After Leaving the Sports Circle, I Became a Cooking God (Completed BL)

Chapter 177-178

Translator: dapotaturs

Release Date: 10/01/2023

Chapter 177: Match Analysis & Men's and Women's Mixed 4x400-Meter Relay Final

"Third place? Bronze?"

Li Junhao initially thought Zhang Ziyi was joking when he heard this.

Qiu Wen scratched his head with a casual smile, and Guo Dun also wore a pleasantly surprised expression. Clearly, this news was an unexpected delight for them.

In the original order, the United States had crossed the finish line first, followed closely by Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, with China leading Belgium by a body length.

The American team's athletes appeared quite relaxed after crossing the finish line. They exchanged smiles and handshakes, celebrating their victory. However, before they could finish celebrating, they received a notification from the nearby panel of referees: The American team had committed a baton exchange violation, and their result was invalidated.

......

............

_(:3)∠)_？

All viewers watching the live broadcast could almost see the palpable question marks hovering above the heads of the American team. They had no idea at which stage their team had committed the violation. Barnes, the first leg runner for the United States, spread his hands open and kept asking in a perplexed voice, "What?"

In the sports channel's live broadcast room, both Shao Minyi and Li Sen smiled upon seeing the American team's reaction.

"Ah, these American athletes, how should we put it?" Shao Minyi paused for a moment, as if organizing his words, then continued, "We all know that the United States has the strength to compete with Jamaica in sprint events. The individual abilities of American team members are unquestionably strong. However, their teamwork and baton exchanges have always been their weak points."

"We often see that the American team, relying on strong individual skills but poor baton exchange coordination, shows inconsistent performances on the track. One reason for this is that American relay athletes receive less training in baton exchanges. But part of the reason for this lack of training also comes from the American team's selection mechanism. Typically, they decide on the final roster for the competition only shortly before the event. This reduces the training time for athletes to build cohesion, and the lack of coordination is expected."

After all, it was a live broadcast, and Shao Minyi's explanation was intended to save face for the American team. However, the American team's history of relay race disqualifications and canceled results was a long-standing joke in the track and field community.

Let's take the example mentioned by Shao Minyi and Li Sen during the broadcast—the fact that the American team hadn't achieved any rankings in world-class competitions for several consecutive years due to relay violations.

This issue had been going on for more than a decade, and it was difficult to understand why the American team had kept this problem unresolved from the perspective of domestic thinking.

While baton exchange required coordination and had certain technical requirements, it wasn't something that the United States, with its resources, couldn't solve. It had stubbornly persisted for many years, much to the puzzlement of observers.

Some explanations suggested that the pressure to achieve world-first results and the athletes' nervousness might be affecting the American team. However, baton exchange had likely affected the American team's performance in numerous world championships, making this explanation hard to accept.