3-2-1 GO?! Somalia suspends chairwoman of country’s athletics federation after an embarrassing display where an untrained and unprepared runner placed dead last in a 100m sprint, nearly 10 seconds slower than the winner
Lord only knows why Somalia sent out someone so unqualified, untrained or unprepared for such an event, but if I had to guess, a no-show would have probably been worse than what they did, and they’d probably lose their spot or face some form of penalization. Details are murky, but I’ve heard nepotism could’ve been at play, with the runner being related to someone in the decision-making process, or just completely inept planning, seeing as how a trained runner or any prepared backups were even in the building when they did what they did.
What really sucks is that despite the fact that in all likelihood it was not her fault, the poor runner is the one who is going to eat the unforgiving wrath of the internet, and be the target of all sorts of ridicule, commentary, memes and other less-than flattering outcomes. More likely than not, it wasn’t her idea to be put in this situation in the first place, but she’s unfortunately the one who will be immortalized on the internet for this scenario.
But here it comes, not going to lie, I laughed my ass off when I saw the video. I started snickering even before watching the video just from the synopsis alone, and by the time I got to watching the video, I knew what was going to happen, but it didn’t stop me from belly-laughing at the sheer hilarity of someone being in a situation they had no business being in, regardless of if it were their choice or not.
Even prior to the race, when you see the poor Somali runner stepping up to the blocks, everything about her stands out from her dress, stature, physique, and you just know it’s not going to be pretty. And then the race starts, and it’s exactly what you predict is going to happen if you didn’t know the backstory behind it, and literally the best way to describe it is that it’s as if everyone knew about the Mario Kart starting light boost trick except the one person.
I know it’s not that person’s fault for being in that position, that it was entirely the result of inept leadership and people in decision-making positions that aren’t remotely qualified for them. But I can’t deny that I haven’t laughed so hard at a video in a very long time, and I really, really needed it, and that I really, really appreciated the expense they’re coming at in order for me to have it, all the same.
