I was living 20 minutes from the stadium back then and I remember the blue lines painted on the streets for the marathon. They lasted for years and years after the Olympics. I don't know what type of paint they used but it probably was freakin good.
I was in Hythe Kent England aged four at the time but i am sure I was watching. I cherish the interview with David Coleman and the marathon coverage, still love watching both when I get the chance the interview with David Coleman and the marathon commentry, means everything.
Was glued the box as they made those opening laps of the track and the whole family were SCREAMING for Barry Watson as he led the pack out of the stadium...don't think this clip shows it but vividly recall him giving a farewell wave as they disappeared down the tunnel...
I was so inspired by Frank Shorter in this race as a 14-year-old. Yale lawyer, Olympic medalist. I wanted me some of that kind of overachievement. I started distance running and joined the track team that year. 7 years later I got into Dartmouth Medical School. Thanks Frank for the inspiration :)
Waldemar Cierpinski war der beste Marathonläufer! Hat der den Shorter abgekockt....der hat wohl zu wenig Doping genommen....die Amis haben doch viel mehr gedopt!
@@cesarcoelho7227 Well... if he was doing what the Finns were suspected of doing then no, it wasn't illegal but unethical. They were suspected of transfusing their own blood ie. taking blood out the body as if giving blood to a blood bank then reinjecting it which increases the oxygen levels in the bloodstream akin to using EPO. As I just said it wasn't illegal at that time but considered unethical. It became illegal not so many years after (as if that made much difference...) and indeed Czierpinski being a DDR athlete would have being doping so was Frank Shorter the real winner and thus the real double Olympic champion?
Pity that nothing is written about the Indian athlete shivnath singh he still holds the national record of 2:12 made in 1978 and remains unbroken till this date
@@torstenrichter169 Incredulous.Shorter did things the honest way-- ever since high school.In the two mile,the 5000, 10k, Marathon wins in Fukuoka, road race victories,National XC Titles,Munich and Montreal. CHEATING is NEVER OKAY! EVER!
@@torstenrichter169 Deserved to win?! No.That doping gave him a huge advantage Frank didn't have.You must be a millennial who was't even around then. Cheating in everything today is condoned(Academics,sports, work, etc).It is meaningless.
@@nidabatayan3047 Shorter doped like all Americans! I know Cierpinski personally and believe him much more than a scribe who has no knowledge! They lie!
Except that in so many calls on this and other videos he refers to Soviet athletes as Russians. Russia was not an independent country then. It was part of the Soviet Union (USSR), and some of those "Russians" he referred to may have been from Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia or any of the other republics that comprised the Soviet Union.
@@tommytempo1 -- A final thought on my original comment. I think referring to a Soviet team as Russians is just as bad as an announcer calling a British relay team English.
Too bad the best British athletes in 1976 Ron Hill and Ian Thompson were not selected, especially Thompson who was the world number 1 in 1974. Good to see BBC coverage of this event.
I watched it live from Ramey AFB Puerto Rico a few years before my running life began.Still run at 57.Was 15 at the time.Shorter was screwed.He should have gone down in history as having won back to back Olympic marathons.Cierpinski knows that the world knows that he knows that we know.Its almost as if he is in the German equivalent of a witness protection program. He has lived pretty much a guarded in the closet life all these years.Its just as well-no one wants to hear his obvious lies.
I suspect this is the BBC coverage of the race. I believe the 1976 Olympic men's marathon was the first marathon to be telecast live from start-to-finish, and that the BBC, Canada's CBC, and ABC in the 'States all carried it in full.
Definitely the BBC coverage with the great commentator David Coleman (RIP)! I remember watching this as a nine going on ten year old and getting excited as Barry Watson took an early lead and being told that there was a long way to go... What memories!
All the participants including Germany, USA, Puerto Rico, UK, and many other countries, this marathon it's before the famous Kenyan domination on this olympic marathon, good to make a huge comparison about olympic marathon history
Numerous African countries boycotted the Olympics in 1976 - not sure of this was something to do with Apartheid, possibly - sad thing of course was that so many great African distance runners couldn't show their ability. Miruts Yifter (Ethiopia) was perhaps the best then...couldn't take part. Probably would've beaten Viren in the 10,000 and maybe the 5 as well. Shame.
Paul thats intetesting. I have to admit i didnt look at times, performances etc. I guess i just went on age and i know that yifter was a bit older than most. Still he did have his "day in the sun". As someone else has said here, if british selectors had any sense then they would have preselected ian thompson who was then both commonwealth and euro champion. He wouldve given shorter a real run for his money. He wss our best chance. Still no uk winner of the marathon. We have had silvers and bronzes but no gold. If farah wasnt able to do it, i dont see us ever doing it now.
Thanks to the Métro, my dad and I watched the race just outside the stadium at the start, at two spots out on the course, and made it back for the finish.
The African nations boycotted to protest the IOC. The racist IOC broke its own rules to include New Zealand despite the fact that New Zealand, an ultra-racist nation in the 1970s, had carried on with sports matches with Apartheid era South Africa. New Zealand should have been banned but the IOC chose New Zealand over all of Africa. None of the track outcomes beyond 400m would have been the same
Not all East Germans were on drugs. Yes, there was systematic doping in the GDR. But that also happened in the USA, Russia or the BRD. But you can't judge everyone. Because there were also athletes who were clean. Waldemar Cierpinski is a German runner of the century. Which one has to show respect!
