Dear Sir,

Adrian Robson’s Friday Forum<$> column (November 23, 2001) is an attack on Bermuda, the athletes who represented Bermuda at the recently held CAC Cross Country Championships, the athletes’ families and friends, the 200-plus volunteers who worked at the CAC Championships and made them the best-ever championships, the BTFA and its many supporters, the Ministry of Tourism, the Ministry of Community Affairs and Sport, the CAC region and me. Given those facts this response is submitted as an open letter to your readers.

Four international cross country races — junior males, junior females, women and men — were held the weekend of November 17-18 at the Port Royal Golf Course. The junior events featured athletes who had to be no younger than 14 and no older then 19 years of age. Bermuda had teams in three of the four categories.

While Adrian Robson whines about the absence of a women’s team and engages pure speculation about the possible success had there been a women’s team, he failed to mention and acknowledge the actual success of our junior female and junior male teams. Both teams, under the circumstances that existed, earned silver medals. Additionally, one of the junior males earned the bronze medal for his individual placing. None of those facts were mentioned in Adrian Robson’s Friday Forum<$> article.

Adrian Robson had the opportunity to uplift our junior runners. Instead, he completely ignored their performances. He shunned them. He did not write one word of their achievements. In essence, he selectively dismisses a part of the future of Bermuda.

Our three teams — junior female, junior male and men — collectively won three medals; not the one medal that Adrian Robson would have you believe.

Let me address the matter pertaining to the participation of our women.

Roger Lambert, the immediate past BTFA vice-president of road running, issued invitations to several male and female athletes. Additionally, all BTFA affiliates were requested to forward the names and encourage the participation of athletes in the training preparations for the CAC Cross Country Championships. General invitations were extended, also, to athletes via the media, and personal invitations were issued to many male and female athletes. Additionally, approaches were made to our athletes who reside in North America.

With regards to the personal invitations, at least six junior male runners were invited to train with the national cross country squad. Five accepted and one was committed to soccer and, therefore, declined the invitation. One of the five was found to have a serious knee condition and had to withdraw from the squad. At least seven junior females were invited to train with the squad. Only four of the invitees accepted the invitation. They trained and they represented Bermuda. Nine men declared their interest in selection.

Ashley Couper, Emily Ferguson, Anna Eatherley, along with others not mentioned in Adrian Robson’s Friday Forum article, were invited. Zina Jones declared her interest in selection, trained for a period with the squad but subsequently withdrew.

Ashley Couper, residing in California, declared as far back as August, that she would be unavailable for the CAC Cross Country Championships. The BTFA accepted her decision. Adrian Robson’s comments, therefore, cannot be substantiated by fact and his motives have to be questioned.

Emily Ferguson was extended an invitation in August too. She too resides in the USA. I had the opportunity to talk to and correspond with Emily.

Her November 6 response to my September 27 correspondence informed us that she had done only one race — a road race — and that was back in September. She further indicated that she had been extremely busy with her job and other activities during the preceding several weeks. In closing she graciously withdrew herself from consideration. Additionally, Emily did not sign and return the necessary documents to the BTFA.

Fifty year-old Annette Hallett’s commitment was to the Marine Corps Marathon, not the CAC Cross Country Championships. She had known about the championships since last year. Therefore, her interest in the CAC Cross Country Championships was secondary. However, Adrian Robson has not addressed an important matter. In what sort of competition readiness shape would a 50-year-old be for the challenges of a tough international cross country course after exhausting herself in a 26.2 mile race only three weeks before the international competition, and also compete against athletes younger than her by at least 20 years.

I extended a personal invitation to Anna Eatherley as I had done with many of the athletes. My first contact with her was on August 22. On that occasion I invited her to consider selection, subject to the criteria, and represent Bermuda at the CAC Cross Country Championships. She seemed generally enthusiastic. On that same occasion she was informed about the meeting that was held August 29. She was given the time and venue of the meeting. She did not indicate anything negative or any extenuating circumstances. She did not attend the meeting.

On September 4 I delivered the documents — identical to what had been issued to all other interested athletes — to Anna. I took the initiative and delivered them to her. During the course of our discussion, she mentioned that she had a busy schedule, but expressed that she could generally meet all of the requirements including the once-a-week training sessions.

Anna Eatherley did not attend any of the once-a-week national squad training sessions for the men and women — usually held Tuesday evenings. She did not participate in any of the cross country trials whose dates, venues and start times were issued in August (or in her case September 4). She did not return the acceptance/non-acceptance form that had to be signed by her. She did not submit the form that would have provided information about her competition uniform size. For those reasons Anna Eatherley was not selected. She not once contacted Mr. Roger Lambert or me after September 4.

Kavin Smith and Albert (Jay) Donawa are the top local male runners, yet they and others complied with the minimal training squad requirements. Contrary to Adrian Robson’s article, the men and women were required to train as a squad, usually, only once a week. On each of those occasions I directed the training session. Apart from those sessions, all the athletes followed their personally designed training programmes.

Therefore, there is absolutely no substance (again) to Adrian Robson’s comment that the men and women had to comply with training programmes drawn up by me. Again, his motives have to be challenged and his scant regard for the truth is shown.

There was also reasonable and accommodating flexibility with athletes’ training. For example, at least once of the men has employment that requires shift work. On those occasions when his work coincided with squad training, he always made me aware of that situation and he always did the required session earlier in the day.

At least half of the men’s squad is married too, have young children and have family commitments. However, they declared their interest, signed and returned the necessary documents to the BTFA by the end of August, made the once-a-week training squad sessions (supported by their respective families), competed in the two cross country trials and the National Cross Country Championships.

So stop making excuses for Anna Eatherley. She is an adult and she needs to take responsibility for her shortcomings. I do not accept fault for any of her behaviours.

There is another important aspect to training as a squad. It promoted team or group unity or cohesiveness. Training as a squad fostered inter and intra-team support systems. The presence and importance of those qualities became evident during the post race interviews or our athletes.

Mr. Victor Lopez, president of the CAC Athletic Confederation, was in Bermuda for the period November 15-19. He attended both days of the CAC Cross Country Championships held at the Port Royal golf course. Strikingly, one of the Royal Gazette reporters, Mr. Dexter Smith, heard Mr. Lopez address many volunteers at the Port Royal Golf Club following the completion of the championships races on the Sunday morning (November 18). Mr. Smith would have heard Mr. Lopez tell the volunteers that Bermuda had put on not a good or very good event but a first class international championship event. Mr. Dexter Smith would have heard Mr. Lopez remark also that Bermuda had hosted the best CAC Cross Country Championships and had certainly raised the standard of the CAC Cross Country Championships. I do not recall any of those informed comments being carried in the Royal Gazette and certainly not in Adrian Robson’s Friday Forum<$> column.

GERRY M. SWAN

BTFA national coach

SPORTS EDITOR’S NOTE: <$>Coach Swan indicates that last week’s Friday Forum<$> was an attack on a variety of organisations and as such a slight on Bermuda. It was not. The criticism was aimed at Swan and the BTFA, and was not simply a personal view but a reflection of the thoughts of many of those involved in local athletics who have had to tolerate Swan’s policy of exclusion for far too long, and to whom I have spoken at length.

Friday Forum<$> is designed to discuss issues of the day and the issue here was why Bermuda was not represented by a senior women’s team at a regional championship that this country was hosting. Thus, there was no point in repeating news concerning the ‘success’ of our junior teams — that had been covered in some depth in a news report, pictures included, on the previous Monday.

However, lest our readers be misled by Swan’s diatribe, we should point out that the junior male and female teams collected silver medals only because there were in fact only two teams competing! We reported that they finished second, when we could have said they finished last! Providing the runners didn’t fall over and fail to finish, they couldn’t help but win the silver medal.

As for the success of individuals, Mark Morrison’s bronze medal win was well documented by this newspaper.

Swan makes a case for all of the females mentioned as to why they did not join his training squad and were subsequently not selected. But there’s another side to the story, which those involved prefer not to discuss in public but will willingly relate during private conversation. Such is Swan’s ‘do it my way or not at all’ manner that many of those invited to represent their country simply don’t feel comfortable training under the current national coach.

It’s for that same reason why so many of our top young athletes, affiliated with various clubs around the Island, also choose not to be part of a national programme.

It should be noted that because of the length of Swan’s letter, space restrictions necessitated considerable editing.