Duncan Mackay explains how the dash for cash is manipulated by the world’s top athletes
A FUNNY thing happened to Moses Kiptanui on his way to winning a third 3 000m steeplechase title in Gothenburg recently. He suddenly slowed down when he realised he might break the world record. “I want to save that for Zurich,” the Kenyan admitted.
There Kiptanui converted his gold medal into the real thing. One of his prizes for his epoch-making performance of 7:59.18 — the first man under eight minutes — was a 1,2kg bar of gold. In addition to his $7 000 prize money, he received a cash bonus of $50 000, another $50 000 just for turning up and bonuses worth $25 000 from his kit sponsors, Reebok,
Kiptanui is also in line to pick up one of the 20 bars of gold available for athletes who win their specialities at each of the “Golden Four” meetings — Oslo, Zurich, Berlin and Brussels. Having won in Oslo, Linford Christie can also take home one of the gold bars after his miraculous comeback in Zurich.
The Golden Four meetings, bankrolled by sponsorship and TV, are virtually the athletics equivalent of the grand slam in tennis, with the $5-million Zurich event track’s Wimbledon — “the Olympics in two hours”.
The London Grand Prix, promoted by the British Athletic Federation on a budget of $800 000, is more like Eastbourne in comparison.
With such big money on the line, who’s to blame Kiptanui and Ethiopia’s Haile Gebresilasie for conserving energy for Zurich? After winning the 10 000m in Gothenburg, Gebresilasie missed the rest of the championship to save himself. There he produced one of the great performances of all time, taking nearly 11 seconds off the 5 000m record and setting new figures of 12: 44.39 to earn the same as Kiptanui.
Athletes usually have a very short period in their lives when they are fit and strong enough to break world records.
Unless they are Sergey Bubka, of course. The Ukrainian pole vaulter has redefined the art of cashing in by being able to raise his world best a centimetre at a time — a luxury denied to other record-breakers such as Britain’s Jonathan Edwards. Bubka, who earns $80 000 in bonuses every time he breaks the world record, has achieved the feat 35 times.
Yet, despite the fact that the sport’s top performers are millionaires, the International Amateur Athletic Federation are no closer to dropping “amateur” from their title than they were in 1912, the last time the world’s best athletes assembled in Sweden for a major event, the Olympic Games.
The Games are remembered for the legendary American Jim Thorpe, who won gold medals for pentathlon and decathlon but was later ordered to return them to the International Olympic Committee after it was discovered he had played baseball for $25 per week. Thorpe thus became the most celebrated victim of the injustice of the brand of amateurism espoused by men like wealthy American industrialist Avery Brundage, president of the IOC from 1952-72. He described the Olympics as “a revolt against 20th century materialism — a devotion to the cause and not the reward”.
The IAAF, one of sport’s richest organisations, pull in around $70-million annually. Yet until now they have refused to bow to the demands of athletes and offer prize money to their world champions, preferring instead to award Mercedes cars they have bought at cost from the manufacturers. But as Linford Christie said when he was given his in Stuttgart two years ago: “I’ve already got one of these at home — and it’s bigger than the one they’re giving me here.”
Gebresilasie would have valued cash more than the Mercedes he won in Gothenburg. He also won one in Stuttgart, but has never had time to learn to drive and for two years it has been sitting on the dealers’ forecourt in Addis Ababa. “I go and sit in it, switch on the radio and pretend I’m driving,” the Ethiopian said. What will he do with this latest one? “Park it next to my other one.”
For several years, the International Association of Athlete Representatives have been pressing the IAAF to offer more than $11-million in prize money — as well as medals — at the world championships. They want $100 000 for first place scaled down to $5 000 for eighth. A world record would be rewarded with $100 000. Instead, the IAAF has increased significantly the prize money available in the Mobil Grand Prix.
Since 1993, they have totalled $2.3-million for the 17 meetings (mostly for the final, this year to be held in Monte Carlo), with $100 000 for the overall best male and female athlete and $30 000 for each individual
But it seems the IAAF president, Primo Nebiolo, not insensitive to the demands of the elite, now realises that this is no longer enough. If the world championships are to retain their status he must ignore the 99 percent of competitors who remain true to the Corinthian ethos preached by Brundage. So $6-million in prize money will almost certainly be available at the 1997 Athens championships.
As Leroy Burrell, the world 100m record-holder, once told The Wall Street Journal: “We aren’t in this sport because we like it, or we want to earn our way through school. We’re in it to make money.”