TRACK AND FAILED
Gemili: Stars must speak up.. our sport is at an all-time low and we must force changes
ADAM GEMILI has urged athletes to make their voices heard to dig track and field out of the hole it is in.
This is the worst of times for athletics in the UK with the only event scheduled being this week’s British Championships – two days of competition, behind closed doors, without any big hitters involved.
Sir Mo Farah and Katarina Johnson-Thompson will instead compete at a Diamond League meet in Brussels tomorrow night.
‘Super Saturday’ seems a lifetime ago, let alone the halcyon days when the nation would stop to watch stars like Seb Coe and Steve Ovett.
“The sport needs headlines,” said Daley Thompson. “It needs a great shop window, otherwise the kids will never get interested.” Right now it has neither and Gemili, the first Briton to clock sub-10 seconds for 100 metres and sub-20 for 200m, said athletes need to “speak up and speak out” to effect change.
“The power of the athlete voice has never been stronger,” he said.
“Look how effective it has been in highlighting racial and social inequalities. Yet, in athletics, I don’t think we’ve had athlete leadership.
“Athletes have always been bottom of the pecking order behind agents, meet directors, people running the sport. Athletes don’t get consulted, they’re not asked for their opinions.
“Take the change to the Diamond League format, with four events axed. I wasn’t asked, I don’t know anyone who was. Athletics’ stock is low, the sport needs change and it’s our responsibility to lead that.”
Gemili, 26, still has the smile with which he dazzled the world as a teenager at the 2012 London Olympics. He has won European and world gold medals and is on a mission to avenge his Rio Olympic near miss in Tokyo next summer. But he recognises his sport needs a makeover and has decided to do something about it.
He fronted a campaign threatening legal action against the British Olympic Association which brought greater freedom for stars to promote their sponsors during Games time.
And he helped devise a Team GB policy of not punishing athletes using Tokyo’s Olympics as a platform to protest against racial injustice.
He put himself forward to help the Alzheimer’s Society in tribute to his grandmother’s battle. And he joined the board of the new Athletics Association, an athletes’ union formed in response to the Diamond League changes. “We’re speaking out for those who don’t have the power, platform, or voice,” added Gemili.
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