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Becca has re-introduced the topic of the Russia/China agreement on mutual assistance in preparation for the Beijing Olympic Games, by quoting Craig Masback's comments on the matter.The latest suggestion forwarded to PVP is achtungpv's that the USATF should take advantage of the opportunity to challenge RUS/CHN to a triangular meet. I don't think that's going to happen. Russia can stay reasonably close to the U. S. in over-all medal count in an Olympic field (at Athens, 25 medals for USA, 20 for RUS, 2 for CHN), but in a USA/RUS/CHN triangular I think they would be badly out-classed. The results of such a meet would greatly increase enthusiasm and support of U. S. fans for track and field. Neither Russia nor China would want to see that happen.

Two months ago, I became interested in constructing a "virtual" 2004 USA vs USSR dual meet, based on best 2004 outdoor performances by USA athletes and those from the 15 countries that comprised the USSR at the time of its dissolution. After I assembled the data, that project bogged down over my inability to find information on team membership, order of events and scoring for dual meets.

By the time Peter Matthews provided the information on members and order (two athletes per event, scoring 5-3-2-1) and Gérard Dumas brought copies of the August, 1958 Track and Field News with order of events for the meet that year, my interest had shifted back to women's vaulting in the current season.

Now, I think it would be interesting to similarly construct a virtual 2004 United States/Russia/China triangular. Again, I don't know what are the rules or conventions about athletes per event, scoring, and order of events for triangular meets. I'd appreciate advice on that. I'll start assembling the 2004 data for the top three of each country (as I originally did for the dual) and can always whittle it down.

Meanwhile, maybe you'd be interested in the way the 2004 dual meet turned out:

United States vs. Union of Soviet Socialist Republics Dual Meet--2004 Men
(USA vs. Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Estonia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrguzstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan)

Two athletes per team for each event, scoring 5-3-2-1.

100 meters:
1. Justin Galtin USA 9.85
2. Maurice Green USA 9.87
3. Anatoliy Dovgal UKR 10.17
4.Andrey Yepishin RUS 10.25

USA 8, USSR 3


110 meters Hurdles:
1. Allen Johnson USA 13.05
2. Terrence Tramell USA 13.09
3. Stanislav Olijar LAT 13.20
4. Sergey Demidyuk UKR 13.37

USA 8, USSR 3 (After two events: USA 16, USSR 6)


Hammer Throw:
1. Ivan Tikhon BLR 84.46
2. Vadim Devyatovsky BLR 82.91
3. A. G. Kruger USA 79.26
4. James Parker USA 79.20

USA 3, USSR 8 (After three events: USA 19, USSR 14)


400 meters:
1. Jeremy Wariner USA 44.00
2. Otis Harris USA 44.16
3. Anton Galkin RUS 44.83
4. Oleg Mishukov RUS 45.55

USA 8, USSR 3 (After four events: USA 27, USSR 17)


Shot Put:
1. Christian Cantwell USA 22.54
2. John Godina USA 21.71
3. Andrey Mikhnevich BLR 21.23
4. Yuriy Belonog UKR 21.16

USA 8, USSR 3 (After five events: USA 35, USSR 20)


10,000 meters:
1. Abdi Abdirahman USA 27:34.24
2. Bob Kennedy USA 27:37.45
3. Vasily Matviychuk UKR 28:18.18
4. Sergey Yemelyanov RUS 28:18.96

USA 8, USSR 3 (After six events: USA 43, USSR 23)


Pole Vault:
1. Tim Mack USA 6.01
2. Toby Stevenson USA 6.00
3. Igor Pavlov RUS 5.80
4. Pavel Gerasimov RUS 5.75

USA 8, USSR 3 (After seven events: USA 51, USSR 26)


Long Jump:
1. Dwight Phillips USA 8.60
2. John Moffitt USA 8.47
3. Vladimir Zyuskov UKR 8.23
4. Valeriy Vasilyev UKR 8.21

USA 8, USSR 3 (After seven events: USA 59, USSR 29)


20 kilometers Walk:
1. Vladimir Stankin RUS 1:17:23
2. Vladimir Parvatkin RUS 1:18:17
3. Tim Seaman USA 1:22:02
4. John Nunn USA 1:22:51

USA 3, USSR 8 (After eight events: USA 62, USSR 37)

4 x 100m Relay:
1. USA:
Justin Gatlin 9.85
Maurice Green 9.87
Shawn Crawford 9.88
John Capel 9.95

2. USSR
Anatoliy Dovgal (UKR) 10.17
Andrey Yepishin (RUS) 10.25
Sergey Bychkov (RUS) 10.26
Dymtro Gluschenko (UKR) 10.26

USA 5, USSR 3 (After nine events: USA 67, USSR 40)

---End of Day One--

Let me save the posting of the Day Two events until tomorrow, to keep you in suspense overnight, as was the case with the real USA/USR dual meets. I'm also sending this material to t-and-f darkwing, but a day later to avoid distracting attention from the remaining U.S. Championships events. In that posting, I've included thanks to those who have helped and/or encouraged my compilation of this 2004 Virtual Dual.

Nice job with that... GO USA! But if you're only doing it with two teams (USA vs USSR) the scoring would be 5-3-1... right?

...and with points (5) only going to the winner in a relay event.

Thanks to LHSpolevault, because it's the sort of input I really need if I'm going to try a USA/RUS/CHN triangular; but at least for the 1958 dual in Moscow, it's clear from the scoring given in Track and Field News that the scoring was 5-3-2-1 for individual events and 5-3 for the relay.

I think it really should have been 5-3-1 and 5-0, but that's not the way it was in this meet. As far as the relay goes, maybe it continued to be 5-3. I have a very dim memory of a relay in this series when a very young USA runner was so angry at losing, after a jostle, that she threw her baton at the opponent and was disqualified, costing the USA three points for second. Does anyone remember the details of that better? I have it as a teen-age Mary Decker; but why woud she have been running in the 4x400?

They should do that throughout the spring and maybe winter for indoors, have dual meets. One country versus another... though it would probably be costly for traveling... It would be something nice to see.

USA vs. “USSRâ€Â

Roger, awesome job with the simulation and the research for all of the times/distances. My comments before were just out of curiousity, no harm . Awesome. 25 - 100m runners ahead of the USSR's first? wow.


Team USA... dominant as always.

Nice job Roger!

Interesting stuff to look at.

cool indeed. no decathlon though?

Patrick remarked, "no decathlon, though?"

I didn't include the decath, because it apparently was held, but not included in the scoring of the Moscow 1958 meet I've used as a model for the structure of the dual.

For the benefit of Patrick and others who may be interested, the result of a "virtual" decathlon for 2004 would be:

1. Bryan Clay (USA) 8820
2. Tom Pappas (USA) 8732
3. Dmitriy Karpov (KAZ) 8725
4. Erik Nool (EST) 8317

This brings up another bit of uncertainty for me. I've assembled the data for a women's 2004 virtual dual and am working on a USA/RUS/CHN triangular. I started posting this material on PVP because it's where I first heard about the Russia-China olympics accord, but this is getting quite far afield from a pole vault topic.

I'd appreciate advice on whether I should post the women's dual and the triangular on PoleVaultPower. If you'd like to keep your view private, you could e-mail me at rruth@shaw.ca

Cheers

Roger Ruth wrote:I'd appreciate advice on whether I should post the women's dual and the triangular on PoleVaultPower. If you'd like to keep your view private, you could e-mail me at rruth@shaw.ca

Cheers

I think you should post it!

thanks a lot for posting it, i was curious.