Taking part, not winning, is Blade Runner’s achievement

[1]

Oscar Pistorius will be the first amputee athlete to take part in the Olympics. He will be featured in the 400 metres individual event and the 400 metre relay team of his nation.

South Africa has done a signal service to the disabled in taking such a brave decision that will be for the good the sport even more than the individual good of the athlete who has, of course, made so many sacrifices to live and fight on without fibulas — a birth defect — and with legs which were amputated at the knees when he was less than a year old.

His career as the ‘Blade Runner’ has been riddled with controversy, with fellow competitors calling him a cheat for using carbon fiber blades for legs. He has been accused of all kinds of tactics to gain an advantage as he trained to compete against all odds.

But fear not — he may not finish anywhere near a medal as his times are indeed very slow. It is the uniqueness of his participation that will make the day for the Olympics as he appears on the track at the Games in London.

The Paralympics routinely see many disabled and differently abled athletes compete in various disciplines for medals. For the Olympic Games to accept such a concept as a runner with artificial limbs is a huge fillip to those who wish to compete with their fellow men despite their genetic defects.

His J-shaped fiber blades — called the Cheetah Flex Foot — that are attached to prosthetic devices were initially banned by the IAAF on the grounds that they gave him an unfair advantage.

The truth is very different. The Court of Arbitration for Sport recognised that and overruled the IAAF ban and history is waiting to be made.

Far from gaining an advantage from the flex foot, Pistorius has timed a personal best only of 45.07 seconds over 400m, which is about the 2,000th best time ever recorded in the world. His year’s best 45.20 seconds has been beaten 56 times in 2012 alone. To imagine then that Pistorius will deprive someone of a medal is too fanciful to represent sporting logic.

The South African 4x400m relay team won a silver medal in the 2011 world championships but Pistorius was not one of the quartet. The chances are that if Oscar gets on to the final SA quartet he will probably slow his team down, which is what the record suggests in the eight years that he has been featured in competitions. His story is not about medals as about the human effort to overcome a handicap, which as we all know, needs a tremendous amount of effort.

On the flip side, the fear is the Olympics may be opening the doors to all kinds of ingenious competitors looking to squeeze home an advantage. Some day an athlete might turn up with turbocharged, artificial legs or even trunbo-powered shoes that might see him ski off as if on a snow jet.

The saving grace is no one has quite tried too many tricks with equipment just to upset the odds although individual disciplines have been known to grapple in the past with all kinds of innovations, including in swimwear to boost flotation and speed, not to speak of the performance enhancing drugs that have brought shame to so many.

The very fact that Oscar will be running at least in the heats to try and qualify for the 400m final will be a great victory for the disabled in sport. He will also be serving the highest Olympic ideal of being there just to take part.

How many times has it been dinned into us that “It’s not the winning that counts but to take part”? In rubbing shoulders with the likes of the record-breaking Olympian, Michael Phelps, the Blade Runner will be bringing a unique flavor to the 2012 Olympics.