By GEOFF CUMMING
The self-analysis games have begun: a nation studies the entrails of its Olympic team, searching for clues to the diminishing returns across the spectrum of sports.
New Zealand's biggest team yet produced its poorest medal haul since 1968.
Worse, the gap between our best and the world's best has widened in core disciplines such as track and field and swimming, to the point where we are hardly competitive.
In a country where sport is synonymous with national pride and identity, our inability to keep up in Sydney is nearly as bad as failing to win the Rugby World Cup.
The inquisition - which began almost as soon as the Olympic flame was lit - has laid blame on everyone from politicians and schoolteachers to the athletes and their parents.
But before we all whip ourselves in penance, let's reduce the field. Somewhere between "our athletes should be hungrier" and "they need more support" lies the answer to our sporting mediocrity.
Money is undoubtedly a factor. In most Olympic sports, our athletes compete at a huge disadvantage with rivals who have access to the best coaching, training facilities and sports science. Australia and Britain have proved that you can buy medals with well-financed campaigns.
After decades of under-performance at this level, Britain is toasting its re-emergence as a sporting nation after winning 11 golds and a total of 28 medals in Sydney. The Blair Government's investment of £36 million ($124 million) a year since 1997 is credited for the resurgence.
Contrast Canada, where lack of financial backing, which left some competitors on the poverty line, is blamed for a moderate medal tally of 14.
But it is not simply a matter of giving the athletes a blank cheque to buy Olympic glory. As veterans from Peter Snell to John Walker have said, our competitors must be willing to make sacrifices. And the money needs to be spent in the right areas.
New Zealand's disappointing results are all the more galling because they follow a deliberate strategy to boost our medal haul in Sydney.
Five years ago, these Olympics were identified as our greatest opportunity to do well since Melbourne in 1956 - the last time they were held in our backyard.
In 1995, Prime Minister Jim Bolger set up the Sport 2000 Taskforce to plot success at Sydney. It advocated directing most money to a handful of sports where we had the chance of winning medals.
The Sports Foundation was revamped to concentrate on high-performance sport, with chief executive Chris Ineson declaring: "We want our sportsmen and women in the A finals or within striking distance of a medal.
"The public wants winners," he said. "I would rather back 15 athletes to win 15 medals than send a team of 55 for the sake of participating."
To this end, annual lotteries funding nearly doubled, from $7.6 million in 1995-96 to $14.7 million last year. And the money was increasingly targeted to specific sports and individuals.
Eight sports - yachting, cycling, equestrian, rowing, athletics, hockey, swimming and triathlon - shared $14 million in the three years before Sydney. Money for women's softball doubled after the White Sox won their qualifying tournament.
As well, 23 individuals ranked among the world's best received direct funding.
The policy was a response to what the Sports Foundation has termed paltry funding compared with other nations. But even before the games, critics warned it was high-risk and shortsighted.
Instead of giving the money to a few athletes at their peak, many argued for money to help emerging talent reach its potential.
Has the picking winners approach delivered? Obviously not on the evidence of four medals returned by 150 Olympians.
Of greater concern, the vast majority failed to progress beyond qualifying rounds. Many of our track and field athletes and swimmers could not even muster personal bests.
But if the chickens have come home to roost, the public should have been ready for it. In track and field, our athletes have returned from every games since 1976 to "what went wrong?" debates.
New Zealand's double-figure medal hauls in 1984, 1988 and 1992 disguised a growing reliance on a few sports - equestrian, yachting and, in 1984, canoeing. Uncharitable observers, Australians especially, have pointed out that all these sports are contested sitting down.
In other sports, the gap between our best and the world's best has steadily widened.
John Walker, a member of the foundation, says it should take a hard look at what its funding approach for Sydney achieved.
His blunt assessment: "We've put a lot of money into failures."
Many sports officials share Walker's view that a longer-term vision is needed, with more emphasis on talent spotting, coaching and competition.
In technical sports where we don't have the expertise, coaches should be brought in from overseas, as happens in Australia, the United States and Europe. Athletes also need frequent exposure to world-class competition, and that means overseas travel.
That requires more money and here the Government must shoulder responsibility. Walker recalls sitting on a ministerial taskforce in the 1980s which recommended using lottery proceeds to finance sport. This led to the launching of Lotto in 1987. But this year, sport received only a quarter of the $123 million allocated from lotteries profits. Of the $30 million or so for sport, the Hillary Commission channels a third into programmes encouraging youngsters and older adults to participate in sport.
For the current financial year, only $3.8 million was specifically tagged for high-performance sport.
The rest of the lotteries money is put into health, welfare, the arts and the environment. Yet successive Governments have hidden behind the lotteries as an excuse to avoid directly giving money to sport.
Olympic sports have also suffered for being unable to garner the sponsors' dollars that television staples such as rugby, cricket and America's Cup yachting can call on.
Dependent on both lotteries' cash and corporate sponsorship, the Sports Foundation has adopted a cut-your-cloth-to-fit mentality.
Arguing against investment in bricks and mortar, it resisted for a decade calls to imitate the Australian Institute of Sport.
The Canberra-based institute provides training, coaching and sports science advice to teams and individuals - paid for by $26 million in Government funding each year. It is credited with transforming Australia from an Olympics also-ran in 1976 to a sporting superpower.
Ten years later the success of the Australian approach became obvious - at the 1990 Commonwealth Games in Auckland. New Zealand is poised to set up high-performance training academies in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Dunedin.
A number of sports administrators have reservations about the academies, fearing they will soak up scarce resources.
"They are trying to make an Australian Institute of Sport on the cheap," rowing coach Steve Gunn said yesterday.
The intention is that the academies will provide some of the advantages that foreign athletes, particularly in Europe, have come to enjoy, especially in technical sports.
But athletes from an isolated country of 3.8 million, struggling economically, must expect to compete with some disadvantages. As much as money is an issue, Sydney has raised questions about their commitment.
Like others, John Walker finds it inexcusable that our track and field representatives could not even produce personal bests. He believes some did not have to extend themselves to qualify for Sydney and were content simply to take part.
"To win a medal you have to get single-minded about it and train for years. You have to be prepared to go to Europe a year or so before the Olympics and get into tough, hard competition. Then, if you can't hack it, you just don't go to the Olympics."
Walker worries that debate about funding disparities and sports science will divert the focus from the athletes - and their determination to make sacrifices.
With the likes of Arthur Lydiard, Peter Snell and John Davies, Walker is of the old school who maintain there is no great secret to success in running. All the lectures, psychiatrists and monitoring in the world will not compensate for hard slog and the right coaching.
"We are trying to make it so complicated when it's really quite simple," he says. "What happened to just putting on a pair of running shoes, training hard and having a couple of beers and a pizza afterwards?
"What makes you compete better is ability, dedication, hard training and winning races."
He believes New Zealand track and field still has the grassroots talent to succeed internationally. The potential needs to be identified early and properly coached - and that is where the money should go.
"I don't believe you need hundreds of athletes just goofing off and not working."
The Sports Foundation has signalled a change in its approach with the introduction of its high-performance academies.
Within days of the start of the games, Ineson told the Herald of his concern that the gap had widened between our best athletes and the world's elite. The quality and depth of Olympic competition was truly formidable and the games were "a reality check" for New Zealanders.
The need to put more emphasis on coaching and extending the talent base had become obvious, he said. If Sydney signals the end of the picking winners approach, developing sports will be grateful.
New Zealand Gymnastics executive director Marie Stechman says that without an international profile and no academy, the sport has struggled for the money it needs to raise standards.
An initiative to employ a national director of coaching collapsed last year when the foundation reduced finance because athletes had not met its performance targets. The Russian coach moved on to Australia.
Other sports had similar pre-Olympic coaching crises. Athletics New Zealand's high-performance director Steve Hollings lost his job and swimming coach Brent Naylor's future employment was unclear.
Swimming New Zealand chief Catriona McBean says the games highlighted the need for our swimmers to go overseas more often.
"The swimmers who swam with Susie O'Neill and Inge de Bruin found it a great experience but they also found it daunting. The huge media build-up and the psychological games they play - it's not just what happens in the water but the out-of-water experiences."
Judo New Zealand president Harry O'Rourke supports the view that more money must be found for coaching and for sending teams overseas.
Such strategies are not likely to produce results in time for the next Olympics in 2004. If, as Ineson contends, New Zealanders crave international competitiveness rather than taking part, then a much smaller team should go to Athens.
As debate about our performance rages, a Government taskforce is hearing submissions on a comprehensive overhaul of New Zealand sport and leisure.
Ineson sees the review as the public's chance to tell the Government which is more important - winning medals or participating.
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