Well, well......
What can I say?
I was there, in the orbit. There was always that air of secrecy about the top few people. It was a very tiny club, and the core of the onion seemed distant, and probably impenetrable. There was so much to do with a particular type of culture there, there was a lot of criminality in the broader community, a lot of sense of having an unfair disadvantage culturally because of recency of arrival, and therefore belonging to nothing and owing nothing to anyone, except one's closest family.
A lot of those qualities and more still persist depending on where you are---at least, the same perceptions exist, and there will always be someone who wants to exploit the resulting personality qualities, some "doctor" like Astaphan, or some Italian in Africa or Spain, or some other "doctor" in Jamaica, or Germany, or the southern US like Florida.
It's very much the same as recruiting someone into other types of crime, only this group of selects has a modicum of basic talent at, for instance, sprinting.
Although Ben seems to live in the past, imo he's right that almost nothing has changed. What has changed has been that while the power center used to be the USA, in certain areas that has changed, with the rise of the IAAF corruption under Diack, and events at the IOC. Unfortunately, what he is right about has just increased in scale and scope, to the point where there is no longer any higher authority to which to appeal. When the very highest levels are involved in the shenanigans, there is nothing to be done within that system.
In one sense, that makes for a level playing field among all the relevant players, kind of like the process of selecting where the next OG will be held. It becomes a business proposition of which franchise is to be favored, because of its ability to generate the greatest returns. Make no mistake it's ALL about money. "National pride" means ABSOLUTELY SQUAT. Now America with its athletic offerings has to compete with other places and their athletic offerings, and is only one player, although still a very significant one.
Americans buy a lot of Nike gear, but track itself is vastly more popular in Europe, and other brands like Adidas and Puma have a big presence there, especially in the soccer world--which actually dwarfs the US football and baseball worlds, worldwide. But yes Nike is making big inroads. Point is that the world is a lot bigger than just the USA, and TPTB in track know this. The whole thing is very much like a pro league, with WA/IOC as the Commish/governing body.
You might laugh at Ben, but believe me when I tell you that the people around him weren't exactly geniuses, no matter what their qualifications looked like on paper. And IMO that's STILL the case with at least the sprint world, and I have no reason to believe that mid-d or distance or field is any different. You could probably laugh equally well at any current high-level training group, if you knew any details.
The only thing that has changed is that the problem has become universal, much like the weapons and drug trade, the US dollar, etc. The world has gotten smaller, and at the highest levels has defaulted to the lowest common denominators-- base things like greed, violence, pride, etc. If you want to expand your power base (which is the only aim of these organizations), then you have to appeal to/work with the most universal/base qualities within your target subjects. Basic instinct law-of-the-jungle survival qualities.
So, you have to find another system in order to see authenticity. Want to experience real communication? Read an older book, forget about the web and texts and tweets. Want to eat real food? Grow it yourself or go to a farmer's market, forget about Whole Foods, Aldi, Kroger, Cargill, ADM, Tyson. Want to see a real track competition? Go watch a middle-school meet, forget about Diamond league and World champs and Olympics. It's always the same dynamic.
I don't watch much track anymore, either. In some ways it seems like all that stuff was so long ago, and watching now just seems anachronistic. I have moved on psychologically because I could, because I wasn't in the inner circle; Ben maybe hasn't because he was the focus of everything. Even me, who never really achieved anything in open track, I STILL work out at the track and go hard, and I guess I always will. I haven't moved on, physically speaking, because I really enjoy the hard training process and feeling. To have been in Ben's position and experienced what he did, who knows how you would view things and how you would get on with the rest of your life. Maybe there is a selection effect, people with what they see as their "one shot", and they make it their whole life, forever. Yeah I know Ben has other interests nowadays, and has for a long time, but he still seems embedded in a certain context forever, no matter what.
And wherever I go around the world, when people see me (the old guy) run or work out and start asking questions , maybe the convo comes around to the fact that I was with Optimist. The questions always center around Ben. Amazingly he is still an absolute hero and icon in much of the world, and now with anti-US sentiment rising, his popularity will probably only increase. Time marches on and newer generations have had Bolt as a focus, and IMO he remains the main guy. Even though he has been out forever now, there has been no effective replacement. This is why I always say there are only 3 eras: prehistory, BJ, and Bolt. We are still in the Bolt era, and might be for the rest of my life.
It's all scintillating, if you're a kid. If you're an adult, it's actually kind of boring, tbh. Last week I was working out at a D1/D3 gym, depending on program. I have a bit of medial epicondylitis which I can feel when grabbing a barbell to do squats, so I went on the leg press instead. During my warmup a bunch from the track team came and I let them work in. By the time I got up to 6 plates I attracted an audience. By the time I was doing 8, most of the gym stopped. I didn't even keep going to 10, I didn't like having my form examined by a bunch of people staring (from 5 feet away!), and with headphones blaring, I found I didn't want to have to tune things out in order to do what I normally do, and then potentially explain myself. The whole thing to me was boring, although later some guy told me he thought it was amazing, and very important to him. Things just change, and literally every year there is a new crop of kids who want to feel a part of something, and want to buy in. I couldn't care less.
I'm now the ambivalent old man, the curiosity--and Ben is even older, and even more of a curiosity. I guess it's kind of like being the girl in grade 7 with the big breasts, you really just want to be left alone and not pigeonholed for the one thing. I only experience it in college workout facilities, Ben gets it wherever he goes, all the time. I would be bored as f, with no easy way to avoid it all other than living like a monk.
My 2 cents.