Sharman and Turner entice their spectators
The commonwealth 110m hurdles had been perhaps the most remarkable competition for the British athletes and spectators as the podium was completely swept by three Englishmen. With 30-year-old European Champion Andy Turner bagging a gold, his close rivals
Will Sharman and Lawrence Clarke made it to the silver and bronze medals respectively.
Hurdle race is considered rather an exciting sport around the globe, but in these recent commonwealth games it had something extra for the Briton spectators. 100m hurdling which had been dominated long by Liu Xiang, Dayron Robles, Terrence Tramell and David
Oliver has got its new champions; it seems the era of Andy Turner and Will Sharman has begun now.
The potential and talent depicted by Turner has been unprecedented as the guy showed impressive consistency in his performance by first bagging the European championship and then ending up at the top of the podium in the Delhi commonwealth games. This level
of performance might have been easy to deliver in the era of nineties, but you have got to have real talent and hard work for maintaining it in the present times of tough competitions. Generally after the first success an athlete is required to lift his or
her performance all over again for there can be hundreds of things that can go wrong and besides dealing with them one has to compete the rivals as well.
Though in an interview taken prior to the commonwealth games Andy had doubts about his performance, but the guy remarkably managed to keep his focus and finally delivered it in the finals. Despite of the fact that the standard of the sport maintained at
Delhi commonwealth games was not quite spectacular, but that could not temper the achievement of the young athlete in any way.
Andy is expected to face a different class of rivals at the Olympics in London, and he might develop the pressure caused by negative thoughts all over again, but his coach and spectators are hopeful that the athlete has got the ability to deal with that
in an impeccable way.
A few months back Andy had been advised by a former athlete that he needed to get his rhythm back each time he was to participate in a major event. Moreover he was also told about putting the trail leg in time with the lead leg. Fortunately he picked up
with the point and depicted a hurdle race performance that was far more fluid than normal. The experts believe that with the passage of the time he would gather more confidence and maturity which would automatically provide him the support to stay unbeaten.
Besides well trained rivals, the biggest challenge before Andy prior to the Delhi Games event was the Achilles tendon trouble. This was perhaps the worst injury for a hurdle runner as after passing each hurdle you have to land upon it to propel yourself
again. The back-to-back training sessions make it further harder to put into it. However, he tackled the problem with tremendous will power and managed to be back in the groove. The guy is now focusing upon going under 13 seconds.
According to the experts, he can manage to go under 13 seconds if he can concentrate on retaining his shape. If the runner maintains his rhythms at the majors and people around him constantly make mistakes, he would be the only one taking the medals.
As for Will Sharman is concerned, amid an upset stomach, the past few championships had been a bit difficult for him, however, with remarkable resilience and will power he maintained his performance in the races. Apart from the impressive performance depicted
by Sharman, a major reason for why England needs to work upon him is that in order to keep its dominance in the sport, the country cannot afford to rely upon one athlete. It would have to work upon Sharman to ensure that two good domestic runners going head
to head domestically are able to participate into the large events. Perhaps that is the only way they can strike the magic for England all over again.
Tags: