Dwight Stones

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Dwight Stones
200px
Stones (right) interviews Xavier Carter and Kelly Willie of LSU.
Personal information
Nationality  United States
Born (1953-12-06) December 6, 1953 (age 70)
Los Angeles, California
Height 6 ft 5 in (1.96 m)[1]
Weight 172 lb (78 kg)[2]
Sport
Sport Track and field
Event(s) High jump
College team Long Beach State 49ers
UCLA Bruins
Medal record
Men's Athletics
Representing the  United States
Bronze medal – third place 1972 Munich High Jump
Bronze medal – third place 1976 Montreal High Jump
IAAF World Cup
Silver medal – second place 1977 Düsseldorf High Jump
Updated on 9 June 2013.

Dwight Edwin Stones (born December 6, 1953) is an American television commentator and a two-time Olympic bronze medalist and former three-time world record holder in the men's high jump. During his 16-year career, he won 19 national championships. In 1984, Stones became the first athlete to both compete and serve as an announcer at the same Olympics. Since then, he has been a color analyst for all three major networks in the United States and continues to cover track and field on television. He served as an analyst for NBC Sports coverage of Track and Field at the 2008 Summer Olympics.[3]

Biography

Born in Los Angeles, California,[4][5] Stones set a national high school record in 1971 at Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value).,[1] then won the bronze medal at age 18 at the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, West Germany. He set his first world record the following summer when he cleared Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value)., also at Munich.[6] That jump also made him the first "flop" jumper to set a world record, five years after Dick Fosbury made that style famous while winning the gold medal at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City. Stones raised the world record to Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value). in 1976 at the NCAA Championships at Franklin Field in Philadelphia in June,[7] and added another centimeter to the record two months later.

Stones attended UCLA his freshman year (1971–72), and later transferred to Long Beach State for a year and a half,[1] and is a member of that university's hall of fame.

In 1998, Stones was inducted into the National Track and Field Hall of Fame. He was a 1991 inductee into the Orange County Hall of Fame.[8]

Olympic competition

Stones was one of the world's top high jumpers from 1972 to 1984 and has been twice named the World Indoor Athlete of the Year by Track & Field News. At age 18 during the 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, he took the bronze medal in the high jump behind Jüri Tarmak and Stefan Junge. At the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montréal, he was a heavy favorite to win the gold medal. Earlier, he finished second at the U.S. Olympic Trials, then had to settle for another Olympic bronze behind Jacek Wszola and Greg Joy when his jumping ability was hampered by competition in the rain.[9] A few days later in Philadelphia, he raised the world record to Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value). in dry conditions at Franklin Field.[10]

His participation at the Montreal Games sparked a heated debate, in which he supposedly said he hated French Canadians (Montréal-Matin Newspaper, July 29, 1976, pages 5 and 8). This produced raucous boos during the whole competition, and the debate became so inflamed that he decided on a new tee-shirt for the day of the finals. The back of his shirt read, "I love French Canadians."[9]

He returned to the Olympics at age 30 in 1984 in Los Angeles and finished fourth. He earned his spot on the U.S. Olympic Team by setting his 13th American record at Lua error in Module:Convert at line 1851: attempt to index local 'en_value' (a nil value).[11] at the U.S. Olympic Trials on June 24.

Professionalism

In the transitional time when amateur sports were beginning to break the barrier of payment to athletes, Stones was a leading advocate of the change. During that period, one of the first options was for winnings to be paid to the athlete's club. To answer that, Stones created the Desert Oasis Track Club, a California corporation. The only athlete in the club was Dwight Stones.[12] The stockholders and officers were Dwight Stones and his family members. Stones first made money in the televised sports creation Superstars which was "donated" to the track club. This caused the IAAF and its American affiliate the AAU to suspend Stones. The ensuing lawsuit led to the Amateur Sports Act of 1978, which broke up the AAU, decertifying it as the national governing body for track and field (and many other sports) causing the formation of The Athletics Congress and the slow transition to allow professionalism.[8]

Records held

  • World Record: High Jump – 2.30 m (7 ft 6​1⁄2 in) on July 11, 1973 [2]
  • World Record: High Jump – 2.31 m (7 ft 6​3⁄4 in) on June 5, 1976
  • World Record: High Jump – 2.32 m (7 ft 7​1⁄4 in) on August 4, 1976
  • American Record: High Jump – 2.34 m (7 ft 8 in) on June 24, 1984 [11]

Championships

1984
  • 1984 Olympic Games: High Jump (4th)
  • 1984 U.S. Olympic Trials: High Jump – 2.34 m (1st)
1983
  • 1983 TAC Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1983 TAC Indoor Championships: High Jump (3rd)
1982
  • 1982 TAC Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
1980
  • 1980 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (3rd)
1978
  • 1978 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
1977
  • 1977 World Cup: High Jump (2nd)
  • 1977 AAU Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1977 USTFF Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1977 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
1976
1975
  • 1975 USTFF Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1975 USTFF Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1975 AAU Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1975 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (3rd)
1974
  • 1974 USTFF Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1974 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
1973
  • 1973 USTFF Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1973 USTFF Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1973 AAU Indoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
  • 1973 AAU Outdoor Championships: High Jump (1st)
1972
  • 1972 Summer Olympics: High Jump – 2.21 m (3rd – bronze medal)
  • 1972 U.S. Olympic Trials: High Jump – 2.21 m (1st)
  • 1972 NCAA Outdoor Championships: High Jump (3rd)(UCLA)

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  3. ↑ Medium Well: Your NBC Olympics lineup – A blog on sports media, news and networks – baltimoresun.com
  4. ↑ [1]
  5. ↑ [2]
  6. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  7. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  8. ↑ 8.0 8.1 http://articles.latimes.com/1991-10-17/sports/sp-993_1_dwight-stones/2
  9. ↑ 9.0 9.1 Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  10. ↑ Lua error in package.lua at line 80: module 'strict' not found.
  11. ↑ 11.0 11.1 http://www.usatf.org/statistics/champions/OlympicTrials/HistoryOfTheOlympicTrials.pdf?avad=55097_f6f7d5cf
  12. ↑ http://www.avclub.com/article/icheap-seatsi-superstars-1978-67865

External links

Records
Preceded by Men's High Jump World Record Holder
1973-07-11 — 1977-06-02		 Succeeded by
Soviet Union Vladimir Yashchenko
Sporting positions
Preceded by Men's High Jump Best Year Performance
1973 — 1976		 Succeeded by
Soviet Union Vladimir Yashchenko
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