for excellence does not just lie with the athlete . The challenge also depends on the system and government policies , starting with education and health … and in the case of the SA Government , our ‘ gold medal ’ success story is that we have now achieved the number one ranking as the unhealthiest nation in the world ! That is our ministerial achievement , judged on 10 factors , many of which are initiated by attitudes set in basic education , health and nutrition from school age .
For example , in 2003 obesity levels in SA were 27.4 % and 7.5 % amongst women and men respectively . By 2016 , just 13 years later , this had grown to 41 % and 11 % respectively . This is an increase of more than 45 %, which means that even with linear growth , obesity is probably now around 57 % in women and 15 % in men . It is highly probable that 18 months of lockdown has accelerated this , given that in 2016 , 68 % of women and 31 % of men were classified as overweight .
Clearly this health depreciation in the population is not simply indicative of poor national education and health policies , but will tend to mitigate against elite sport . Where is the physical education and skills training in primary and secondary school ? Run , jump , catch , throw , hit , kick and agility are the alphabet of sport , but no-one teaches these skills before pigeonholing kids based on pre-puberty size or speed . Then we expect excellence in sport . It ’ s like giving a child War and Peace to read before teaching them the alphabet !
If we want to feature on the meaningless medal table , we need to provide a structure that promotes activity , recreation and sport , with clear progression pathways from foundation to elite . Although such development pyramids are often talked about , such structures and programmes are a rarity in South Africa , and those that do exist have no measurement to assess year-on-year progress in terms of building teams to compete at world level . And as long as national health continues this depreciation , it will become increasingly harder to activate the population in the mining of true sporting talent .
Politics Piggybacks Performance
Currently , the leadership piggyback on medal winners , declaring them ‘ their ’ national product , although we have very few consistencies of success in any event or sport . The reality is that South Africa ’ s stars have achieved glory in spite of , not because of the system . Consider these athletic sporting stars of the past : Josia Thugwane ( marathon ), Elana Meyer ( 10,000m ), Hestrie Cloete ( high jump ), Marius Corbett ( javelin ), Jacques Freitag ( high jump ), Llewelyn Herbert ( 400m hurdles ). Since them , we have had signs of some continuity in the long jump , with Khotso Moekena , Ruswahl Samaai and Luvo Manyonga , and the makings of depth in the sprints , but the zero-medal haul in Tokyo is a first for athletics since the international return to world sport in 1992 .
For three decades , these medal winners have provided the powers that be with sufficient smoking mirrors to disguise a failure to initiate any form of continuum or production line that can deliver on the wealth of talent existing in the country . If medal tables , or championship cups , are used to judge sports progress , there will never be the progress required amongst the clubs and provinces to create meaningful programmes .
Meaningful Analysis
Olympic Medals are the highest of rewards for both individuals and teams , but do not recognise progression of anyone outside the top three . Athletics uses an eight-point system for athletes achieving a place in the final , and I would propose this needs to be expanded to at least 24 to properly appraise our sportsmen and women at World Championships and Olympics . This would better reflect the ‘ state of the nation ’ and the success of the development of talent . Allocating points from 24 for gold to 1 for the last amongst the semi-finalists not only acknowledges achievement beyond qualifying for the Olympics , but also provides a measure of strength in depth . To illustrate my point , this year the athletics team analysis would look like this :
Athletics team performance
Event |
Men points |
Women |
|
|
points |
100m 46 --- 200m 26 --- 400m 13 --- 5000m 0 --- 10000m --- 5 110m H 0 --- 400m H 10 8 Long Jump 3 --- shot putt 19 --- Javelin 2 1 20km walk 5 --- 50km walk 0 --- Marathon 0 10 4 x 100m 0 --- 4 x 400m 0 --- Totals 124 24 Total Team Points 148 Total Points Possible ( 18 events ) 1242 Performance ranking (%) 11.92
While no medals were earned in athletics in Tokyo , there is reasonable strength in depth in the men ’ s 100m and 200m , but a lack in most other events . The performance percentage of 11.92 thus becomes a marker for future years , and the objective is to have a good points levels in each event , and this also considers the sport ’ s gender objectives . Additional points could be added for world , Olympic , continental , national , personal , or season records on a basis of 10 down to 1 . Such scoring evaluates the sport and can be applied individually , and even used to compare sport to sport .
If we want to see success at Olympic level , we need to promote basic athletic skills at grassroots level
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