Like a plague of locusts, so predictable

Like one of those locust cycles that erupt with scientific predictability, here we are five months before an Olympic Games and, just on schedule, there’s an outbreak among the ladies and gentlemen of the press of OMG the-sky-is-falling. What, you say? These Rio Games are on track to be a disaster! Zika! Water pollution! Slow ticket sales! Ack! Danger, Will Robinson! Or maybe, you know, not.

It’s so foreseeable. It’s also eminently tiresome. This happens every single Olympics.

Here’s a call for reasonableness, a major dose of perspective and some balance. Not everything is a crisis, or needs to be treated that way.

It's elemental that there's no need to be Pollyanna.

At the same time, in advance of every single Olympics in recent memory, the press stirs itself — and consequently readers and viewers — into a gloom-and-doom, bad news-mostly frenzy.

Then the Olympic cauldron gets lit and, what do you know — the spectacle if not miracle that is the Games takes over and the next 17 days are predictably magic.

Bet that’s what happens in Rio, where the Games start on Aug. 5, roughly 150 days away.

In the meantime, and for entertainment purposes only of course, here’s a take on an old game — instead of a bean in a jar for every time a newlywed couple celebrates being married, put a dollar into a jar at each mention in the media between now and then of Zika and the Olympics.

By Aug. 5, you’d have enough to buy — well, so many mosquito nets you might do the honorable thing and send stacks to Africa.

"World Malaria Day" this year is April 25, aimed at focusing attention on that silent, relentless killer: 214 million cases of the disease in 2015, 438,000 deaths globally, 90 percent of which are in sub-Saharan Africa, 78 percent children under 5.

About 3.2 billion people are at risk, a little under half the world’s population, for malaria.

For sure not to dismiss anyone's suffering anywhere, but what's at issue is a major discrepancy in scale: 1.5 million cases against 3.2 billion people at risk. Why no slew of journalistically responsible stories about malaria?

For emphasis: Zika is assuredly important. Too, it is newsworthy.

Typically, Zika leads to a few days of aches and fever. But it has been linked to brain damage in roughly 650 babies. And a very few with the Zika virus also develop a paralysis called Guillain-Barré syndrome (the paralysis is normally reversible).

But, as the opening of the pre-Games U.S. Olympic Committee’s media summit Monday in Beverly Hills, California, underscored, the relentless focus on Zika is at least one and probably several degrees too many.

As things opened Monday, with a session involving several U.S. swim stars, including Ryan Lochte, Missy Franklin and Natalie Coughlin, the first question — with so many amazing stories sitting on stage — was about Zika.

Right after that came a session with USOC chairman Larry Probst, chief executive Scott Blackmun, high-performance chief Alan Ashley and marketing boss Lisa Baird — and a half-dozen questions about Zika.

The leadership group also got questions about doping in Russia, Kenya and Ethiopia. Including: what level of confidence does the USOC have that American athletes, particularly in track and field, will compete on a level playing field? And as a leader in the Olympic movement, does the USOC have any role in trying to shape a fix?

Hello? Don’t such questions pre-suppose that we in the United States are sporting the white hats and everyone everywhere else is not? Talk about short memories. It was only 12 years ago, before the Athens 2004 Games, that the United States, and in particular the U.S. track and field program — in the midst of the sordid BALCO mess — served as world poster child for dirty play.

Or maybe everyone has already forgotten that it was just three short years ago that Lance Armstrong, arguably the king of doping, had his memorable “confession” with Oprah Winfrey.

Oh, and inevitably, here came a question to the USOC leadership about whether the International Olympic Committee ought to consider an “alternate bid city” if “things start to fall apart.”

As if.

The USOC, remember, put Chicago up for the 2016 Games. It did not win. Rio did.

Just try to imagine the diplomatic, political and economic consequences of, for instance, yanking the Games away from their first edition in South America. Or, two years ago, amid the Sochi-is-not-ready whining and wailing, taking the Games away from Russia and Vladimir Putin.

The welcome turn finally came Monday afternoon with a group of track and field stars: Aries Merritt (looking healthy after a  kidney transplant), Meb Keflezighi (the marathon star still going strong in his 40s), Allyson Felix (trying to run both the 200 and 400), Alysia Montaño (a champion pre-, during and post-pregnancy), Dawn Harper-Nelson (thoughtful, eloquent gold-medal hurdler) and Ashton Eaton (decathlon champion and world record-holder who is, simply, one of the truly great guys in Olympic sport).

The track and field group got questions about doping, for sure (Montaño: “not really confident” the playing field is clean). But for the most part the questions were about the athletes, and their stories (who knew Felix loves Beyoncé tunes?).

There are way, way, way more things going on in advance of these Olympics than Zika.

Like Paralympic champion Tatyana McFadden, who — take that, Galen Rupp, with talk of a 10k and marathon double — said from the stage that she intends in Rio to go for seven golds on the track: the 100, 400, 800, 1500, 5k, marathon and relay.

"You have to transform perceptions," the head of the International Paralympic Committee, Sir Philip Craven, said from two places away. "You only do this with positive experiences."

"I think we have to recognize what our role is," Blackmun had said earlier on the stage. "We're one of 200 countries that participates in the Olympic Games. By definition, you have to have someone in charge of the overall project. Every single Games brings its own unique set of challenges that causes people to question whether the Games should've been awarded to 'X.' "

Fact: it’s going to be winter in Brazil during the Olympics. Zika risk will thus likely be way, way down.

Fact: after the Olympic circus packs up, the people who live in Brazil are still, for the most part, going to be living in Brazil. You want to talk about Zika? No problem. You want to do a story now? Sure. But — make a commitment to get back to the story in a year or two, when the Olympic spotlight is not on.

(Query: last story earning front-page attention about LGBT issues in Russia was — when?)

As Adeline Gray, the female U.S. wrestling world champion who took part in a test event in Rio in January, said afterward, referring to the threat of the virus, "It’s part of traveling. This is something that the people of Brazil have to deal with on a daily basis. The fact that I’m only here for a short time. It’s not really fair for me to freak out about it to that extent. I think if I was planning to have a child in the next month, I would be extremely uneasy about this.”

Fact: as the USOC’s leadership made plain on Monday, it’s up to every single athlete to decide for him or herself whether to go to Rio. Prediction: every single eligible athlete will go. That’s what Olympic athletes do. We all live in a world of risk; they live for a moment that comes only once every four years, and maybe just once in a lifetime.

Blackmun said he was not aware of “any single athlete” making the decision not to go.

It was up to Coughlin, the versatile and veteran U.S. swimmer, to put things in some perspective. She took that first question Monday morning about Zika, answering from the stage, “There are always things that are beyond our control at the Olympic Games. This is just one of them.”

Let us review many of the recent pre-Games hysterias:

Sydney 2000: calendared for September, not July or August. Would anyone watch? Well, yes. Remember Cathy Freeman? Lighting that cauldron of fire? And her 400-meter victory, just one race on what was an amazing night on the track? How quickly the narrative turned — Sydney, best Summer Games ever.

Salt Lake 2002, the first post-9/11 Games: terrorism. Everything turned out just fine.

Athens 2004, the first Summer Games after 9/11: again, terrorism. Many media concerns even put reporters and crew through gas-mask training. Everything turned out just fine.

Beijing 2008: Human rights. Cost overruns. And air quality, with a tornado of stories warning that the skies were going to be filthy and the athletes might not even, you know, breathe. The skies were mostly blue. As for athletic performance: Michael Phelps, eight gold medals. Too inside for you? Outside: Kenya’s Sammy Wanjiru winning the men’s marathon (on a hot, sunny morning) in an Olympic-record 2:06.32.

London 2012: again, terror (the July 2005 underground attacks). Cost overruns. General angst from the “forensic” British press, to use the term favored by now-IAAF president Sebastian Coe. Now London is, in the minds of many outside Australia, considered the best Games ever.

Sochi 2014: LGBT issues. Black Widow bombers. Putin. $51 billion. Hotel rooms not quite ready a few days before opening ceremony. Everything turned out fine.

No less an authority than the Economist — Nelson Mandela’s magazine of choice during his 27 years of imprisonment at Robbin Island — published a feature a few days ago under a headline that declared, “An Olympic oasis,” and, underneath, asserted in plain terms that Zika “will not be much of a threat to the Rio Games.”

It went on:

“There is already much to celebrate about the Rio Olympics, though with their city turned into an obstacle course of road works for the new metro and bus lanes, cariocas” — what the locals call themselves — “may not yet feel like cheering. There has been no obvious waste or corruption. The city has used the Games as a catalyst for a wider transformation.”

The mayor since 2009, Eduardo Paes, “tore down an elevated motorway that scarred the old port, burying it in a tunnel. The port area now hosts new museums and public spaces; next month a tramway will open there. Apart from better public transport, the Olympics may bequeath an overdue revival of Rio’s decayed and crime-ridden historic centre. If urban renewal were a sport, that would win a gold medal.”

You want a story, ladies and gentlemen? That’s a story.

U.S. No. 1 overall -- in fast-changing world

BEIJING — With images of Jesse Owens and Luz Long on the big screens, Owens’ grand-daughter kicked off the final night of the 2015 track and field championships by presenting Usain Bolt his gold medal from the men’s 4x100 relay the night before.

This was, in a nutshell, the past and present of the sport. The future?

This, probably more than anything, from Seb Coe, the newly elected president of the IAAF, the sport’s governing body, taking over from Lamine Diack of Senegal, who served for 16 years: “We are more than a discussion of test tubes, blood and urine.”

He also said at a Sunday news conference, “We have a sport that is adorned by some of the most super-human outrageously talented people in any sport. Our challenge is to make sure the public know there are other athletes,” not just Bolt, “in our sport.”

This is not — not for a second — to discount the import of doping in track and field. But it’s clear things are changing.

The men’s 100 is often thought to be the dirtiest race in the sport; not so; a read of the historical record shows that, without question, it’s the women’s 1500.

And now that times in that event are often back at 4 minutes and over — the final Tuesday saw a slow, tactical 1500, won by one of the sport’s breakout stars, Genzebe Dibaba of Ethiopia, in 4:08 — more women from more countries can claim a legitimate shot at a medal.

That, actually, is one of the two big take-aways from these 2015 worlds: more athletes from more countries winning medals.

And, despite a disappointing medal performance by the U.S. team, the other: the emerging political influence internationally, concurrent with Coe’s presidency, of USA Track & Field.

Despite the chronic backbiting within certain circles — sometimes, track and field comes off as the only major sport in the world in which its most passionate adherents seemingly find joy by being so self-destructive — the sport could well be poised for a new era in the United States.

That depends, of course, on a great many factors. But everything is lined up.

Next year’s Rio Games are in a favorable time zone.

USATF has, in the last three years, under the direction of chief executive Max Siegel, made significant revenue leaps.

Beyond that, Eugene, Oregon, last year played host to the World Juniors and a meeting of the IAAF’s ruling council; the 2016 world indoors will be staged in Portland, Oregon; the 2021 world championships back in Eugene.

The 2017 track championships will be in London; in 2019, in Doha, Qatar.

By comparison: the swim world championships have never been held in the United States. This summer’s FINA championships were held in Kazan, Russia; in 2017, the swim worlds will be in Budapest; in 2019, in Gwangju, South Korea.

In elections that preceded this Beijing meet, all five of USATF’s candidates for IAAF office won; USATF president Stephanie Hightower got the highest number of votes, 163, for any candidate running for the IAAF council.

“You’ve got Seb leading the way but the change in the USATF position internationally is extremely significant,” Jill Geer, the USATF spokeswoman, observed Sunday night.

She also said, “Our development has to continue, and we don’t take our status as the world’s No. 1 track and field team for granted, at all,” adding, “No medals are guaranteed.”

From 2013 going back to 2004, the U.S. has been a 25-medal average team at world majors, meaning the Olympics or worlds.

Here, 18 overall, six gold.

Kenya and Jamaica -- with a victory late Sunday in the women's 4x4 relay -- topped the gold count, with seven. Kenya, overall: 16. Jamaica, overall: 12.

The upshot: for the first time at a world championships, dating to 1983, the U.S. finished third or worse in the gold-medal standings.

The last worlds at which the Americans won so few medals: Edmonton 2001, 13 overall, five gold; Athens 1997, 17 overall, six gold.

Here, the Chinese showed they are an emerging track and field threat, with nine medals, seven of them silver.

Ethiopia, Poland, Canada and Germany won eight apiece. Canada won two golds, in men’s pole vault, Shawn Barber, and on Sunday in men’s high jump, Derek Drouin, with a jump of 2.34 meters, or 7 feet, 8 inches.

Some specific examples of how the world is changing in real time:

The women’s 100 hurdles, long the domain of the Americans (and, recently, Australia’s Sally Pearson, who was hurt and did not compete here)?

Your Beijing podium -- Jamaica, Germany, Belarus.

The women’s 200? Gold went to Dafne Schippers of the Netherlands in a time, 21.63, surpassed in history only by the Americans Florence Griffith-Joyner and Marion Jones.

Asked the inevitable question, Schippers said, I’m clean.

Allyson Felix, the U.S. 200 star, didn’t challenge Schippers in that race; instead, Felix ran the 400, cruising to gold Thursday in 49.26, the year’s fastest time. Coe said the conversation ought to begin in earnest now about the possibility of allowing Felix the chance — like Michael Johnson in Atlanta in 1996 — to double in the 200 and 400 next year in Rio.

Without question, Bolt remains the dominant figure in track and field, and has been since his breakout performance here at the Bird’s Nest seven summers ago. Indeed, Coe said no single figure in international sport had captured the public imagination like Bolt since, probably, Muhammad Ali.

Assuming Bolt can keep himself in the good health he showed here, the world gets at least one more run-through of The Bolt Show, next summer in Rio, now with a worthy rival, the American Justin Gatlin, who took silver in both the 100 and 200. After that? Bolt’s sponsors want him to keep going through the London 2017 world championships; Bolt said he will have to think about it.

That relay Saturday night capped yet another incredible performance for Bolt. But for his false start at the Daegu 2011 worlds, he has won everything at a worlds or Olympics since 2008 — 100, 200, 4x1.

That was a familiar storyline.

This, too:

Mo Farah, the British distance star, nailed the triple double — winning the 5 and 10k, just as he had done at the Moscow 2013 worlds and the London 2012 Olympics.

The American Ashton Eaton won the decathlon, setting a new world record, 9045 points. He and his wife, the Canadian Brianne Theisen-Eaton, make up the reigning First Couple of the sport; she won silver in the heptathlon.

Dibaba, after winning the 1500 on Tuesday, took bronze in the 5000 Sunday night, a 1-2-3 Ethiopian sweep. Almaz Ayana broke away with about three laps to go, building a 15-second lead at the bell lap and cutting more than 12 seconds off the world championships record, finishing in 14:26.83.

Senbere Teferi outleaned Dibaba at the line. She finished in 14:44.07, Dibaba seven-hundredths behind that.

For junkies: Ayana covered the last 3000 meters in Sunday’s final quicker than any woman has run 3000 meters in 22 years.

Dibaba’s sister, Tirunesh, had held the world championship record, 14:38.59, set in Helsinki in 2005. Tirunesh Dibaba holds the world record still, 14:11.15, set in Oslo in 2008.

Then, of course, Beijing 2015 saw this all-too-familiar tale:

The U.S. men screwed up the 4x1 relay, a botched third exchange Saturday night from Tyson Gay to Mike Rodgers leading to disqualification after crossing the finish line second, behind Bolt and the Jamaicans.

Going back to 2001, the U.S. men’s 4x1 has failed — falls, collisions, botched handoffs — at nine of 15 major meets. Not good.

Job one is to get the stick around. If the Americans do that, they are almost guaranteed a medal — and, given a strategy that now sees Gatlin running a huge second leg, the real possibility of winning gold, as the U.S. team did in May at the World Relays, with Ryan Bailey anchoring.

Bailey did not qualify for these championships.

It’s not that the U.S. men — and women — didn’t practice. Indeed, all involved, under the direction of relay coach Dennis Mitchell, thought things were lined-up just right after the prelim, in which the same four guys — Treyvon Bromell, Gatlin, Gay, Rodgers — executed just fine.

The plan, practiced and practiced: hand-offs at about 10 to 12 meters in the zone in the prelims, 12 to 14 in the final. The plan, further: 28 steps in the final, 26 in the prelim — the extras accounting for the faster runs in the final, adrenaline and other factors.

Rodgers took responsibility for the essential mistake. He broke too early.

I don't make to many mistakes and I never make excuses I'll take the blame for this one, Ima learn from it and move on!

— Mike Rodgers (@Mr_Rodgers_DAT) August 29, 2015

As Jill Geer, the USA Track & Field spokeswoman put it in an interview Sunday night with several reporters, “In the relays, there’s a lot of pressure. everybody feels it,” athletes, coaches, staff.

She added, “They don’t accept a DQ any easier than the public does.”

Geer also noted, appropriately, that medals at this level are a function of three things: preparation, execution and luck, good or bad.

In the women’s 1500 on Tuesday, American Jenny Simpson — the Daegu 2011 gold medalist, the Moscow 2013 runner-up — lost a shoe. She finished 11th, eight-plus seconds behind Genzebe Dibaba.

Men’s decathlon: Trey Hardee — the Berlin 2009 and Daegu 2011 champion — got hurt halfway through the 10-event endurance test. He had to pull out.

Women’s 100 hurdles: 2008 Beijing gold and 2012 London silver medalist Dawn Harper-Nelson crashed out; Kendra Harrison was DQ’d; and the 2013 world champion, Brianna Rollins, finished fourth.

Women’s 4x4 relay: the Americans sent out a star-studded lineup, 2012 Olympic 400 champ Sanya Richards-Ross, Natasha Hastings, Felix and Francena McCorory, who had run the year’s fastest pre-Beijing time, 49.83.

Before the race, the four Americans went all Charlie's Angels.

Felix, running that third leg, then put the Americans in front with a 47.7-second split. But McCorory, windmilling with 90 meters to go, could not hold off Novlene Williams-Mills, and Jamaica won in a 2015-best 3:13.13. The Americans: 3:19.44.

It was the first Jamaican 4x4 relay worlds gold since 2001. The Jamaicans have never won the relay at the Olympics.

In the men’s 4x4, LaShawn Merritt reliably turned in a winning anchor leg to lead the U.S. to victory in 2:57.82.

Trinidad and Tobago got second, a national-record 2:58.2. The British, just as in the women’s 4x4, took third. The British men: 2:58.51; the British women, a season-best 3:23.62.

Earlier Sunday night, Kenyan men went 1-2 in the men’s 1500, Asbel Kiprop winning in 3:34.4, Elijah Manangoi 23-hundredths back.

The U.S. got three guys into the final, including 2012 Olympic silver medalist Leo Manzano and Matthew Centrowitz, second in the 1500 at the Moscow 2013 worlds, third at Daegu 2011.

The American finish: 8-10-11, Centrowitz, Manzano, Robby Andrews.

Manzano said afterward, “The first 800 was fine, but I thought I was just going to gear up like I did two days ago,” in the prelims, riding his trademark kick. “Unfortunately it didn’t quite pan out like that. Sometimes it just clicks in place, and today didn’t quite fit in there.”

A couple hours before that men’s 1500, Geer had said, “We had an awful lot of 4-5-6-7 finishes,” adding that “those are the kind of finishes where we will be drilling in and saying, how do we turn that 4-5-6 into a 1-2-3?”

The men’s 5k on Saturday, for instance: 5-6-7, Galen Rupp, Ben True, Ryan Hill.

Beating Farah? That’s an audacious goal.

But, Geer insisted, there is “nothing systemically wrong” with the U.S. effort.

“Our performance wasn’t necessary all the medals we had planned for or hoped for,” she said.

At the same time, she asserted, “When you look at our performance here, where we did well and maybe didn’t do well, if we can fix, which we absolutely can, even half the areas we had execution mistakes or under-performed, we will be extraordinarily strong in Rio.”

Racing to a kidney transplant

BEIJING — These 2015 world track and field championships at the Bird’s Nest drew more than 1,900 athletes from more than 200 nations.

Every single one of them has a story. But no one has a story quite like Aries Merritt, your 2015 110-meter hurdles bronze medalist. In just a few days, he's going to have a kidney transplant.

Merritt, the 2012 Olympic 110 hurdles champion as well as the world record-holder, 12.80 seconds, run in Brussels that same Olympic year, took third in the 110 final Friday night, in a season-best 13.04.

Sergey Shubenkov of Russia ran a national-record 12.98 for the win. Jamaica’s Hansle Parchment took second, in 13.03.

This coming Tuesday, back in the United States, Merritt is due to have a kidney transplant. His sister, LaToya Hubbard, is to provide the donor kidney.

"I feel like my bronze medal is a gold medal, to be honest," Merritt said.

Also Friday, the American Ashton Eaton ran a ridiculous 45-flat in the 400 to top off his first day of the two-day test that is the 10-event decathlon. That’s a world record for the decathlon 400; Bill Toomey had run 45.63 in 1968.

That 45-flat would have gotten Eaton seventh in the open 400, won Wednesday night by South Africa's Wayde Van Niekerk.

After Day One, Eaton has 4703 points. He is on pace to break his own world record in the decathlon, 9039 points, set at the 2012 U.S. Olympic Trials.

In the women's 200, Dafne Schippers of the Netherlands, a former heptathlon standout, raced to the win in a 21.63, a world championships record.

Only Florence Griffith-Joyner and Marion Jones have run the women's 200 faster. Flo-Jo ran 21.34 and 21.56 at the 1988 Seoul Olympics; Jones' 21.62, run in 1998, was done at altitude, in Johannesburg.

"I know I'm clean and I know I work very hard for it," Schippers said afterward when asked about the other two.

Asked if she envisioned ever going back to the heptathlon, Schippers laughed and said, "I don't think so."

Jamaicans Elaine Thompson, in 21.66, and Veronica Campbell-Brown, in 21.97, went 2-3.

Just before these championships got underway last week, Merritt disclosed — in a story posted on the IAAF website — that he suffers from a rare genetic disorder found predominantly in African-Americans.

His condition was aggravated by a virus that had attacked his kidneys and, as well, his bone marrow.

Kidney function, he said, is down to under 20 percent. That's both kidneys. He said late Friday, "They’re not filtering properly. They don’t work."

Earlier this week, he had told reporters, “Just to be keeping that secret, it felt like a weight had been lifted when I was able to share it.

“The positive outreach has been amazing. I love running, I love competing. This is my life and here I am.”

Pause for just a moment. Think about all this.

That Merritt is here is, in the first instance, remarkable.

That he made the final all the more so, winning his semifinal Thursday night, in a then-season best 13.08.

That he won a medal — a testament to his considerable will.

“I am only 75 percent physically healthy,” Merritt had said after the semifinal. “That should be enough to give me a medal."

Seriously? For real: "I am still keeping it smooth. For the final there is nothing I want to change. I want to stay consistent. My rhythm is coming back — I am glad that it is coming back for the world championships.”

The sprint hurdles make for some of the great, truly great, races on the track and field program. Anything can happen, and often does.

The Americans had been expected to dominate both the men's 110 and women's 100. Didn't happen.

In the first women’s 100 semifinal Friday, for instance, the American Dawn Harper-Nelson crashed into the second hurdle and down to the track, rolling into the third hurdle; she is the Beijing 2008 gold and London 2012 silver medalist. She walked away, apparently unhurt.

For the record: Dawn Harper-Nelson is one of the classiest acts in track and field. This is what she said afterward: “I am sorry I let people down.”

In the next semi, another American, Kendra Harrison, was disqualified for a false start. She was not happy about it, and took a good long time leaving the track.

In the final, here was the finish, a result absolutely no one could have predicted:

Jamaica’s Danielle Williams with a personal-best 12.57 for the win, Cindy Roleder of Germany a personal-best 12.59, two-hundredths back, and Alina Talay of Belarus in third with 12.66, another national record.

The defending champion, American Brianna Rollins, finished fourth, in 12.67.

"The last years, you saw the trend," with Americans expected to dominate the women's sprint hurdles, Talay said, adding, "It was really tough to fight against them. You can see that European girls can do that, and we proved that today."

"And Caribbean girls," Williams said.

The men’s 110, particularly over the past few seasons, has been that singular event in which the top competitors in the world line it up and race each other, meet after meet.

By contrast, Usain Bolt and Justin Gatlin had not run against each other in the sprints — with the exception of the World Relays in the Bahamas this past May — since 2013. And in that relay, Gatlin ran the second leg for the U.S., Bolt the anchor leg for Jamaica.

Bolt, in a news conference Thursday night after winning the 200, Gatlin taking second, just as they had done in the 100 Sunday night, noted that he had been injured for most of 2014 and had to work himself back this year back into winning form.

“People were saying I was ducking Justin Gatlin most of the season,” he said, demurring, “It makes no sense to compete when I’m not at my best and Justin Gatlin is at his best. I’m going to lose.”

The first 110 world record, 15 seconds, dates to 1912. The benchmark now for a championship performance is 13 seconds, or under. Since they have been keeping records, before Friday night only 18 guys had gone sub-13.

Shubenkov makes it 19.

Three years ago, at his best, Merritt was essentially unbeatable. He won in London in 12.92 — after running 12.93 three times in a row before that, including at the U.S. Olympic Trials.

About a month after the Games, on September 7, 2012, Merritt ran that 12.80 in Brussels — his form and fluidity a thing of beauty whether you are a hard-core track fan, or just casually dropping in.

In that race, Merritt dropped seven-hundredths of a second off the standing world record, 12.87, which Dayron Robles of Cuba had run in 2008. It made for the record’s largest single time drop since 1981, when the American Renaldo Nehemiah became the first guy ever to run under 13; he went 12.93, cutting seven-hundredths off his own mark, 13-flat, which he had run two years before.

The next year, Merritt ran much, much slower.

After the 2013 world championships in Moscow — he finished sixth in the high hurdles — Merritt checked into the emergency room at the Mayo Clinic in Arizona.

That was October.

He didn’t leave the hospital until the next April.

The first concern was treating the virus. After that, the doctors’ focus was his kidneys.

"When they told me I'd never run again, my whole world ended in my mind," he said.

The condition, Merritt said, is called "collapsing FSGS," for "focal segmental glomerulosclerosis." He is obviously thinner than he was three years ago -- six pounds, he said. Too, he has undertaken a significant lifestyle change -- he can't process potassium so he can't, for instance, drink orange juice.

"It has been a struggle," he said Friday night. "It has been very tough for me these last couple years. Just to be here at these world championships shows I’m mentally tough and I have the heart of a champion."

In May 2014, Merritt showed up again to race. Again, the month before, he had been in the hospital. He ran 13.78 at the Steve Scott Invitational in California.

At the end of the summer of 2014, back in Brussels, he finished seventh in the Diamond League final. He said he was thrilled.

This year, he ran 13.12 at the Prefontaine Classic, in Eugene, Oregon, as May turned to June. A few weeks later, at the U.S. nationals, he qualified for the worlds by finishing third, in 13.19, behind David Oliver and Ronnie Ash.

Oliver had eased into Friday’s final with a 13.15 in the heats, 13.17 in his semi.

Ash never made it out of the start in the rounds. He flinched, according to the electronic timing system, and was DQ’d. Like Harrison Friday night, Ash did not think he had flinched. As the official IAAF report would later note in a delicate reference, “The American was not too happy at the decision and several minutes of confusion ensued before he finally left the track.”

Merritt went 13.25 to win his heat. Then, again, 13.08 for that win in the semis.

In the final, Oliver hit the first hurdle and got knocked out of rhythm. He finished seventh, in 13.33.

From that first hurdle, the race was clearly between Shubenkov, Parchment and Merritt.

Shubenkov, who is completely fluent in conversational English, said afterward, "It was a little bit of a surprise for me. It’s not every day a guy from Russia goes and wins the world championship in the hurdles and goes sub-13."

Both he and Parchment expressed admiration that someone in Merritt's condition could run, much less make the podium at a world championships.

"I still can not imagine how this is possible," Shubenkov said, adding a moment later, "Just now I learned he has such a severe condition. It's just, I don't know, beyond my realization. I can't think about it -- how it's possible."

Parchment: "I think he’s a very strong guy. To be here still competing … it’s really great, and i congratulate him on getting a medal here.

"I hope," he also said, "his surgery will go well and we will see him next year … in Rio."

Straight talk about Qatar

They held a track meet Friday on a typically warm and balmy evening in Doha, the opening Diamond League event of the 2013 season. It was sensational. American long jumper Brittney Reese, the 2012 Olympic gold medalist, sailed out to a personal best, 7.25 meters, or 23 feet, 9 1/2 inches. It was the best jump by an American in 15 years.

Another London gold medalist, David Rudisha of Kenya, won again, in 1:43.87, considerably slower than his world-record 1:40.91 at the Games. That was to be expected for an early-season outing. Even so, he beat Mohammed Aman of Ethiopa -- who had beaten him last year in Zurich -- by more than half a second.

In the women's 400, Amantle Montsho of Botswana defeated Allyson Felix in a rematch of their thrilling encounter at the 2011 world championships in Daegu, South Korea; Felix hadn't lost in Doha in 10 races but, then again, hadn't run the 400 in a meet since Daegu. Montsho crossed Friday night in 49.88, Felix in 50.19. Britain's Christine Ohuruogu, the London silver medalist, took third, in 50.53.

In all, there were 11 world-leading performances. More than two dozen Olympians made the meet.

The focus Friday in Doha was on track and field. Nothing else. It just goes to show -- again -- that when given a chance, the Qataris know how to put on a big-time sports event where the athletes are front and center.

It's a mystery why so much of the world -- still -- views what is going on in Doha with such suspicion.

It's as if having money is a bad thing.

Like, why?

That is stupid thinking and ought to stop.

This is not naiveté.

If there is evidence of misconduct or wrongdoing, then it should be produced, and examined for everyone to see.

If there is not, then what is at issue is stereotyping, or worse -- and that really needs to stop. Because, as Fahad Ebrahim Juma, the director of planning and development for the Qatar Olympic Committee said in a recent interview in Doha, "Believe it or not, the Middle East is part of this earth."

One day, there are going to be Olympic Games in the Middle East.

Maybe they will be in Istanbul in 2020. The International Olympic Committee is going to vote this September on the 2020 site; Istanbul is in the mix, along with Tokyo and Madrid.

If Istanbul doesn't make it, Doha -- which bid for 2016 and 2020 but was cut -- will surely bid for 2024. Maybe even if Istanbul does make it. Who knows?

Of course, Qatar will stage soccer's World Cup in 2022.

Again, if there is documentable evidence of misconduct or wrongdoing in the Qatari World Cup bid, bring it on.

Until then, here is some of the evidence of what is actually going on in Qatar:

The country is being developed, and rapidly, according to a "National Vision 2030" plan that includes sport as one of its key pillars.

Part of the strategy involves international outreach. In 1993, Qatar staged two international sports events. In 2002, 10. This year, 40. The 2020 objective, 50.

Next year, it will stage the world swimming short-course championships; in 2015, the world handball championships; in 2016, the road cycling championships.

The Qataris announced Friday they intend to bid for the 2019 world track and field championships; they tried for 2017 but lost to London.

Another element of the 2030 plan is an internal focus. An Olympic program in the country's schools drew 5,000 students in 2008 -- 1,500 girls and 3,500 boys. This year, roughly 21,900 students -- 7,555 girls, 14,345 boys.

At the London Games, Qatar sent women to the Games for the first time -- four. But it's not as if there aren't Qatari female athletes. More than 200 Qatari women competed at the 2006 Asian Games. The Qataris are, for the most part, trying to get their female athletes to the Games by qualifying them the way every other nation does, not just by accepting wild-card invitations in swimming and track.

The nation's flag-bearer at the opening ceremony in London: female shooter Bahiya al-Hamad.

Yes, you can see women in veils in Doha. But, this spring at the QMA Gallery at Katara, near the upscale West Bay development, you could also have taken in the "Hey Ya!" photo and video exhibit -- shots of Arabic women in swimsuits; gymnastics leotards; sports bras, shorts and track spikes; whatever.

You could also have taken in a production across town of the Greek tragedy, "Medea," put on by Northwestern University in Qatar. Northwestern is one of several leading institutions with branch campuses in Qatar -- others include Texas A&M, Carnegie Mellon, Virginia Commonwealth, Georgetown's foreign service school and Cornell's medical school.

You could have gone shopping at the Villagio mall. It has an ice rink in it. And a food court. And every shop-'til-you-drop outlet you can imagine. It's right next to the Aspire complex, with a 50,000-seat stadium and a sports-specific hospital. They put on the 2010 world indoor track and field championships at Aspire.

Or -- and this is where the Qataris got their latest round of bad press -- you could have taken in the "Olympics: Past and Present" Exhibit in a temporary hall close to the Museum of Islamic Art. The show will run there until June 30; it's due eventually to be housed in a Qatar Olympic and Sports Museum.

The exhibit, which opened in March, is split into two parts, one highlighting ancient Olympia, the other the modern Games. On display are some 1,200 items, including over 600 from Greece and international museums.

There's a mini-Olympic stadium. There are Olympic posters and mascots. There is every Olympic torch -- including the super hard-to-find Helsinki 1952 torch.

The display, put together by Dr. Christian Wacker, a German historian, is genuine. It is engaging. Most important, it doesn't skirt the truth -- it confronts the honest realities that, for instance, the Games have had boycotts and been shadowed by doping problems.

All that, and the one thing that the European press bothered to write about -- which then made the English-language wire services -- is some nude statues?

A compromise -- a fabric six feet in front of the statues -- didn't suit the Greek Culture Ministry. So the antiquities were a no-go, and reportedly shipped back to Athens, where it somehow became a story.

Why? Because cultural sensitivities in Doha are, on some level, different than in Athens? Who got together and decided that cultural standards in Athens make the world go around?

The controversy is all the more incredible given that this exhibit is -- again -- literally in the shadow of one of the world's finest exhibits of Islamic art.

Beyond which -- there is nudity in the exhibit, including a lovely small bronze.

Four Olympic champions, meanwhile, were among those touring the show on Wednesday: Felix, Reese, American triple-jumper Christian Taylor and Jamaican sprinter Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce.

It was normal.

Then they, and a bunch of other top athletes, went out Friday night and ran. Normal.

"I love racing in Doha," said Kellie Wells, the London bronze medalist in the women's 100 hurdles, who finished second Friday, behind London silver medalist Dawn Harper-Nelson.

Harper-Nelson ran a world-leading 12.6; Wells ran a season-best 12.73. "It's always great to run here," Wells said. "Every single time."