Patrick Robinson | A statue of the transformational coach

Where did it all begin? In a paper for a workshop, Stephen Francis wrote that, in 1998 at the World Junior Championships in France, he listened as coaches from the US said, “Coaching teenagers is nothing, just baby- sitting. They are growing so fast that it does not require astute coaching skills to get them to improve.  When they stop growing is when the real coaching comes into play at 19 for girls, age 20-21 for men.  You people in Jamaica can’t coach.  All you do is keep the teenagers ready and interested until we, the real coaches, take over”.  
Stung by that harsh criticism, Stephen Francis established the MVP Track Club in 1999. And how did Glen Mills and Stephen Francis, coaches of some of the fastest sprinters in history, wholly trained in Jamaica, make those coaches eat their words!
The first great success for Coach Francis was the 2008 Beijing Olympics: Shelly-Ann Fraser, gold medal in the 100m, Melaine Walker, gold medal in the 400m hurdles, Sherone Simpson, silver medal in the 100m, Shericka Williams, silver medal in the 400m, and Germaine Mason, silver medal in the high jump, representing the United Kingdom. Had these athletes represented another, single country, that country would have placed sixth at the Olympics in track and field athletics.
Twinning athletic training provided by MVP with tertiary education at UTech was a master stroke by Stephen Francis.  For, in doing so he, was offering Jamaica the system that existed in the US, from which many Jamaican athletes had benefitted.  It is in this sense that Stephen Francis’ contribution to the development of athletics in Jamaica is truly transformational. Stephen Francis showed that there was no need for Jamaicans to go to the US for athletic training and tertiary education. 
For me, the most attractive feature of his work was his willingness, if not eagerness, to take under his wings athletes who did not do very well at Champs and make them into world champions.  Asafa Powell’s best time for the 100m was 10.80 secs. What Stephen Francis achieved was truly remarkable. In 2007, Powell became the world record holder with a time of 9.72 secs. But what he accomplished with Elaine Thompson-Herah was even more phenomenal.  At age 20 when she started at MVP, she was running in the 11.80s for the 100m. Some coaches might have suggested that Elaine take up dancing. But he saw something special in her. Elaine is the only athlete to win the 100m and 200m in consecutive Olympics. Moreover, her time of 10.54 secs for the 100m is second only to Florence Griffith Joyner’s 10.49 secs, and, the less said about Flo-Jo, the better.  In a real sense, Stephen Francis and the MVP made Asafa and Elaine great athletes.
Another admirable feature of the work of Stephen Francis is that he coached not only sprinters, but also athletes in the field events.  Mention has already been made of the Jamaican, Germaine Mason, who won silver for the UK in the high jump at the Beijing Olympics.  In 2019, Tajay Gayle won the long jump at the World Championships. Francis’ wholistic approach to track and field athletics should be copied by other Jamaican coaches.
The third feature to be highlighted in Coach Francis’ work is that he made MVP a club from which great coaches have emerged and established their own track clubs:  Reynaldo Walcott of Elite Track Club, Shanikie Osbourne of Uptimum Track Club, and Okeile Stewart of SWEPT Track Club. Thus, Francis is responsible for the MVP producing not only world-class athletes but also world-class coaches.  This is progress and development.
Shericka Jackson has been with the MVP Club from she left Vere Technical High School. Her time of 21.41 secs for the 200m is second only to 21.34 secs by Flo-Jo and, of the latter, the less said, the better. So that, for all practical purposes, in Elaine Thompson-Herah and Shericka Jackson, Stephen Francis and the MVP have produced athletes with the fastest times ever in the 100m and 200m, respectively. 
Coach Francis’ training regimen, worth more than gold, is a Jamaican treasure.
Another excerpt from the 2009 book: “The social and economic significance of what Stephen Francis and the MVP Club are doing at UTech appears to have escaped most Jamaicans. It is not to indulge in hyperbolic comment to say that they are doing for athletics in Jamaica what Marcus Garvey, Norman Manley and Alexander Bustamante did for our political life years ago. For what they are doing, and doing successfully, is nothing less than liberating Jamaican athletes from dependency on a foreign country”. 
Although this was written 17 years ago, the intervening years have strengthened, not weakened, the argument. 
With a total 29 gold, 30 silver and 17 bronze medals won by MVP athletes, the success of Jamaica in global athletics in the 21st century is, predominantly, the success of the MVP Club. 
None of what has been said in praise of Stephen Francis means that I have no regard for other track coaches in Jamaica.  My book devotes several pages to these coaches, including, of course, the great Glen Mills.
How is Jamaica to honour this man who so radically transformed track and field athletics? If education and agriculture had been radically transformed in the way that Stephen Francis radically transformed track and field athletics, Jamaica would already have been a First-World country. We must end the tradition of honouring students but not celebrating their teachers.  A coach is a teacher. The most fitting way to celebrate the contribution of Stephen Francis to Jamaica is to have a statue erected at the National Stadium representing his likeness.

Judge Patrick Robinson is a former Jamaican member of the International Court of Justice (ICJ). He is the author of ‘Jamaican Athletics - A Model for the World’ and executive producer of the documentary, ‘Jus Run’. Send feedback to columns@gleanerjm.com