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Home » documentary » The Price of Gold Documentary

The Price of Gold Documentary

July 21, 2013 By Gregor Winter

Documentary Time …

I recently watched The Price of Gold.

It is a Swedish documentary that takes a look at what sacrifices elite athletes have to make in order to push human maximums for the sake of sport.

For this they followed some of Sweden’s top track and field athletes (Carolina Klüft, Christian Olsson, Susanna Kallur) and tell the stories of their training lives and the injuries that came with their lifestyle.



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Filed Under: documentary, Featured, videos

About Gregor Winter

Hi, I run ATG.

Follow me on instagram @gregorwinter (and ATG @atginsta).

Comments

  1. grobpote says

    July 21, 2013 at 22:08

    O man, it was incredible!

  2. Bill says

    July 21, 2013 at 22:37

    Good documentary. The most shocking thing to see was the male decathlete’s left elbow lockout.

  3. Nish says

    July 22, 2013 at 03:28

    I need a cortisone shot after seeing those cleans. Real shame about the younger athletes.

  4. Ricochet says

    July 23, 2013 at 06:31

    Amazing to hear how hungry they are/were and that they were breaking records and winning medals while dieting and/or hungry! Maybe another reason for the high injury rates as well… what say you?

    • biglifter says

      July 23, 2013 at 11:50

      That had to do with stress. Most of the injuries were stress related, over training etc. So stress plays a huge role in injuries. They need to change their training methods somewhat the fact all the young athletes are getting serious injuries is not good.

    • Dan says

      July 24, 2013 at 05:56

      Both dieting and general stress combine to impact cortisol levels and leptin/ghrelin (sorry to beat a dead horse). Like He said down below, too much stress is no good.

  5. biglifter says

    July 23, 2013 at 11:10

    Do all Swedish people look like models? Great documentary though

  6. MAS says

    July 23, 2013 at 21:20

    Christian Olsson (triple jumper, height 1.92m, weight about 73kg) do hang power clean with 147,5kg O_o BEAST!

  7. Swedish athlete says

    July 24, 2013 at 08:54

    Susanna just recently commented on the positive doping cases from USA and Jamaica, stating that at least her own records had been set with just regular food. She forgot all the anti inflamatory drugs she took during her carrer and on top of that the Xylocain injections she got in her tibia to be able to train and take part in the 2008 Olympics…

    • Ricochet says

      July 24, 2013 at 11:16

      You are considering the use of NSAIDs as doping? Why? Not arguing with you… I am sincerely curious to why you would think this.

      • Swedish athlete says

        July 24, 2013 at 16:33

        It is the exact same thing. You have to get through a training program that your body can’t adapt to and handle. You get hurt! Instead of talong one step back and listen to the body, you take drugs to get rid of the pain and be able to carry on with the program…

        • Swedish athlete says

          July 24, 2013 at 16:38

          I’m not saying that NSAID’s are doping beacause they ain’t. But using them to be able to train and compete is basically the same thing as doping! Not to
          Mention that they have foten openly talked about the use of corticosteroid injections, which according to WADA, is doping!

          • Ricochet says

            July 25, 2013 at 12:38

            Gotcha; thanks for responding as I was interested in your reply. Food for thought mate. Cheers.

    • jh says

      November 12, 2013 at 22:20

      if you start with a bad premise,you end with a bad answer.
      All elite sport is based on performance enhancement-you ban that,you confuse elite sport..So cortisone is allowed (you know the long term damage of cortisone),and some footballer gets a temporary ban for cocaine.
      Cocaine is not performance enhancing-it is incredibly stupid and fuels s ome fascist mafia,but it ain’t going to make you run quicker or pass the ball more accurately.
      Oxygen tents allowed,high altitude training allowed – I could go on-no wonder athletes are confused-they both represent performance enhancement.
      ok-let us try a different test-does taking whatever result in a shorter life expectancy for the athlete?
      If it does,ban it,those taking it,those coaching and encouraging the consumption -FOR LIFE.
      That is simple

  8. Will says

    August 2, 2013 at 16:55

    I think Agne Bergvall is an incompetent. He sould be banned. The ridiculous thought that you need to completely destroy your body in order to win medals is silly. A lot of athletes have had very successful career and were almost never injured : Michael Johnson, Frankie Fredericks, Jonathan Edwards. The issue is not having one athlete badly injured, that can happen. But if all your athletes are systematically injured with the same kind of injuries and you think it is ok, then you’re just incompetent. Shame on you Swedish coaches.

    • Andrew k. says

      August 14, 2013 at 10:24

      I agree. Look at Chinese athletes. Long tedious hours lifting but they spend almost equal amounts of time recovering. The form of some of the exercises shown such as the lifting and depth jumps were terrible. The decisions made by the athletes were also poor and the coaches should not have let them train whilst injured.

      • Andrew k. says

        August 14, 2013 at 10:25

        It also seems their diets were horrid. The woman who’s bones were that brittle. Most the athletes looked almost malnourished.

    • Carl Jacobson says

      November 18, 2013 at 05:16

      I also agree.
      I wonder if Bergvall ever competed himself? If he did, he should have a better idea on athlete’s recovery and reducing injury and burn-out.
      It seemed like the athletes didn’t cycle their training at all , it was just balls-to-the-wall all the time, no wonder they are plagued by injuries.
      What kind of coach has their athletes do a single leg depth drop a day before competition? An idiot who doesn’t understand the proper use of shock training. It’s like they read the soviet sports training literature but didn’t understand how to apply it properly.
      If the Swedish government spent $50 million kronars or euros, and built the most hi-tech training facilities. they could at least have gotten some competent coaches.

      • PPLu69 says

        January 1, 2014 at 17:55

        Agree!
        But it’s been the way for too many coaches everywhere in the world. The fact is that we only remember the medals….

  9. Dave Brewer says

    September 6, 2013 at 20:29

    Great website. Thank you for that post and many others!!!!

    • Gregor says

      September 6, 2013 at 20:31

      Thanks Dave

  10. Carl Jacobson says

    November 18, 2013 at 05:07

    Good Documentary – It captured the tunnel vision mentality of the athletes,

    BUT – What concerned me was the fact that several of those injured athletes were all trained by the same coach. It seemed that they didn’t have a grasp of the concept of periodization and were overtrained chronically. They were using other training concepts wrong and injuring themselves during training and then competing injured.
    They misused the plyometric/shock training – those tactic should only be used for several weeks close to competition and then tapered off befpre competing.
    They showed footage of the heptathlete girl, the day before competing, doing a warm-up depth drop that resulted in a injury. That’s pure stupidity or just terrible coaching.

    • PPLu68 says

      January 1, 2014 at 18:00

      Yeahhhh!!

  11. An athlete says

    January 21, 2014 at 04:47

    Just imagine all those athletes that don’t get to the top, but yet they give everything. A younger non elite athlete can be just as obsessed about track as the elite athletes, and it can mean just as much to them, but yet they are forced to quit due to injuries or other problems. Is it still worth it?

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