EL CABALLO ALBERTO JUANTORENA, DE SANTIAGO DE CUBA, I went to Montreal in 1976 and I saw that race where he became Gold Metal in 400 and 800, I was 17 years old when I travel from Venezuela to see him.🇻🇪🇺🇸🇨🇺
Damn! I have never seen a runner winning so casually against world class competitors. Juan was just cursing to the finish. Amazing stuff. Thanks for posting.
@Wolfgang Schnauzer Oh, do fuck off, fella! Alberto Juantorena was a natural athlete of awesome ability and never once was he ever accused of using performance-enhancing drugs - was man von westdeutschen Athleten nun nicht gerade behaupten kann. Meine ich nur. MsG
There were no allegations in the mid-late 70s because it was in its infancy for middle distance. With Cuba as a client state of the USSR, sport being of such huge national importance, there have to be suspicions. We'll never know.
Alberto Juantorena, the only athlete to ever win Olympic gold in 800 and 400 metres at the same meeting. A feat never to be repeated because no runner has such a ten-foot stride like he has. MsG
@@jimmyvega287 , yes I agree , it's so strange how it's so rare athletes trying it I thought Michael Johnson could off, but the training for 800m is so different because you are doing close to the 1,500 m in training .
Thanks for posting this Kevin. It's great to see a crystal clear view of the great Juantorena when all the other footage of him is of such poor quality. At the end of the race, it seems like he is thinking, "Who the F*#! was that?!"
@zabaleta66 his prime was quite short, due to injuries. That same year 1977 he underwent surgery ( he had already been operated before the Montreal Games ) and it was the end of his prime. Recurrent injuries never left him to train properly again. It is a pity, we couldn't witnessed duels between Juantorena and Coe. He was quite new in the distance ( 800 m ) , less than two years, when he lost his best condition. Consider how many years it took to Coe for his best performances on 800 m ( Coe also ran 400 but he never got close to Juantorena's times )
looking for races where my dad of Jamaica Seymour Newman, beat Juantarena at 800m and at 400m. Yes might have been underrated even now in JA, but still Seymour Newman is the 800m record holder of Jamaica since 1977. (42 years)
I would like to see those races.It is amazing your dad still holds the 800 record for Jamaica. Thanks to You Tube I just discovered Ivo Van Damme and other runners from these earlier eras.
Your video super! Congrats!, I ran until now for the year 2020 only, many ultra marathons races register in duv ultra marathons statistics many thousands! miles!! 😊😊and I have to do one more race 100km on December 2020..
He was very good but there have been many better.... Sebastian Coe and David Rudisha for example. Coe was the first to run inside 1:43 and then the first inside 1:42...his WR of 1:41.73 stood for many years and he is still 4th on the all time fastest list..... Juantorena never broke 1:43 and he is 81st on the all time list...and Rudisha....he is the only man to break 1:41 and his WR in London 2012 still stands. So can you see that Juantorena, albeit a superb runner, is a long way from being the 'greatest runner ever at 800m'.
@@david2804me to understand the courage as athlete of Juantorena one should understand that medically he was unfit to run because of his flat feet. Due to this his career was mired with surgeries. His prime was quite short, due to injuries. That same year 1977 he underwent surgery again ( he had already been operated twice before the Montreal Games ) and it was the end of his prime. Recurrent injuries after this operation never let him properly train again. He was quite new in the distance ( 800 m ) , less than two years, when he lost his best condition. He established world record in Montreal with barely a few months of training. Consider how many years it took to Coe or Rudisha for their best performances on 800 m .
@@david2804me Bear in mind that Juantorena was primarily a 400m runner - if he had really concentrated 100% on the 800m there's no telling what times he might have run.
i wonder how he would have performed in the 1500 meter or mile. I remember Juantorena being a freak of sorts at his height. Later of course we had the even taller 100 yd sprinter Usain Bolt.
Just checked Wikipedia. Garry Cook in this race, one of the first times I think we see him in the senior ranks, was only 19 years old! That makes him a year and a half younger than Seb Coe but made the international scene at exactly the same time.
@@roshanfernando9657 the 1980 Olympic boycott ruined , what could of been the race of the Olympic in the 800 m with Steve ,seb Alberto,and Mike of Kenya in that final when all was at there very Best,at the same time.
@@roshanfernando9657 the 1980 Olympic boycott ruined , what could of been the race of the Olympic in the 800 m with Steve ,seb Alberto,and Mike of Kenya in that final when all was at there very Best,at the same time.
By the time Coe set his world 800M record Juantorena was past his best so sadly they never raced. They could have faced each other in the Moscow 800M but Juantorena only ran the 400m and finished 4th. He possibly did not want to face the 2 UK runners who were at their peak. A wise move.
@@LPCLASSICAL to understand the courage as athlete of Juantorena one should understand that medically he was unfit to run because of his flat feet. Due to this his career was mired with surgeries. His prime was quite short, due to injuries. That same year 1977 he underwent surgery again ( he had already been operated twice before the Montreal Games ) and it was the end of his prime. Recurrent injuries after this operation never let him properly train again. He went to Moscow almost without training, and was able nevertheless to reach to 4th place, what shows his resilience. Running both distances would have been silly. You should know that not too many runners has tried this duet, a challenge in itself due to its demanding physical condition, and to run both races in an Olympiad was a sheer prowess he was not in condition to attempt. ( Winning both races as he did in Montreal gives a measure of the unique quality of this athlete ) It is a pity, we couldn't witnessed duels between Juantorena and Coe ( and Ovett ) in their primes ( or close ). He was quite new in the distance ( 800 m ) , less than two years, when he lost his best condition. He established world record in Montreal with barely a few months of training. Consider how many years it took to Coe for his best performances on 800 m ( Coe also ran 400 but he never got close to Juantorena's times. Of course, Coe was rather a middle distance runner an Juantorena a sprinter who never tried 1500 m, where Coe also excelled. )
No epo for Alberto...chopped sugar cane as part of his training...just toying with the Americans...university of new mexico....poor hapless runner...juantoreno was virually jogging...not even out of breathe at the finish...could have easily broken the 1000 meter on this night!
a eso se le dice "rodar" pero bueno para eso tambien necesitas medir 1 80 minimo, por la longitud y poder llevar u a frecuencia no tan veloz... tremendo !
Was at his peak shame he didn't race Coe I knew he beat ovett in the Olympic final in 1976 and the 1980 robbed us of that meeting at the Olympic games.
@@archiewoosung5062 Dont think he did.....his career really took off though in 1977 when he destroyed John Walker over the last 200m in the World 1500m
Alberto Juantorena, my first track-and-field hero when I watched my first Olympic Games 1976. Watching this video I think his running style wasn't very economic because he was shaking his head all the time not like Paula Radcliffe but also not perfect. And he shows a little arrogance as well as he starts to look back to the opponents already 200m before the finish line.
@mick1967 I don't think it was arrogance, he always ran watching those coming behind him, from his beginnings as athlete. I think he couldn't avoid doing that, and if I don't mistake he was criticized because of it by his coach.
Seymour Newman did win 400 m to Juantorena in the 1977 Central American and Caribbean Championships in Athletics,, 45 66 ( Newman's best in the distance ) to 45.67 the times. In 1976 and 77 Juantorena was chosen best athlete in the world, so if he attended this minor event was surely because he was not free to avoid it ( Cuban government financed his career ) so he was not set to put all his efforts in this race. The event in the video was in 1977 too, and you can see he just strolled in it. He was to run in the World Championship in those days and for sure that was what mattered to him, so he didn't want to waste energies in other events. 45.66 was the best mark of Newman, 44.26 the best of Juantorena. Newman holds also the best mark in 800 m in Jamaica, but it is 2 seconds from Juantorena's. Addition: Seymour Newman was in this race, he got the third place.it was short after or before the race where Newman won to Juantorena.
I was just searching. He is my dad. His record did get broken Last year on the 10th of June (2022) by Navasky (college student) I believe he ran 1:45.2
to John Organ... How was he better than Sebastian Coe at 800 meters? What you been smoking? Coe beat all his records at 800 meters & Coe had the 800 meter World Record from 1981 to 1997 @ 1:41.7
@@LPCLASSICAL That is a thing we will never know because Juantorena never ran at his all potential. why?. Nobody knows for he never said. And he wasted time looking at his side when he was running. Back in Cuba many people criticized that behavior, many said it was bad training.
@@beatrizhugo2006 I don't know why you suppose he never ran at full potential. I looked at film of his 800M gold in Montreal. He looks like he is flat out and I do not see him looking to the side. In this 1977 video he is not flat out and looking to the side as he is being pressed and since he is running inside his ability wants to be ready to increase speed if needed. We saw Coe doing this too when he was defeating top class fields but when he was flat out for the line he did not do it. Had Ovett looked to the side in the last 10 metres in the John Treacy race he would have won.
@@LPCLASSICAL when Juantorena lost his prime due to surgeries, he had been in the distance for less than 2 years. Obviously he could have easily bettered his performances in a longer period. How many years did it take to Coe or Ovett to get theirs ? Coe was 21 years at the time of this event, and was for sure no match to Juantorena. Coe set his best mark in 1981 and at the time the had been running the distance for at least seven years.
@@juliomiguel6597 Quite right. We should bear in mind that Juantorena was primarily a 400m runner. Had he concentrated more on the 800m he could certainly have run sub 1-43.
I am glad you say this. Due to injuries he ran the distance for less than two years. I think with a little more time he would have got much better marks.
Te conocí en la parada de la 100 en la Ceguera cuando no eras conocido solo te pregunto k hizo Fidel Castro con tus premio y el de Iván Pedroso y otros ,a ti te dieron como rembolso un puesto a dedo patria y Vida 🇨🇺
