Oscar Pistorius

As I'm sure all of you know that Oscar Pistorius aka "Blade Runner" is trying his best to run against "able body" athletes at this year's upcoming Beijing Olympic Games. He's the Paralympic World Record holder at 100, 200 and 400 meters. Yesterday the IAAF ruled that he is ineligible for this years 29th Olympiad as well as any other sanction able body events.

Here in the "4700 House", I was the only one who thought he should be able to run the 400 at the Olympics if he qualified for it. I'm not arguing the fact that his "Cheetah" prosthetic legs may give him an unfair advantage, I was arguing the fact that he should be able to compete based solely on the fact that the Olympic Creed states:

"The most important thing in the Olympic Games is not to win but to take part, just as the most important thing in life is not the triumph but the struggle. The essential thing is not to have conquered but to have fought well."

If his only dream is that to compete in this year's Olympics, then based on the Creed, they should let him. I don't think that he poses a great threat to the Jeremy Wariner's and LaShawn Merritt's of the world, I don't even think he would make it past the first round with his personal record being 46.56 (in the 2004 Athens Olympics, 45.88 was the slowest time to make it out of the first round), but in the actual spirit of the Olympics, he should at least get a shot.

He realistically doesn't stand a snowball's chance in hell competing, for the simple fact that if the IAAF/IOC let him compete, then that would open a Pandora's Box of situations that no one really wants to deal with. I think his prosthetics do give him an advantage by not experiencing fatigue in his legs and he uses 30% less energy and all that, but I hope he does exhaust all of his avenue's in order to realize his dream this summer.