By David
I was in two minds whether to write this piece. Cameron has gone. She is yesterday’s news. In just a few days her career will be wrapping Friday’s fish and chip orders. Besides, how much time should you spend looking back? Isn’t the way ahead more important? Then I read a report on Cameron’s departure in today’s New Zealand Herald. Journalist, David Leggat, is clearly a Cameron sycophant. Perhaps he is hunting for a job with Cameron’s Sky Sport husband. However, good journalism does demand a higher standard of independence than he has shown here. There are four specific items of Leggat worship I would like to address. A balanced look at the Cameron years requires that his adulation does not pass as the truth. Here is Quote One.
“Look, in life you only really have to look in the mirror,” Cameron said yesterday. “That’s your judge of how you’ve done and what you’ve done. If you do that and you’re happy that’s all you have to be. I look in the mirror and can be pleased with what I’ve done.”
My principal complaint with Cameron is her coaching philosophy. She favours a central control method of delivering elite sport. I favour a diversified free enterprise method of delivery. Cameron’s coaching philosophy suits her personality. For years swimming in New Zealand revolved around Jan Cameron. It was all about her. The sport was paralyzed unless Cameron gave her approval. Swimwatch and the Ineson Report recorded hundreds of examples of swimmers in fear of Cameron’s wrath. Ineson labelled it accurately and for eternity as a “climate of fear”.
Leggat is right. Cameron would say, “Look, in life you only really have to look in the mirror,” The problem is, that’s all she did. Every decision was made in terms of its effect on her legacy, her power, her image. For a decade it was all really about Jan Cameron. Swimming in New Zealand became the coach’s journey. Swimmers were accessories to the main event taking place in Cameron’s mirror.
However on one topic she rolled up her sleeves, labelling the Ineson report as “rubbish”. “Poorly written, poorly done, rubbish,” she said. Elements within the 32-page report released in June were “speculation, opinion and unsubstantiated stuff put there as facts.”
A few months ago I wrote a Swimwatch story that said Ineson would be incapable of writing an honest report. He was too involved with the Wellington circle of sporting power to be truthful about the condition of elite swimming. I was wrong. I have already apologized to Ineson in Swimwatch and do so again now. I can see why he is an Olympic Gold medallist. He does have courage. He reported on Swimming New Zealand honestly and without favour. He did our country proud in Montreal, Canada and again when he tabled this Ineson Report. For Cameron to turn around and dismiss Ineson’s work as “rubbish” is rich beyond belief. Of course it is typical of the dismissive attitude she takes to anyone who crosses her path. Yet another of my county’s best athletes has just earned the Cameron label of “rubbish.”
I do love the bit where Cameron accuses the Ineson Report of being “poorly written”; this from the woman who sent us the following gem from the New Delhi Commonwealth Games. “I believe that this was a successful campaign with further learning’s which can and will help us even more going forward:” I imagine few of you will have read a worse hatchet job of the English language. Who in this world ever told Jan Cameron that the verb learning could be used as a noun? In comparison Ineson’s report is positively Shakespearian.
“One point which clearly hurts is that Cameron is adamant the sport is in far better shape at top level than it was when she began. If it were not, then you might accept a need for change more easily.”
We are forever hearing this tale. But is it true? We know that Cameron and Byrne are masters of spin, so I thought I’d test the assertion. Let’s see if Leggat is a real journalist who tests the information he is given or has he simply parroted back Cameron spin. So here is what I did. I took each current World and New Zealand swimming record and calculated how much the New Zealand records were behind. I then calculated that as a percentage. I found that the current New Zealand men’s records are 4.5% behind the World records. The women’s records are 4.9% behind. Eleven years ago New Zealand’s records were 4.6% and 4.9% behind. Effectively there has been no change. Cameron tells us the sport is in “far better shape” and it is just not true. Byrne says we are in danger of going back twenty years. He must mean back to the time when Loader, Moss and Kingsman were winning Olympic medals, when Simcic was breaking world records and Kent, Bray, Langrell, Jeffs and others were winning world short course equivalent championship medals.
I was surprised at how far we are behind the world. Cameron has had plenty time and consumed huge taxpayer resources and we are still over 4% behind the world. Given that the American Swim Coaches Association believes 3% per annum is a good rate of improvement – we are about 16 months of improvement behind the world’s best. Unfortunately the Olympic Games start in 11 months. That’s called being up Cameron’s creek without a paddle.
Cameron’s passion is firmly intact. It’s just a suspicion, but it’s unlikely swimming has seen the last of her. The sport cannot afford to turn its back on people with her skill, energy and knowledge. “Now a door is closing, I’m sure [others will] open,” she added.
Jan Cameron – you have used our time, you have exploited the talent of our best athletes, you have spent our money – and you have failed to deliver. Your nepotism and rough shod management has caused embarrassment and hurt. We are done with you and those who supported your Millennium folly. We are moving on to a future that, I hope, does not include you. Leave swimming alone and I promise Swimwatch will never mention your name again.