CHASING THE WIND

With his performance at the World Championship in Berlin, sprinter Ramil Quliyev has written a new page in the history of Azerbaijani track athletics. No other Azerbaijani sportsman had qualified for the final eight, but the Azerbaijani runner opened a new phase in his career. By any measure, seventh place in the 200-metres sprint is great progress and speaks volumes about Ramil's potential.

No reverence for Bolt

Ramil has made tremendous progress over the last year and his success at the world championship came as no surprise at all. Victory several months ago at the Belgrade Student Games, setting a new European junior record (20.04), showed that the sprinter can develop into a top-class runner to be reckoned with at adult level. It is one thing to produce phenomenal results among youngsters, but it is quite another not to be overwhelmed by adults in serious competition. Ramil has proved even at this stage that he is capable of coping with the strongest challenges and is moving towards the biggest goal - the 2012 Olympic Games in London. We can only guess at this point what speed Ramil will reach by the Games if he maintains progress at the same rate.

Going back to the world championship, it is worth saying that Quliyev was believed to be one of the top four in his semi-final to qualify for the final. And he did - the sprinter finished fourth in 20.28 seconds, beaten only by 0.1 second by Charles Clark from the USA, who finished third. Quliyev started off quite well and was among the leading four from the outset. He was joined by another American, Wallace Spearmon, and Steve Moolings from Jamaica. It was notable that a guy without experience of major adult competitions performed in Berlin as if he had been in the elite for many seasons. In principle, there was nothing for our sprinter to lose but the opportunity to compete in the final with three-time Olympic champion Usain Bolt. Of course, the Jamaican is in great shape, he sets one record after another, but we should not forget either that Ramil's results are gradually approaching those of Bolt. In fact, this was pointed out by Ramil himself, who said that "if we analyze Bolt's results at the age of 19, he ran pretty much the way I do now. Maybe slightly faster. Therefore, everything is possible. I don't think Bolt is unbeatable. He is certainly a strong sportsman with very great achievements, but there is nothing extraordinary about him." 

At the beginning of the road

Considering our sprinter's age, the world championship final can be seen as a ceiling. He is still a junior and did not prepare specifically for the German trip. There have been several competitions lately - the Belgrade Student Games, where Quliyev came first with a European record (20.04), the European youth championship in Novi Sad, where our sprinter won silver in the 100 metres and gold in the 200 metres. There were also many intermediate competitions. "There was nothing unusual for me at the world championship. The results my coach and I had initially planned for had already been achieved at the beginning of the season. I was in good form by the championship and eventually made it all the way to the final. To be honest, I did not intend or want to go to Berlin because of the difficult season I have had, but I had to go. I came under quite a lot of pressure for someone my age, but managed to summon the strength required. And once my coaches and I decided that I should go, we understood that it was quite realistic to aim for the final. With my level of results it did not appear to be an unattainable task. I can say now that I am pleased with everything and the goals I set have been reached. Let's wait now for next season when I will have to deal with more ambitious challenges. I hope everything will be just fine!" said Ramil.

In other words, the world championship appearance was largely impromptu, but even that was enough to reach the final. By and large, it did not matter much exactly how he would perform in the final itself because he had already fulfilled the plan. He did not run at his best in the final (20.61) and finished seventh, but we must remember that he is still a junior.

The key figure in the final was Usain Bolt, who set a new world record (19.19). One can't help being astonished at how easy he makes these victories look. Bolt said recently that two victorious seasons was not enough to become a legend. Rephrasing this statement, we can say that one season or, to be exact, one competition at adult level is not enough for Ramil to feel confident and comfortable among the world's best. But our sprinter is working towards this and, let's hope, quite successfully.

Genetic ability

Meanwhile, Ramil has already outlined targets for next season, the first of which is to finish in under 10 seconds in the 100 metres and under 20 seconds in the 200 metres. "There is not too much left to do. In the 200 metres, for example, it is just four hundredths of a second. I do want to break through these times at last. If everything goes well and without injuries, I hope it will work out well for me next season," the sprinter said.

Speaking about his progress over the past year, Quliyev said he hadn't changed anything in his training and that everything was going according to the plan prepared by his coaches. "There is nothing extraordinary going on. Last season I had an injury so common among sprinters - a sprained hamstring. Because of that I could not show my best. This year things are progressing on schedule. In fact, my father Eldar Quliyev used to run the 200 metres at the level of master of sports. About 20-25 years ago he had a time of 21.00. In other words, I must have inherited some ability genetically. Then my father became a coach and started training me. Now I have two coaches - my father and Oleg Mukhin, also a sprinter in the past," said Ramil Quliyev.

It may be that the sportsman will soon have a blood passport. "No-one will argue that track athletics is the most universal sport of all," says the president of the International Olympic Committee, Jacques Rogue. "Moreover, track athletics is the key sport in the summer Olympic games. We have had a lengthy discussion on the subject of doping. It mainly concerned the establishment of blood passports. Of course, this would mean a step forward, a step into the future. There are some aspects which still need to be resolved. Most important is the transportation, freezing and storage of blood samples. If a sample has been taken in a hot climate, somewhere in Africa, it is technically difficult and expensive to send it to a European laboratory for analysis. We are working with the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) to, first of all, simplify the procedure of sample taking and storage and, secondly, increase the number of accredited laboratories. There are very few WADA-accredited labs in the world now. This type of testing is certainly great, but it helps to discover only two types of doping: EPO and blood transfusion. Testing cannot "catch" anabolic steroids and many other medicines. New methods of blood testing will help open a new "window". However, it is not technically easy to implement. We always cooperate with WADA to deal effectively with all arising problems."

In fact, the false-start rule will be changed from next year. This decision was made by the congress of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF). A total of 97 members of the council spoke in favour of the decision, 55 against and six abstained. According to the president of the association, Lamine Diaka, 2010 is an ideal year for such experiments. "We need to introduce this rule next year so that all sportsmen have enough time to adapt to it," Reuters quotes Diaka as saying. The head of the IAAF technical commission, Jorje Salsedo, believes that the current system is good for fraudsters. "Some do it on purpose to make their opponents nervous." Under the new regulations, only one false-start during a race is allowed; after a second a runner will be automatically disqualified, whether or not he was guilty of the first false-start.