Semenya is a consistent sandbagger

You must have numerical dyslexia. Roesler ran a well-paced 55.37.

ukathleticscoach wrote:

To be fair the pacemaker went out much too fast. Caster asked for 55 and got 53!

1:51? NO, I don't think so Spanky.

The IAAF and CAS are too politically correct. They made the rule change with the intent of not offending anyone, yet it has completely backfired. Studies have shown that there is an unfair advantage, but yet the facts are ignored and the damage keeps mounting as many hard working athletes lose out on medals and prize money. Sad!

You can't blame her, running is her job, plain and simple. Winning is what matters. If she runs a 1:52 it will open up a can of worms and she may be out of a job. There is no doubt she can run 1:52 but we will not see it until she is ready to call running quits.

Wilson looks like she may be capable of 1:54, as she did not seem stressed at the end of the race

She finished her 1:55 and didnt really look to be out of breath. She looked like she could run intervals at that pace

Loved the quote where he says, "The girls ran fast today..."

Wow

Mary Decker is always referred to as "drug cheat".

Gatlin, not so?

Why?

Ajee Wilson looked just as relaxed as Semenya at the finish. Some runners are just able to look relaxed.

This is true. However, a runner who ALWAYS wins while looking relaxed certainly will get people assuming they are sandbagging. In the case of Semenya, it is justified. The girl who finishes 3rd looking relaxed, runs a PR, NR gets "she might be able to run faster" but since she finished 3rd you have to wonder if it was just a relaxed looking "all out".

reahlity wrote:

Ajee Wilson looked just as relaxed as Semenya at the finish. Some runners are just able to look relaxed.

Semenya reminds me of Milton Berle. He famously said he would pull out just enough to win.

That's Semenya in virtually every race. So blatant it's hilarious. She would never be capable of some of the 200 meter closing splits if she didn't have much more in reserve. No matter the pace or traffic or how the race unfolds its always there. Only in something like the Olympic final last year did she make sure to not cut it so close.

In 2009 she didn't understand the forthcoming scrutiny and risk so she briefly won by daylight.

That 400 last week was a farce. You can watch Diamond League women's 400s all year and never see someone jog out of the blocks like Semenya did the first 200. It was caused by comments like Brenda Martinez', when she said in a taped interview that one distance is okay but if Semenya starts toying with us in the 400 also then that's another matter. And Brenda has been comparatively supportive of Semenya.

Yeah I don't know exactly what is going on (sandbagging, "friendly advice to not run hard" etc etc) but it is fairly clear and obvious that something is going on with respect to the "capping" of the top-end performance.

Monaco was one of the more obvious ones in this rather sad state of affairs.

It's rare in a meet like Monaco to have a queue of athletes on your shoulder and looking like you are going to be rolled over and just have enough to hold them all off at any point - and look very nonchalant about it.

It reminds me of 1500m heats where the top guys toy like that with the borderline guys in the final 120m in order to save energy for later rounds (a clear incentive and agenda). So its bizarre to ever do this in a meet like Monaco where (for example) you could run a WR and get $60k from the IAAF and probably $250k from your sponsor (or more?)

It does look like Semenya could run in the 1.52.5 to 1.53.0 range if desired. At 50.4 and 4.02 the 800m PR of 1.55.27 is actually an outlier poor performance.

Pretty sad all-round to be honest.