100-meter butterfly

Swimmer Anthony Nesty: Coming Out of No Where to be Suriname’s Only Olympic Medalist

 

Anthony Nesty
Anthony Nesty in 1992

Suriname – a country so small, you may not have realized it was a country (to paraphrase John Oliver).

With a population of about 570,000 people, Suriname is the smallest country in South American, just north of South America’s largest country, Brazil. Since forming a national olympic committee, Suriname has sent small teams to the Olympics since 1960, although never forming a team larger than 7.

In 1988, Anthony Nesty was a 20-year-old swimmer, was one of six to represent Suriname at the Seoul Olympics. And represent he did!

Not only was Nesty the first ever Surinamese to place in the finals of an Olympic competition – the 100-meter butterfly – he took gold in a surprising finish. Watching this video clip from an American broadcast, the announcer mentions the American Matt Biondi who led the entire race, as well as Michael Gross of Germany and Jon Sieben of Australia – all proven champions. The only time Nesty’s name is mentioned is after the finish.

ANNOUNCER: They now have 10 meters to swim, Matt Biondi going for the gold. Jon Siebens coming hard on the outside. But Biondi looks like he’s going to take it to the wall. And they get….NESTY! Nesty finally takes in lane 3 at the very last moment!

Nesty is 5ft 11 in (1.8 meters) tall, and is significantly shorter than the 6ft 7 (2 meters) Biondi. In very real terms, Biondi has a 8 inch lead on Nesty at the start of every race. But at the finish of this finals, Biondi lost by the barest of margins because he glided in, instead of stroking in. “I was halfway between a stroke and trying to kick in and I decided to kick in,” said Biondi. “If I had to stroke, I might have touched with my nose.”

Nesty was born in Trinidad in 1967. His family moved to Suriname, about a thousand miles southeast, to Paramaribo, Suriname. While Nesty enjoyed soccer, his father encouraged his son to swim. Clearly his father saw something in his son’s stroke, but Suriname, a country about the size of Georgia, USA primarily covered in rain forests, was not rich in swimming pools. In fact there was only one 50-meter pool in the country.

Where he could, Nesty trained and got stronger, strong enough to be named one of only two to represent Suriname at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics. Outclassed, the 16-year old finished in 21st place in the 100-meter butterfly, but as is explained in this article, he got a taste of the Olympics and wanted more, promising himself “to be more competitive next time around.” That commitment led to his acceptance at the Bolles Prep School in Florida, where world-class swimmers come to train and develop. Nesty developed so quickly he ended up breaking the prep school’s record for the 100-meter butterfly, set by Pablo Morales, who had a gold and two silvers, including one in the butterfly, at the 1984 Games.

He told the press in 1987 that he was not very well known in Suriname as he was now training in the United States.

“I’m proud, I guess,” says Nesty, who had the world’s 10th fastest time in the 100-meter freestyle, finishing 10th in the trials. He possibly has more fans in the United States than in Surname, a small nation in northern South America. “They respect me there, but I haven’t been there for over a year,” he said. “Suriname has a lot of military coups and political things. My dad told me if I stayed there much longer wouldn’t have much of a swimming career.”

Matt Biondi, Anthony Nesty, Andy Jameson
Matt Biondi, Anthony Nesty, Andy Jameson on the medals podium at the 1988 Seoul Olympics
But when Nesty returned from Seoul, Korea to Paramaribo, Suriname, he returned a conquering hero, greeted by 20,000 people at the airport and mobbed in the streets. His face was placed on commemorative stamps, coins and banknotes. And the indoor national stadium was named in his honor.

To this day, Nesty, with his gold in the 100-meter butterfly at the Seoul Olympics, as well as a bronze at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, remains the sole Olympic medalist from Suriname.

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Joseph Schooling Takes the Master to School: Singapore’s First Ever Gold Medal and it’s a Whopper!

syschooling28

Singapore exploded. The Southeast Asian nation of over 5 million, affectionately self-proclaimed as the Little Red Dot, blew up their part of the Twitterverse with exaltations of pure bliss – one of their boys took gold at the Rio Olympics.

And it wasn’t just any gold. It was one destined to land in the hands of Michael Phelps, arguably the most successful Olympian ever.

Joseph Schooling, a 21-year-old third-generation Singaporean, lept to a great start in lane 4 of the 100-meter butterfly finals. Schooling quickly took the lead, held it at the 50-meter turn, and never relinquished it. He led from start to finish and defeated the favorites by a clear margin. Phelps, Chad Le Clos of South Africa, and László Cseh of Hungary finished in a tie for second, 0.75 seconds behind the University of Texas third-year student.

Schooling Sets Olympic Record

“I’m really honored and privileged to swim alongside some of these great names, people who changed the face of our sport,” he told Channel News Asia. “I can’t really tell you how grateful I am to have this chance to swim in an Olympic final and to represent our country.”

Phelps did not add to his treasure trove of gold, instead settling for silver. But as noted in this wonderful New York Times article, Phelps has no one to blame except himself. Ever since Phelps began collecting gold medals at the 2004 Athens Games, he has inspired young swimmers all over the world. Le Clos idolized Phelps as a child, and had the umbrage to defeat Phelps in the 200 meter butterfly at the 2012 London Games, albeit by a mere .05 seconds. Phelps came back to defeat Le Clos in the same race at the Rio Games.

Phelps and Schooling
Schooling, age 13, meets his idol, Michael Phelps in 2008
Schooling is no exception, as he explains in this article. “As a kid I wanted to be like him,” said Schooling, who got his photograph taken with Phelps before his eight-gold medal performance at the 2008 Olympics in Beijing. “It’s crazy to think of what happens in eight years,” Schooling said, adding, “A lot of this is because of Michael. He’s the reason I wanted to be a better swimmer.”

While most casual observers of the sport wondered who the heck Schooling was, his competitors were aware. After all, Schooling is the reigning NCAA champion in the 100- and 200-meter butterfly in the US. And the fact that Schooling was in lane 4 indicated he was fast in the heats leading up to the finals. Two days prior, Schooling had won his heat, defeating Phelps. In the semis, he posted the fastest time of all competitors.

But even so, with Le Clos and Phelps in the mix, Schooling’s victory was not a given. And as the winner of Southeast Asia’s first gold medal in swimming, Schooling’s victory is significant, as all trailblazing accomplishments often are, and will no doubt impact the dreams of millions of young athletes in Asia for years to come.

Phelps Le Clos and Cseh celebrate silver
Phelps, Le Clos and Cseh celebrate silver, while Schooling awaits his golden reward.
Schooling’s father, Colin, was ecstatic, but also aware of the responsibility his son now carries.

Singapore, he did what you all wanted and he did it in style. The most important thing is to be an ambassador for all our children in Singapore that gives them hope that they also can do it. There’s nothing special about him, just a boy who is interested in the sport.

Yes, just a boy…a boy who would be king.

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The Unseemly Story of Christiane Knack and the East German Doping Machine: “All in All You’re Just Another Brick in the Wall”

The images from Pink Floyd’s The Wall, particularly the 1982 film of that name, are haunting.

“We don’t need no education. We don’t need no thought control”, chant the students in unison, faces blank, walking into the gaping maw of a meat grinder.

In 1977, fifteen-year old Christiane Knacke, was a promising swimmer in East Germany, the first woman to swim the 100-meter butterfly in less than a minute. Now targeted for greatness, Knacke’s coach began to put his new swimming prodigy on a new regimen, as explained the wonderful tome, The Complete Book of the Olympics, by David Wallechinsky and Jaime Loucky.

Christiane Knocke
Christiane Knacke in 1980

“Her coach, Rolf Glasen now added to her regime a daily dose of ten to fifteen steroid pills. She also received shots of cortisone and procraine and, twice a week, intraveneous drips of an unknown liquid. In less than a year Knacke grew from 50 kilograms (110 pounds) to 65 kilograms (143 pounds).”

At the 1980 Moscow Olympics, boycotted by over 60 nations in protest of the Soviet Union’s invasion of Afghanistan, the East Germans swept the women’s 100-meter butterfly, 18-year old Knacke taking the bronze. According to Wallechinsky and Loucky, right after her triumph in Moscow, Knacke had three operations on her elbow, her bones having turned to “crystal” due to an excessive intake of anabolic steroids.

In 1998, 9 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall, Knacke was a co-plaintiff in a suit against former East German coaches who oversaw the implementation of the systematic doping. Glaser publicly apologized to Knacke, and Knacke voluntarily gave up her bronze medal.

According to this PBS article, The East German Sports Performance Committee, with the

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