BY IAN BURNETT

Observer sports editor

JAVON Francis appears destined for greatness. There’s absolutely no question about that.

He has already exhibited in his relatively infantile senior international career that he possesses the physical qualities to do so, and one needs to look no further than his super-fast split time of 43.5 seconds for the anchor leg of the 4x400m relay final at the 15th IAAF World Championships inside the Bird’s Nest on Sunday.

Francis, the outstanding ex – Calabar standout, received the baton in fifth place about 15m behind the leaders (T&T and USA) and about three to five metres behind Great Britain’s Martin Rooney.

At the end, Francis lost the bronze medal by a hair’s breadth to Rooney after literally ‘dying’ on his legs over the last 100m – 150m following a lung-busting, maximum burst of speed to the halfway mark immediately upon receipt of the baton.

I claim no standing as an athletics expert, but I’m certainly a student of sport, including track and field, and am forever grateful for being an avid horse racing fan — a sport that has taught me the very important element of knowing how to judge pace.

I would like to see Francis realise his true potential and win many gold medals for himself and for Jamaica in the future, but to do so, I humbly submit that despite recording the fastest split of 43.5secs in the race, his race execution could not have been worst. In other words, he appeared to have had absolutely no idea how fast he was going, and in races over 100m, judging pace is extremely critical.

He gave himself little or no chance to succeed, having done what he did for the first 200m of a 400m event. I wish the statisticians could furnish us with the 200m split, because I suspect Francis might have stopped the clock at about 20 seconds or faster, which was obviously suicidal. At that rate of speed early on, his deceleration in the end would be even faster, as he had no chance to grab what is called a ‘breather’ or relative rest during the race. And it means that his last 200m, and even his last 100m would have been pedestrian at best, all pointers of poor distribution of his speed/pace (race intelligence) over the duration of the event.

This was not a 100m leg where acceleration, maintaining speed and overcoming deceleration was the order of the day. It was a 400m leg, which though classified as a sprint, requires more use of tactics, or simply put, requires a more measured distribution of speed/pace, and human physiology dictates that a runner’s near top speed cannot be maintained for more than 30-35 seconds.

The following is a commentary from a British network of the final leg of the said relay, which I believe spoke eloquently to the facts of the race.

“Trinidad and Tobago from the United States and Belgium perhaps and Martin Rooney has it now for Great Britain and Northern Ireland, and he has work to do.

“LaShawn Merritt biding his time and as he does that, Belgium and Jamaica and Great Britain close up and godness me ,Javon Francis has gone crazy here! Now Rooney has got to be careful, he has to just settle because surely Francis cannot keep that going.

“Rooney in fourth place, Trinidad and Tobago with Cedenio who is a very strong runner right there, now Rooney has got to be chasing the Jamaican for me down the backstretch.

“Merritt is gonna try and get past Francis here, has the Jamaican got anything left? And Martin Rooney is coming, so is Cedenio. Merritt is away, Francis is fading. Here comes Cedenio. Come on Martin Rooney, oh, he gets it!

“Gold for the USA, silver for Trinidad and Tobago, and I’m going with the big daddy, Martin Rooney. Did he get third? He’s looking at the screen, we are waiting for it to come up, we are waiting for it to come up, it’s very tight. A national record for Trinidad and Tobago… yes, he has!”

Like many of us Francis burst of speed surprised the commentator, who was sure the Jamaican couldn’t keep it up. After all, over the many, many years of athletics numerous athletes have tried that said tactic and they have all ended up with the same result — failure, because the human physiology dictates otherwise. It was so bad I have jokingly explained to all and sundry that Francis would have lost with a similar strategy, even if he was the only one running.

I hope Francis and his handlers give a listening ear to this commentary in their review of the meet, and view it as coming from an intelligent foe rather than a stupid friend and learn from this experience to better strategise and become a more effective 400m runner going forward.

And by the way, Rusheen McDonald, you haven’t escaped the dragnet either, because you too employed a similar tactic and inevitably ended up with the same result. McDonald received the baton in fifth position, double digit metres behind the leaders and by the halfway stage he charged the field to be about two metres adrift in third place, only to blow up from then on to hand over the baton to Francis in fifth position, as we know, about 15m behind. Like Francis, McDonald, the national record holder of the distance with 43.9 plus seconds, possesses great ability, but is yet to learn how to pace himself over the distance.

Contrast those efforts with those of Allyson Felix, who did not try to wipe away Stephenie-Ann McPherson’s 12-15m lead within 100m or 200m, but over the course of 400m.

Still not convinced? Okay, what about Novlene Williams-Mills’ effort? She bided her time (paced herself) until in the straight when she unleashed a strong final effort to overhaul Francena McCorory and land gold.

The fact that Francis’s race plan has sparked so much debate among athletics practitioners, experts and the general public at large, has me flabbergasted. No wonder as a country we have not done particularly well over the distance in the immediate past. For me, it is elementary. Such a tactic can only lead to failure, and if Francis was able to run 43.5s second with such a poor race plan, then God help the rest of the world when he gets it right.

Thank God he’s Jamaican. Now let’s get it right, as we are here to support you, Javon.