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Hurry up and wait Keyed-up Greene is ready to go for his gold -- now
SYDNEY -- The waiting is worst. Thursday afternoon, on a slow, spongy training track adjacent to the Olympic Stadium, Maurice Greene blistered through his best sprint training session of a very long season. This is very solid for Mo, the overwhelming favorite to become the first U.S. man to cross the line first in an Olympic 100 meters since Carl Lewis in 1984. (Lewis finished behind Ben Johnson in '88, but won the gold when Johnson was dinged for using steroids.) The painful part for Greene is that his race is more than a week away. "I wish it was tomorrow," Greene told me Friday. "I feel sooooo good right now." Greene arrived in Sydney from Los Angeles last Sunday, after spending roughly a week at home following the end of the European track season. "It's taken me a few days to get acclimated to the weather and the time difference. But getting my body ready to sprint has been no problem." Mo has had some other minor problems. He is living in a suburban Sydney house with HSI teammates Jon Drummond, Inger Miller and Ato Boldon (who runs for Trinidad and Tobago), but also wants to spend time in the Olympic Village. He was disappointed by the U.S. coaches, who put him in a triple room in the Village because they assumed Greene wouldn't use his bed. (He hasn't, but Mo's view is that now he couldn't even if he wanted to). Moreover, Greene has been getting in and out of the Village in a car that belongs to Boldon and the Trinidadian delegation, because HSI's vehicles haven't been given the proper access.
Who will fill long-jump void?U.S. long jumpers have gotten more bad publicity than Bob Knight recently. (Well, maybe not more than Knight, but a lot). The hottest stat circulated at the U.S. Olympic trials in July was that in his prime, Jesse Owens would have made the current team. This piece of trivia was trotted out to illustrate how far the long jump has fallen since the retirement of Lewis and Mike Powell. To observers, this kind of talk is sad and funny, but to U.S. long jumpers, it's demeaning. "Those guys are gone, aren't they?'' said 21-year-old Savante Stringfellow, who was fifth at the Trials, but had his ticket for Sydney punched when Walter Davis and Robert Howard elected to compete only in the triple jump. "How many guys in the world are jumping as far as Mike and Carl did?" The answer? One. Cuba's Ivan Pedroso, the overwhelming favorite to become the first non-American since 1964 to win Olympic gold in the event. Pedroso, a sensational talent ("I hold my breath every time that guy jumps, because I know he can get my record,'' said world-record-holder Powell), has the only jump in the world over 28 feet this year. In fact, there have been only eight jumps over 27' 6", a distance jumpers reached consistently in the mid-'70s. Stringfellow and U.S. trials champion Melvin Lister, who is only 23, make this point: It's not just the United States that is experiencing a post-Carl/Mike vacuum. It's the whole world. "We're young guys, still learning the event," says Lister. "But in the Games, Melvin Lister will be heard from.'' Dragila ready to vault to fameSo will Stacy Dragila. The U.S. pole vaulter has been the favorite to win the first gold medal in the women's vault since she captured the inaugural world title last summer in Seville. In order to win on Monday night, Sept. 25, Dragila will have to overcome a stadium filled to its capacity of more than 110,000, most in full-throated support of Australian Emma George. Is Dragila ready? Late this week she cleared 15' 3" in a training session. That would break her world record. She's ready, all right. Sports Illustrated senior writer Tim Layden is in Sydney covering the Games
for the magazine and CNNSI.com. Check back daily to read Layden's
behind-the-scenes reports from Down
Under.
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