The greatest athletes will dominate any generation: Track and field legend Carl Lewis
When Carl Lewis speaks, everyone listens. The man who retired from active sports in 1997 at the age of 36 with nine Olympic and eight World Championship golds across track and field events is in town as the international brand ambassador for the 20th edition of the Vedanta Delhi Half Marathon. Lewis did not hold back on a multitude of issues ranging from doping to improved sports science in an exhaustive interaction here on Friday.
Lewis, now 64 and a coach at his alma mater, the University of Houston, believed that the best athletes are not confined to their generation and was categorical that the lure of social media had led youngsters to focus more on presentation than performance.
“I would love to have run against a lot of generations. I would have loved to have run against Jesse Owens, Bob Hayes, Tommy Smith, John Carlos, Steve Williams. And then, of course, the kids now. Come on, I’d handle them.
“The greatest would be the greatest; the ones that dominate a generation will dominate any generation. So I would love to run against Jesse Owens, just to say I did, but I wouldn’t want to run against Jesse Owens, because the guy was so much better. You think he wouldn’t be better now?
“I was all over the place. I wanted to entertain on the track. But it never affected the core performance. Now, kids think that’s first and then the performance. It’s all about how you present yourself and asking for acceptance instead of performing and earning respect,” he declared.
Lewis, who himself had to battle doping allegations before being exonerated by the authorities, also favoured forever testing. “I think the numbers are going up because the testing is getting better. I think we need to continue to test. The vast majority of people are clean and do the right thing. But I think until there’s the fear of forever, we’re not going to have it. Now they continue to test for years.
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“I think they should test every time. Every Olympics, they should test the old Olympics forever. And if they get someone 20 years from now, that’s okay. They should go after them financially. And maybe that ends your career. Well, that’s on you,” he said.
Asked about the changes in athletics over the years, Lewis felt that while some areas had gotten much better with time — including diet, nutrition, videos and recording — the actual mechanics of running had gotten much worse. “When I look up on the Internet, every day I see 10-15 people promoting their running. And at least 95% of them are completely wrong,” he said.
Asked about his advice to youngsters today, Lewis said, “Two things. One, and I say this a lot, if life was easy, everybody would be good at it. And two, I used to miss the parties, now I give them. Which means you’re going to have to sacrifice a lot to be who you want to be, but knowing that maybe you’ll benefit 10, 20 years from now. Get away from the prize for the ultimate goal.”
Published on Oct 10, 2025