From Orin Gordon in London
Aliann Pompey was apologetic.
“I got your message,” she told me as she came off the track in her last race for Guyana at an Olympic Games.
“Sorry I wasn’t able to get back to you.”
I’d tried to contact her the night before her semi final race.
“You needed your sleep,” I said.
“Clearly not,” she quipped. She smiled as said that.
Aliann had just finished last in her semi-final, and we stood talking in the mixed zone where athletes meander their way past journalists within touching distance on the other side of a barrier in the bowels of the stadium.
They come off the track and before they disappear underground, they have to negotiate TV interviewers trackside. Then it’s radio, and finally print.
As on the track, the mixed zone operates on a strict hierarchy.
She was clearly fighting mixed emotions. Chagrin at a poor performance, sadness at having run her last Olympics race for Guyana, brought close to tears by the sheer magnitude of it all, but ruefully smiling and philosophical all the same.
Her time of 52.58s was some way off her best of 50.71s, and her season’s best, 52.10s, which she had equalled in her opening heat.
The 400m, the quarter mile, is the most beautiful and graceful of all the races in athletics. Not quite a sprint and definitely not middle distance, it’s a subtle mixture of flat out and eased running. Few athletes combine a genuine sprint with the 400m. The great Michael Johnson did it. It’s quick, yet tactical.
A slow start left Pompey playing catch up with world champion Amantle Montsho of Botswana, who she also faced in her heat. Trying to run down championship calibre runners is a recipe for ruin, and Pompey paid the price on the home straight. She had nothing left and faded badly.
She smiled as she reflected on her race. Up close she’s slight, but with the clearly defined muscle structure of elite athletes, including an impressive washboard stomach.
“It’s hard to cover any ground on such phenomenal and accomplished athletes,” she said.
“It was extremely hard. In fact it was impossible. When Amantle and Francina (McCorory of the United States) are running 50-point there’s just no coming back or pulling them in.”
Montsho and McCorory finished one-two in 50.15s and 50.19s respectively, well ahead of Pompey.
“It is a disappointment, but it is not something I will allow to follow me around,” she said.
“I’ve done a substantial amount of good things in my career to be happy about it.”
Those achievements include Commonwealth Games gold in 2001 and Pan Am Games bronze a year later. She’s the athlete who has represented Guyana the most—- four Olympic Games and five World championships in addition to smaller games such as Commonwealth and Pan Ams.
At 34, Rio 2016 will not happen for her.
“Hopefully I’ll be able to take my young child to Brazil to give them a taste of spectating the Olympics, but I will not be competing in Brazil, definitely not.”
Pompey’s flameout was the last act in a dismal day for Guyana.
The 400 metres runner Winston George finished sixth in his heat in the morning and did not qualify for the semis. His 46.86 was a tick off his season’s best of 46.51, but significantly slower than his personal best of 45.86s.
The 100 metres runner Jeremy Bascom came up against one the of the gold medal favourites, Yohan Blake of Jamaica. Like George he finished sixth, did not qualify, and ran slower than his season’s and personal best which are the same.
With the exception of Pompey, who ran her season’s best in her heat, not one of Guyana’s five athletes in the pool or on the track beat his or her personal best.
That must disappoint them and team management most of all and questions are sure to be asked about preparation, expectation and motivation.
The comment by a Stabroek News reader online is one of devastating simplicity. They should be able to rouse themselves to achieve PBs in the biggest sporting festival on the planet.
But it’s not necessarily that simple. As British athlete Dean Macey noted, the size and magnitude of an Olympic Games can turn athletes legs to jelly. That’s not anything like an answer for Guyana’s disappointing showing, but it’s worth bearing in mind for anyone who imagines that the bigger the stage, the easier it is for athletes to ramp up performances.
The inquest into the team performance is already starting. I’ll be seeking some answers and asking some tough questions of the team’s management.
That, however, is for another day. Today the country should salute one of its most enduring athletes who has run her last Olympics race for the Golden Arrowhead.
Aliann Pompey never got to the finals of the 400m, let alone medaled in it. But she’s Guyana’s most consequential track athlete of the past decade.
Orin Gordon is a Guyanese journalist living in London. Follow him on twitter @oringordon
