The Olympic Games and the Duke of Westminster's Appeal

36 THE OLYMPIC GAMES. pupils, that the costume of the Americans, which looked so well-white flannels, blue serge coat cut blazer-fashion, and ijtra.w hat--wa.s in every detail typically English. A few years ago white flannels and blazers were unknown in the United States, except as they happened to be seen on a visiting Englishman. But the difference was not a mere matter of costume. Even more was it a matter of bearing and of seeming confidence of spirit. And the disorderliness and lack of discipline and control soon showed themselves in innumerable ways. Complaints of the quarters in which some of our men were lodged, of over· crowding, and of inadequate food were bitter. It is a fact that some of our men went on to the track without any one in authority havin~ addressed one word to them on the subject of trairung either before they went to Stockholm or when they were there. Nearly all our men lost weight to an excessive extent, some to an amount of ov~r a stone. None can have gone into the Stadium without a feeling that he went almost unbacked and neglected, to meet, at least so far as the United' States was concerned, an organized body of opponents pumped full of. con– fidence and trained to the last ounce. The moral effect of it all was extremely bad. The common belief which got abroad, however, that our athletes habitually disregarded all training rules while in Stockholm is wrong and unjust to the majority of them. There were conspicuous instances of individuals who did so, and they came to utter grief. \.Ye also had a good many men there who should never have gone ; and it cannot be too clearly understood that it is worse than useless to sendsecond-ratemen to future Olympic Games. The best of our men, however, bore themselves well and did all that they could do by individual pluck and by the example that they set to others to atone for the absence of any proper management. They showed that we had material which under equally good handling would have been not incomparable with the Americans. And it must be remembered that, although in the field events in the Stadium we were practically non– existent, in the running events there was no other nation to be considered except ourselves and the Americans. The older Kohlemainen from Finland was, of course, the bright particular star of the Stock– holm•Games ; and it was hard luck that Bouin, the Frenchman, had such a man to meet. There were Braun and Rau from Germany, who both deserved to do better ·than they did. But, barring the Ameri– cans, no country had anything like such a group of men as we had in Anderson, Jackson, Hutson, Apple- ,c...:.________ ,aa,nh...Moore,-13aker.,--MacMillan.,...Seedhouse,-Fowell, Lord; Porter, and Webb, without counting Mac– Arthur, Gitsham, Patching, and Goulding from other pa.rte of the Empire. No amount of management on our part could have prevented Anderson's falling or Applegarth from being accidentally judged out (if he was judged out) of a heat which he is believed to have won in the 100 metres; nor, as we were not in command of the track, could it have prevented some of our men from being fouled. But it could have kept certain others in training, and it could have put our runners in general on the track in fit con– dition. with a bett,!i,r idea how a race should be run ~ with some feeling of confidence and pride. As 1t was, in all the track events, whether inside the Stadium or outside (including the Marathon race, the long-distance walk, the bicycling and cross– oountry run) the Empire won 28 points out of a ~"bfe 102 (on the 1912 plan of marking), which, though the thanks are largely due to South Africa llild to Canada, wu by no m8111l8 a diaoreditable per· formanoe.. Yet in all tlte distances under a mile we won nothing but a solitary third place in the 200 metres race. , · It is preposterous to suppose that that represents the best that we can do. In the field events, out of a possible 96 points the Empire won 5, all of which were gained by Canada (by second places in the hammer and Jong jump and third place in the pole. vault) and none at all by Great Britain. How much we can improve on this has yet to be seen. Butw~t is certain is that, as the standard of the Olympic contests is bound inevitably to be higher at each succeeding Games, if we take part in the same hap· hazard way as we did last year, we shall make if possible an even poorer figure. The Stadium events, of course, are only a portion of the Games. Though they receive by far the largest advertising they represent only a little more than one-third of the total points, for the shooting, swimming, rowing, fencing, riding, yachting, lawn tennis, and football (according to the Stockholm programme) all took place elsewhere. In some of these things we did well. How largely our perform– ance in others was affected by the lack of manage· ment is a question to be discussed in another article. (The Times, Sept. 8, 1913.) II.-COM:PETITIONS OUTSIDE THE STADIUM. We saw in a former article that at Stockholm in all the running events at distances under a mile (apart from one relay race, where, it is to be feared, we owed our success chiefly to diqqualification of our opponents) Great Britain succeeded only in scoring one single point, for a third place in the 200 metres ; and that in all the field events-jumping, pole– vaulting, weight, hammer, discus, and javelin throw– ~. and combinations of thes&-we failed to win any f omt at all ; although for the Empire Canada suc– ceeded in annexing five points, with seconds in the hammer and broad jump and third in the pole– vaulting. The total number of points awarded for all these events was 126. That Great Britain should be able to score no more than one point out of 126 is preposterous. In all the field and running events together at all distances Great Britain took 15 points and the United States 85. Outside the Stadium we did much better ; but it will be interest– ing to notice first the contests outside the Stadium in which we failed to score. There were no entries from Great Britain for the open-air lawn tennis, where, had we thought it worth our while, we could surely have picked up half-a– dozen points at least, although some of them must have been at the expense of South Africa. Nor did we enter for the yachting, in which France, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Russia divided the 24 points between them. It was Sweden's five points m the yacht races that at the very end gave her the final victory over the United States. Needless to say that, had British yachts entered, we could have won some points, perhaps another half-dozen. In wrest– ling the rules ·were farcical : there was no catoh-as– catch-can competition, and the Grmco-Roman rules were altered so that the contests became absurd. So far as we competed we were outclassed ; but with different rules another time we can reasonably hope to pick up a i;>oint or two, though probably not many. In military riding we sent over only four competitors with seven horses, while Germany had 14 men, Sweden 20, and Russia 11 and 14 horses. Our men had had no sp""1ial !;)!"Oparation as a team and hardly any as indiv16'.='1" ; and, having so few altogether, when two of them were injured we were left without a team. We were quite good enough to win points, and had there been six men there instead of four we should undoubtedly have done so. It is earnestly