When athletes -- non-boxers, mixed martial artists and wrestlers -- clinch their fists and swing, it usually doesn’t end well.
Veteran British sprinter Dwain Chambers is learning this two weeks after his 4x100-meter relay team was disqualified minutes before they were to receive bronze medals. Two British sprinters -- neither Chambers -- had passed the baton outside the exchange zone, not an uncommon occurrence (for Britain especially) but an illegal one.
He is said by an insider to have “lost the plot” when told that he would not be receiving a medal.
Only minutes earlier, he had been celebrating his bronze medal with gusto, wearing a bowler hat with a Union Flag fastened to it as he and his colleagues took a prolonged lap of honour.
Chambers, 35, “put his fist through a partition wall,” according to the newspaper. “Russian officials became so concerned at Chambers’s explosion of anger that police were called in to defuse the incident.”
Chambers was one of the bright young stars of track and field in 2000, when he placed fourth in the 100 meters at the Sydney Olympics. His career has been a winding and largely unsuccessful road since, including a steroid suspension and an NFL Europe cameo.
Chambers’ victory lap hat marked one of the highlights of the final day of track worlds, but it was obviously followed by one of its lowlights.
“He obviously blew his top a little bit but he himself wasn’t too proud of it,” a world track and field federation (IAAF) official told The Telegraph.
