I would imagine that the end of the Cold War, coupled with increased professionalization of track in the late 80s and 90s pretty much put an end to mythical stature of these duals/duels. Isn't one of the US-Soviet Union matches from the early 60s still the record holder for the biggest crowd for a track meet in the US? 100,000 plus?
USATF did send out a release on this meet on Friday. http://www.usatf.org/news/showRelease.asp?article=/news/releases/2002-08-16. xml Results of the US-RUS-GBR meet can be found at http://www.tilastopaja.net (you can always count on Mirko). Women's PV -- 1 Svetlana Feofanova RUS 4.62 2 Yelena Isinbayeva RUS 4.50 3 Stacy Dragila USA 4.50 4 Mary Sauer USA 4.05 Larry Wade (13.24w) over Colin Jackson and Allen Johnson, easy win for Darvis Patton in the 200 (20.16), Stringfellow and Pate 1-2 in the LJ, Makarov 87.99 in the JT, Edwards 17.54 in the TJ, US men 3rd in the 4x100 and US women 2nd. -------------------------------------------------------------- | Bob Ramsak | *TRACK PROFILE News Service - Editor | http://www.trackprofile.com | *Race Results Weekly - Asst. Editor --------------------------------------------------------------- | Cleveland, Ohio USA | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | Tel - 216-731-9648 | Fax - 216-731-9675 ----- Original Message ----- From: "Roger Ruth" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, August 18, 2002 10:07 PM Subject: t-and-f: List Inactivity > Earlier today, John Beattie put up a "test" to ask whether the list server > was down. From that, and Mike Prizy's response, obviously, it wasn't. Also, > Zbigniew Jonik managed to put up the Zywiec Cup results. Otherwise, it must > have been the least active Sunday I can ever remember for the t-and-f list. > > Fair enough, if nothing of interest is happening. I wonder, though, why > there seems to be no interest in the U.S./RUS/GBR meet in Glasgow. I may > just be feeling bitchy because my ancient Mac Performa consistently crashes > before I can get any information about Dragila vs. Feofanova from the UK > Athletics link of the Track and Field News website, or any other result > except (surprise!) that Chambers, the UK rep, won the 100m. However, the > way this meet has been organized and (non-) reported seems very strange to > this old-timer. > > Forty years ago, the dual meets between the U.S.A. and the U.S.S.R. were, > in the perspective of American sports fans, the most important of all track > and field competitions, with the possible exception of the Olympic Games, > where interest still turned on the medal counts between the two. I would > have thought that the best promotion of the Glasgow meet would have > featured a renewal of this rivalry, even though USA/RUS must be admitted to > be a less equal contest. > > I remember that, earlier, someone on the list questioned whether USA would > field a true national team for this meet. If they didn't, that might > explain the lack of public interest (for example, less TV sports mention > than arena football or women's boxing!). If they didn't, the question still > remains of why not. > > Subscribers will have noted the welcome increase in contributions by USATF > communications staff to the list. Why did they basically pass on this one? > > Cheers, > Roger > >
