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The International Paralympic Committee said yesterday it was considering whether to sanction Oscar Pistorius for his outburst on Bladegate over the length of his competitors blades after the 200m final at the Olympic Stadium on Sunday night.<\/p>\n
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The International Paralympic Committee said yesterday it was considering whether to sanction Oscar Pistorius for his outburst on \u201cBladegate\u201d over the length of his competitors\u2019 blades after the 200m final at the Olympic Stadium on Sunday night. <\/p>\n
It was unlikely that they would, however, after the committee\u2019s spokesman also admitted yesterday that Pistorius, the most recognisable face in Paralympic sport, had asked them to check the length of the blades of one of his competitors six weeks ago. <\/p>\n
After finishing second to Brazil\u2019s Alan Oliveira, Pistorius vented his frustration at the increased length of the new Paralympic champion\u2019s blades, saying that the \u201ccommittee \u201cjust won\u2019t listen, the guys are running ridiculous times\u201d. <\/p>\n
At the medal presentation yesterday it looked as though Pistorius had a point. <\/p>\n
On the podium Oliveira, who had towered above him after the race, was almost a full head shorter than him wearing \u201cnormal\u201d |prosthetics. <\/p>\n
\u201cOscar phoned me six weeks ago to complain about one athlete and his blade length,\u201d said Craig Spence, the committee\u2019s communications officer. <\/p>\n
\u201cWithin five hours of receiving that phone call we replied that the athlete in question was perfectly legitimate. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt wasn\u2019t Oliveira that he had the concerns about\u2026 therefore, we thought the issue was closed.\u201d <\/p>\n
Pistorius did not, however, and before Sunday night\u2019s race had spoken of his fear that the race would become a farce as Oliveira and Blake Leeper, the American who took bronze, had made their blades a lot longer. <\/p>\n
Pistorius admitted he had been wrong with the timing of his criticism of the rules regarding the maximum allowed length of the carbon-fibre blades that amputee athletes may use. <\/p>\n
He congratulated Oliveira on beating him in the 200m, the first time he has been beaten over the distance, but he did not back down from his criticism of the International Paralympic Committee or the rules. The Team SA management welcomed Pistorius\u2019s apology for his outburst and said they would back him if he wished to take the matter further. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe note and welcome Oscar\u2019s apology for anything said in haste, and we obviously fully understand that he was emotionally upset immediately after such an important event,\u201d said its CEO Tubby Reddy. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ll sit down with Oscar and discuss his concerns and look to address those. <\/p>\n
\u201cHe has our full backing.\u201d <\/p>\n
Spence also said the International Paralympic Committee would take into account that Pistorius had been emotional when they consider any potential sanction against him. <\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s something that we need to take away and discuss,\u201d said Spence. <\/p>\n
\u201cObviously we understand the pressure of coming here and competing in the Olympics and Paralympics, and to suffer your first defeat in over a year in front of 80 000 people is clearly going to hurt. <\/p>\n
\u201cClearly he has an issue which he wants to raise with us and the emotion got to him last night. <\/p>\n
\u201cAt the moment we don\u2019t know, but will make a decision.\u201d <\/p>\n
The committee would also discuss any concerns Pistorius had after the Paralympics. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The International Paralympic Committee said yesterday it was considering whether to sanction Oscar Pistorius for his outburst on Bladegate over the length of his competitors blades after the 200m final at the Olympic Stadium on Sunday night. The International Paralympic Committee said yesterday it was considering whether to sanction Oscar Pistorius for his outburst on […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-14250","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14250","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14250"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14250\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14250"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14250"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14250"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}