Facts to you are a farce. When another poster, who is knowledgeable, unlike you, proves that you are nothing but a windbag, you call it a farce. You are a coward. A real man would admit he was wrong. You NEVER admit you are wrong even though you are wrong all the time. But you were never a real man. :)
Facts to you are a farce. When another poster, who is knowledgeable, unlike you, proves that you are nothing but a windbag, you call it a farce. You are a coward. A real man would admit he was wrong. You NEVER admit you are wrong even though you are wrong all the time. But you were never a real man. :)
You should take up cheerleading. So many cartwheels for the side you support.
What a farce! So he came 5th in a mile race at the end of 1960, after he had just become the Olympic champion over 800m and had yet to focus on the longer distance - which he didn't do until January 1962, when he broke Herb Elliott's world record.
I asked you to list all those defeats you claim from 1960-64 and this is the best you can come up with. But you don't know his career - you have based everything you claim on his disastrous last tour, because you are determined to diminish his reputation for pusillanimous reasons of your own.
There were very few losses in his career after he became Olympic 800m champion in '60 to the end of '64, when he claimed the 800/1500 double in Tokyo and then reduced the 1000m and mile records. The losses in that period came mostly in local races, when he was coming off injury and not fully fit. John Davies, who was one of those few who scored wins over him, effectively acknowledged this. If you were honest (which you aren't) you would admit that he likely suffered fewer defeats in those years than most of the other greats did in their careers, including Coe and Ingebrigtsen - and, unlike them, never at championship level. You pose as an expert but you are a cheap propagandist for a tawdry and misleading view of a great athlete.
You managed it to take the info out of the file? I wasn't certain of that, so kudos to you!
That's from you earlier in the thread - Armstronglivs: "He didn't race the 1500 outside Tokyo. Between 1960-64 he only lost a mile race at a local level, to his rival John Davies"
Step by step - I don't want overwhelm you too much - we are working on the truth, OK?
Isn't it funny that you are corrected again and again with all of your statements, but you continue with your behavior of calling the teller of the truth liar and other insults?
You also want to get his 800m/880y defeats? OK, but not too fast, I know you want to think about any one seperately.
Btw, there were recently so many of your posts deleted. Do you have any idea why? Since you are always polite and totally fact based, and that you always agree when you are proved to be wrong. So, why?
Before you cry: Peter Snell undoubtedly is one of the md all-time greats. As great as he was, for me, Sebastian Coe is still way ahead of him. Snell's career was too short, he has had several losses during his relatively short period at the top, his Mile WR still was little bit weaker than Elliott's 1500m mark. And Coe is by far the greatest record setter in md history. And was much longer at or close to the top than Snell. Others might differ.
You are the one shifting the goal posts. Your claims about Snell's defeats virtually all came from the last 2 months of his career, in one tour. So you have utterly misrepresented his career. I asked you to list his defeats from '60-'64 and you've come up with two. Wow - two! (It also included a mile in early '61, when Snell, the half miler, had yet to move up to focus on the longer distance. A year later he was over 10 seconds faster over the mile and the world record holder. Burleson - who had beaten him in '62 - certainly wasn't, and never seriously threatened Snell again.) Not Coe and not any of the greats after Snell would have had fewer defeats in their careers. (Only Elliott was undefeated in his specialist distance.)
If you were honest - which you aren't - you would say that at his peak from '60-64 Snell had very few losses in his career, none at championship level and saw off all challengers to his title as the greatest md runner of his generation. He also accomplished what no runner - Coe included - was able to do, which is the Olympic 800/1500 double, while defending his 800 title (and Tokyo was the first time Snell raced the metric "mile"). But that isn't your purpose on a Snell thread. It is to pose as an expert on his career and reduce him to suit your own biases with misleading statistics.
This post was edited 14 minutes after it was posted.
I almost never get into discussions about who was the greatest whatever of all time or if Athlete A was greater than Athlete B or vice versa. But I do have to comment about the comparative length of Snell's and Coe's careers. Snell was always an amateur. He had to earn a living from something more than running as did everyone from his time. Elliott was done at 22 or 23. If the sport had been in their times as it was in Coe's you may have seen either or both with careers as long or longer than Coe's. I get your point and am not arguing but I don't believe you can make a valid comparison of Snell and Coe using length of career as a measuring stick.
You managed it to take the info out of the file? I wasn't certain of that, so kudos to you!
That's from you earlier in the thread - Armstronglivs: "He didn't race the 1500 outside Tokyo. Between 1960-64 he only lost a mile race at a local level, to his rival John Davies"
Step by step - I don't want overwhelm you too much - we are working on the truth, OK?
Isn't it funny that you are corrected again and again with all of your statements, but you continue with your behavior of calling the teller of the truth liar and other insults?
You also want to get his 800m/880y defeats? OK, but not too fast, I know you want to think about any one seperately.
Btw, there were recently so many of your posts deleted. Do you have any idea why? Since you are always polite and totally fact based, and that you always agree when you are proved to be wrong. So, why?
Before you cry: Peter Snell undoubtedly is one of the md all-time greats. As great as he was, for me, Sebastian Coe is still way ahead of him. Snell's career was too short, he has had several losses during his relatively short period at the top, his Mile WR still was little bit weaker than Elliott's 1500m mark. And Coe is by far the greatest record setter in md history. And was much longer at or close to the top than Snell. Others might differ.
You are the one shifting the goal posts. Your claims about Snell's defeats virtually all came from the last 2 months of his career, in one tour. So you have utterly misrepresented his career. I asked you to list his defeats from '60-'64 and you've come up with two. Wow - two! (It also included a mile in early '61, when Snell, the half miler, had yet to move up to focus on the longer distance. A year later he was over 10 seconds faster over the mile and the world record holder. Burleson - who had beaten him in '62 - certainly wasn't, and never seriously threatened Snell again.) Not Coe and not any of the greats after Snell would have had fewer defeats in their careers. (Only Elliott was undefeated in his specialist distance.)
If you were honest - which you aren't - you would say that at his peak from '60-64 Snell had very few losses in his career, none at championship level and saw off all challengers to his title as the greatest md runner of his generation. He also accomplished what no runner - Coe included - was able to do, which is the Olympic 800/1500 double, while defending his 800 title (and Tokyo was the first time Snell raced the metric "mile"). But that isn't your purpose on a Snell thread. It is to pose as an expert on his career and reduce him to suit your own biases with misleading statistics.
Wrong, as almost anything you have written to the subject here: not at all about the last 2 months of his career. You are the one pointing on this - because you try to shiftthe attention to something different.
Not 2 defeats, around 15 between 1960 and 1964 at distances between 800m and the Mile, which I have said to you before - you forgot?
Another one for you ( I think you can manage it by yourself, as you were so successful with the others so far, OK?)
Very few losses? That's relative - around 15 in those 5 seasons. Call it like ever you want, just a fact.
None at the really big ones. But losses, to many different runners. So writing he only has lost to John Davies, and just once (as you did), is completely wrong. As almost anything which you state as "fact".
Coe's WRs are way superior to Snell's, that's the main point for me to rank him clearly ahead of Snell. Coe is by far the greatest WR setter in md history.
WRs
800m Coe 2 (currently number 8 all-time), Snell 1
1000m Coe 2 (currently number 2 all-time), Snell 1
1500m Coe 1, Snell 0
Mile Coe 3, Snell 2
Snell's last Mile WR was inferior to Elliott's 1500m mark. And was bettered by a big margin within a few years. For 1000m, 1500m, Mile Coe in this department is clearly superior to Snell, for 800m it's debatable. But when looking where Coe stands 45 years after his prime in the all-time list I say Coe is ahead also here.
On championship level, Snell's record is clearly superior to Coe's who lost so many finals or didn't even qualify for the championships - so this closes the gap significantly.
Add the relatively short period at the top for Snell with those many losses in minor races, and I have Coe as a clear number one in md running, Snell as number two. Others are free to differ.
I almost never get into discussions about who was the greatest whatever of all time or if Athlete A was greater than Athlete B or vice versa. But I do have to comment about the comparative length of Snell's and Coe's careers. Snell was always an amateur. He had to earn a living from something more than running as did everyone from his time. Elliott was done at 22 or 23. If the sport had been in their times as it was in Coe's you may have seen either or both with careers as long or longer than Coe's. I get your point and am not arguing but I don't believe you can make a valid comparison of Snell and Coe using length of career as a measuring stick.
There was no rule which had the athletes to stop after a few seasons also back then,
There were many others with long careers like Paavo Nurmi in the 1920s/'30s, Iolanda Balas or Al Oerter in the 1950s/'60s, Kip Keino in the 1960s/'70s, Irena Szewinska from the 1960s up to the '80s to name a few.
When Herb Elliott finishes his career at age 22 it's obviously his own decision and he was free to do so. But for sure it reduces his career (the reason why he quits is completely irrelevant - "had to make a living" or lost interest or whatever). He could have easily competed at the 1972 Olympics in Munich - would he have been as dominant in all those years in between like he was in 1960?
You are the one shifting the goal posts. Your claims about Snell's defeats virtually all came from the last 2 months of his career, in one tour. So you have utterly misrepresented his career. I asked you to list his defeats from '60-'64 and you've come up with two. Wow - two! (It also included a mile in early '61, when Snell, the half miler, had yet to move up to focus on the longer distance. A year later he was over 10 seconds faster over the mile and the world record holder. Burleson - who had beaten him in '62 - certainly wasn't, and never seriously threatened Snell again.) Not Coe and not any of the greats after Snell would have had fewer defeats in their careers. (Only Elliott was undefeated in his specialist distance.)
If you were honest - which you aren't - you would say that at his peak from '60-64 Snell had very few losses in his career, none at championship level and saw off all challengers to his title as the greatest md runner of his generation. He also accomplished what no runner - Coe included - was able to do, which is the Olympic 800/1500 double, while defending his 800 title (and Tokyo was the first time Snell raced the metric "mile"). But that isn't your purpose on a Snell thread. It is to pose as an expert on his career and reduce him to suit your own biases with misleading statistics.
Wrong, as almost anything you have written to the subject here: not at all about the last 2 months of his career. You are the one pointing on this - because you try to shiftthe attention to something different.
Not 2 defeats, around 15 between 1960 and 1964 at distances between 800m and the Mile, which I have said to you before - you forgot?
Another one for you ( I think you can manage it by yourself, as you were so successful with the others so far, OK?)
Very few losses? That's relative - around 15 in those 5 seasons. Call it like ever you want, just a fact.
None at the really big ones. But losses, to many different runners. So writing he only has lost to John Davies, and just once (as you did), is completely wrong. As almost anything which you state as "fact".
Coe's WRs are way superior to Snell's, that's the main point for me to rank him clearly ahead of Snell. Coe is by far the greatest WR setter in md history.
WRs
800m Coe 2 (currently number 8 all-time), Snell 1
1000m Coe 2 (currently number 2 all-time), Snell 1
1500m Coe 1, Snell 0
Mile Coe 3, Snell 2
Snell's last Mile WR was inferior to Elliott's 1500m mark. And was bettered by a big margin within a few years. For 1000m, 1500m, Mile Coe in this department is clearly superior to Snell, for 800m it's debatable. But when looking where Coe stands 45 years after his prime in the all-time list I say Coe is ahead also here.
On championship level, Snell's record is clearly superior to Coe's who lost so many finals or didn't even qualify for the championships - so this closes the gap significantly.
Add the relatively short period at the top for Snell with those many losses in minor races, and I have Coe as a clear number one in md running, Snell as number two. Others are free to differ.
I'm not going to bother arguing with your misleading sh*te about Snell's losses, which were fewer than most of the other greats, and never in championship finals or match races, but to compare Coe's times with Snell's when they ran twenty years apart on completely different tracks with different shoes and when Coe ran in a professional, i.e fulltime era, compared with Snell's amateur era is ridiculous. So how do the 800 and mile times in 1940 compare to Snell, who - unlike Coe - ran in essentially the same conditions as his forebears, like Lovelock and Wooderson, with no advantages of professionalism? The sport changed far more between Snell and Coe's eras than it did from Nurmi to Snell.
I almost never get into discussions about who was the greatest whatever of all time or if Athlete A was greater than Athlete B or vice versa. But I do have to comment about the comparative length of Snell's and Coe's careers. Snell was always an amateur. He had to earn a living from something more than running as did everyone from his time. Elliott was done at 22 or 23. If the sport had been in their times as it was in Coe's you may have seen either or both with careers as long or longer than Coe's. I get your point and am not arguing but I don't believe you can make a valid comparison of Snell and Coe using length of career as a measuring stick.
There was no rule which had the athletes to stop after a few seasons also back then,
There were many others with long careers like Paavo Nurmi in the 1920s/'30s, Iolanda Balas or Al Oerter in the 1950s/'60s, Kip Keino in the 1960s/'70s, Irena Szewinska from the 1960s up to the '80s to name a few.
When Herb Elliott finishes his career at age 22 it's obviously his own decision and he was free to do so. But for sure it reduces his career (the reason why he quits is completely irrelevant - "had to make a living" or lost interest or whatever). He could have easily competed at the 1972 Olympics in Munich - would he have been as dominant in all those years in between like he was in 1960?
You have just shown you have no understanding of what the sport was like in that era. That's because you probably have no active memory of anything in the last century and think your selective statistics explain everything about the distant past.
This post was edited 35 seconds after it was posted.
Depending, from which country you were from, the athletes were in fact professionals even during the amateur era. All the athletes from the Eastern block were in fact "professionals" - they had been given - without single exception- cushy state jobs - as military personnel (never served a day in their life - only as uniform wearing propaganda figures), political agitators (never had to do anything during training, only speeches after the season at schools and political meetings), or pro-forma administrative workers at large state-owned factories, where they set a foot once a month to collect the check. Without single exception. That includes Szewinska, Kratochvilova, Balas, Kuts, etc. All the footballers in the 1st league were "employees" of large factories on made up positions, and even got "caloric" payments according to tables. Just check the results of the Olympics in football from 1950s, until late 80s - only Eastern block countries won, because all their players were "amateur", and Brazil, Italy, West Germany, etc. had to send only true amateurs from lower leagues and juniors...
As for Kip Keino - the situation was the same in Kenya - he was officially a police officer, but never worked as a policeman. He was an ambassador in his free time, otherwise trained full time. Nurmi may have not been a pro most of his career, but in later years definitely was (and was disqualified from 1932 Olympics because of that). Viren was also "policeman", who trained in South America in altitude. Try being a policeman in Finland at the same time...
Al Oerter is a different story - most throwers at that time could easily work full time. At least as college/HS coaches They did not know doubles - they just squeezed in 1-2 hours of workouts 4-5x a week. Runners trained - at least from the 50s - 12 - 14x a week. Big difference.
As for the NZ and Australian runners - ever since 60s, their approach was shamateurism, and it was a public secret. Even Elliot did this - promoters of track events supplied them with 1st class plane tickets, they exchanged them from economy class and cashed in the difference. Under the table payments were also a norm - for records, for sell our crowds, etc. If you were a track and field star, you got your money even back then.
Only Prefontaine got bummed, because he was not a true star and could not get any benefit from these farce amateur rules...
Wrong, as almost anything you have written to the subject here: not at all about the last 2 months of his career. You are the one pointing on this - because you try to shiftthe attention to something different.
Not 2 defeats, around 15 between 1960 and 1964 at distances between 800m and the Mile, which I have said to you before - you forgot?
Another one for you ( I think you can manage it by yourself, as you were so successful with the others so far, OK?)
Very few losses? That's relative - around 15 in those 5 seasons. Call it like ever you want, just a fact.
None at the really big ones. But losses, to many different runners. So writing he only has lost to John Davies, and just once (as you did), is completely wrong. As almost anything which you state as "fact".
Coe's WRs are way superior to Snell's, that's the main point for me to rank him clearly ahead of Snell. Coe is by far the greatest WR setter in md history.
WRs
800m Coe 2 (currently number 8 all-time), Snell 1
1000m Coe 2 (currently number 2 all-time), Snell 1
1500m Coe 1, Snell 0
Mile Coe 3, Snell 2
Snell's last Mile WR was inferior to Elliott's 1500m mark. And was bettered by a big margin within a few years. For 1000m, 1500m, Mile Coe in this department is clearly superior to Snell, for 800m it's debatable. But when looking where Coe stands 45 years after his prime in the all-time list I say Coe is ahead also here.
On championship level, Snell's record is clearly superior to Coe's who lost so many finals or didn't even qualify for the championships - so this closes the gap significantly.
Add the relatively short period at the top for Snell with those many losses in minor races, and I have Coe as a clear number one in md running, Snell as number two. Others are free to differ.
I'm not going to bother admitting that I know very little about Snell's career.
Wrong, as almost anything you have written to the subject here: not at all about the last 2 months of his career. You are the one pointing on this - because you try to shiftthe attention to something different.
Not 2 defeats, around 15 between 1960 and 1964 at distances between 800m and the Mile, which I have said to you before - you forgot?
Another one for you ( I think you can manage it by yourself, as you were so successful with the others so far, OK?)
Very few losses? That's relative - around 15 in those 5 seasons. Call it like ever you want, just a fact.
None at the really big ones. But losses, to many different runners. So writing he only has lost to John Davies, and just once (as you did), is completely wrong. As almost anything which you state as "fact".
Coe's WRs are way superior to Snell's, that's the main point for me to rank him clearly ahead of Snell. Coe is by far the greatest WR setter in md history.
WRs
800m Coe 2 (currently number 8 all-time), Snell 1
1000m Coe 2 (currently number 2 all-time), Snell 1
1500m Coe 1, Snell 0
Mile Coe 3, Snell 2
Snell's last Mile WR was inferior to Elliott's 1500m mark. And was bettered by a big margin within a few years. For 1000m, 1500m, Mile Coe in this department is clearly superior to Snell, for 800m it's debatable. But when looking where Coe stands 45 years after his prime in the all-time list I say Coe is ahead also here.
On championship level, Snell's record is clearly superior to Coe's who lost so many finals or didn't even qualify for the championships - so this closes the gap significantly.
Add the relatively short period at the top for Snell with those many losses in minor races, and I have Coe as a clear number one in md running, Snell as number two. Others are free to differ.
I'm not going to bother arguing with your misleading sh*te about Snell's losses, which were fewer than most of the other greats, and never in championship finals or match races, but to compare Coe's times with Snell's when they ran twenty years apart on completely different tracks with different shoes and when Coe ran in a professional, i.e fulltime era, compared with Snell's amateur era is ridiculous. So how do the 800 and mile times in 1940 compare to Snell, who - unlike Coe - ran in essentially the same conditions as his forebears, like Lovelock and Wooderson, with no advantages of professionalism? The sport changed far more between Snell and Coe's eras than it did from Nurmi to Snell.
I'm sure you are able to find them - also after 6+ decades of "following" athletics it might be the first time you hear about TRACK & FIELD NEWS - right?
Yes, I select the stats carefully: when you wrongly claim Snell has lost just to John Davies, and just once. I show you are completely wrong (as almost always) by pointing on his losses. Do you understand? His losses show that he hasn't just won - comprehenda? By pointing on his wins it would be still open if he has lost several times. I'm sure you got it NOW.
I havn't compared Snell's and Coe's times at all.
1:44.3 (WR) - 1:41.73 (WR)
2:16.6 (WR) - 2:12.18 (WR)
3:37.6 - 3:29.77 (former WR 3:32.03)
3:54.03 (WR) - 3:47.33 (WR)
I said Coe as a record setter (for me) is by far the greatest in md history. This includes the pure number of records as well as the quality (for sure relative to the era when run).
For me, Coe is clearly ahead of Snell. Especially those three marks (1:42.33, 1:41.73 and 2:12.18) are amongst the best in the history of md running (all probably in the top 5, definitely all in the top 10). Snell's 1:44.3 also ranks very high, but below 1:41.73 and 2:12.18).
You have now realised that you were completely wrong with almost anything. You now have any chance to say sorry for calling me a liar - anything which I said on this thread was correct.
Peter Snell is one of my favorite athletes, an all-time great. Has he won any race he entered? No, he lost many (mostly minor) races.
Peter Snell is one of my favorite athletes, an all-time great. Has he won any race he entered? No, he lost many (mostly minor) races.
The Lydiard system does not lend itself to long undefeated streaks. One of the major periods (referred to as “sharpening”) has the athlete racing or time trialing as much as twice a week, often at off distances. The system is designed to prepare the runner for championships, and Snell’s championship record was excellent. I am not surprised that he sometimes lost other races.
I'm not going to bother arguing with your misleading sh*te about Snell's losses, which were fewer than most of the other greats, and never in championship finals or match races, but to compare Coe's times with Snell's when they ran twenty years apart on completely different tracks with different shoes and when Coe ran in a professional, i.e fulltime era, compared with Snell's amateur era is ridiculous. So how do the 800 and mile times in 1940 compare to Snell, who - unlike Coe - ran in essentially the same conditions as his forebears, like Lovelock and Wooderson, with no advantages of professionalism? The sport changed far more between Snell and Coe's eras than it did from Nurmi to Snell.
I'm sure you are able to find them - also after 6+ decades of "following" athletics it might be the first time you hear about TRACK & FIELD NEWS - right?
Yes, I select the stats carefully: when you wrongly claim Snell has lost just to John Davies, and just once. I show you are completely wrong (as almost always) by pointing on his losses. Do you understand? His losses show that he hasn't just won - comprehenda? By pointing on his wins it would be still open if he has lost several times. I'm sure you got it NOW.
I havn't compared Snell's and Coe's times at all.
1:44.3 (WR) - 1:41.73 (WR)
2:16.6 (WR) - 2:12.18 (WR)
3:37.6 - 3:29.77 (former WR 3:32.03)
3:54.03 (WR) - 3:47.33 (WR)
I said Coe as a record setter (for me) is by far the greatest in md history. This includes the pure number of records as well as the quality (for sure relative to the era when run).
For me, Coe is clearly ahead of Snell. Especially those three marks (1:42.33, 1:41.73 and 2:12.18) are amongst the best in the history of md running (all probably in the top 5, definitely all in the top 10). Snell's 1:44.3 also ranks very high, but below 1:41.73 and 2:12.18).
You have now realised that you were completely wrong with almost anything. You now have any chance to say sorry for calling me a liar - anything which I said on this thread was correct.
Peter Snell is one of my favorite athletes, an all-time great. Has he won any race he entered? No, he lost many (mostly minor) races.
You have produced a couple of the losses that Snell had in his peak years. It doesn't prove what you are trying to show. You have tried to depict his career as having had a litany of defeats. This is false. The very few losses he had in his peak years between 1960-64 were minor races (or before he had begun to focus in the mile), as you have had to concede, but this kind of misrepresentation of the facts is simply another form of lying. You do it to try to claim Coe was the greater runner. He may have been but not from anything you argue. Also when it comes to losses, Coe had far more and at the championship level, which Snell did not.
Your claims also about the amateur era and your failure to understand why runners such as Elliott and Snell had short careers show you are quite ignorant of what it was like in that era. You have simply projected your views on to the past. As I pointed out, the professional era that Coe competed in was nothing like that of the earlier amateur era that athletes like Elliott and Snell competed in.
This post was edited 2 minutes after it was posted.
Depending, from which country you were from, the athletes were in fact professionals even during the amateur era. All the athletes from the Eastern block were in fact "professionals" - they had been given - without single exception- cushy state jobs - as military personnel (never served a day in their life - only as uniform wearing propaganda figures), political agitators (never had to do anything during training, only speeches after the season at schools and political meetings), or pro-forma administrative workers at large state-owned factories, where they set a foot once a month to collect the check. Without single exception. That includes Szewinska, Kratochvilova, Balas, Kuts, etc. All the footballers in the 1st league were "employees" of large factories on made up positions, and even got "caloric" payments according to tables. Just check the results of the Olympics in football from 1950s, until late 80s - only Eastern block countries won, because all their players were "amateur", and Brazil, Italy, West Germany, etc. had to send only true amateurs from lower leagues and juniors...
As for Kip Keino - the situation was the same in Kenya - he was officially a police officer, but never worked as a policeman. He was an ambassador in his free time, otherwise trained full time. Nurmi may have not been a pro most of his career, but in later years definitely was (and was disqualified from 1932 Olympics because of that). Viren was also "policeman", who trained in South America in altitude. Try being a policeman in Finland at the same time...
Al Oerter is a different story - most throwers at that time could easily work full time. At least as college/HS coaches They did not know doubles - they just squeezed in 1-2 hours of workouts 4-5x a week. Runners trained - at least from the 50s - 12 - 14x a week. Big difference.
As for the NZ and Australian runners - ever since 60s, their approach was shamateurism, and it was a public secret. Even Elliot did this - promoters of track events supplied them with 1st class plane tickets, they exchanged them from economy class and cashed in the difference. Under the table payments were also a norm - for records, for sell our crowds, etc. If you were a track and field star, you got your money even back then.
Only Prefontaine got bummed, because he was not a true star and could not get any benefit from these farce amateur rules...
I was around in the early '60's. Your claims about the so-called "shamateurism" of the Antipodean athletes is the kind of bs that is made up by those who weren't there. You have no idea what a simple and quite naive society that countries like NZ were in the late '50's and early '60's. They were still largely rural and very provincial - in every sense. Also, officialdom then was authoritarian and repressive and there was no way under the table payments were sanctioned.