridge University.
Dr Irving said work on the book began in 2007. “It is a lot of work, very, very hard to get all the information. I did interviews with the older sprinters such as Les Laing… but we didn’t have the money to visit George Rhoden,” she said.
She paid special tribute to MVP Track & Field Club head coach Stephen Francis, who believed Jamaicans scientists should feature in the documentation of local athletes.
Dr Irving recalled a conversation she had with co-editor Charlton at UWI where they both work, about Koreans, University of California, and French groups doing documentaries on Jamaican sprinters.
“We have to do something,” Charlton pleaded, “We don’t have the money,” Dr Irving responded.
Despite the lack of funding Dr Irving, research fellow in the department of basic medical services and Charlton, lecturer at the Institute of Education later agreed to plunged themselves into the project. With them, 16 writers have, therefore, contributed to this great work.
Charlton expressed surprise at the outcome of the book “because we were just going along. The book is rich because of the 16 different authors and though Jamaicans don’t like to read this is a story that must be told,” said the Olympian.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/sports/Book-seeks-answers-to-Ja-s-sprint-legacy_8243339#ixzz18bZ9dV3w