Thick with Jamaican accent and complete with three World Championship medals won in the yellow vest of the Caribbean nation, Germaine Mason is preparing to see his name on a Great Britain teamsheet for the first time this week. It is the start of a journey that, if the high jumper proves as good as his boast, will lead to the top step of the Olympic rostrum.
“I know I can win Olympic gold,” Mason said. Not hopes, or believes, but knows. A former training companion of Asafa Powell, Mason possesses the unshakeable self-belief of the world’s joint-fastest man. He even uses the same turn of phrase. When Powell gave a press conference five days before equalling the 100 metres world record in Gateshead last weekend, he was asked how fast he might run the distance eventually. “The sky’s the limit,” Powell said. And Mason’s view of his own potential? “The sky’s the limit,” came the reply.
Mason, 23, has been led to believe that, when the selectors meet today to pick their team for the European Cup in M?laga next week, the high jump berth is his for the taking. “I have been told I have been selected,” Mason said. In which case he will make his British debut in a competition of which he has little knowledge. “I do not know a lot about it,” Mason confessed. Why would he? To Caribbean athletes, the European Cup means as little as the Pan-American Games means to Europeans. It was in becoming Pan-American champion in 2003 that Mason jumped 2.34 metres, finishing the year as joint-ranked world No 3. That remains his best height but he believes that Steve Smith’s British record of 2.37 is within his reach.
Having won medals at two World Junior Championships, Mason made his first visit to the senior podium in March 2004, taking the bronze at the World Indoor Championships. However, after rupturing a patella tendon, he missed the Olympic Games in Athens and returned with caution last season, jumping 2.27 as he eased his way back. While on the mend, Mason fell out with his coach, Stephen Francis, who guides Powell, and the athlete went to Austin, Texas, to be coached by Sue Humphrey, who trained Charles Austin to the 1996 Olympic high jump title.
Although Mason is now based in Birmingham, Humphrey coaches him by e-mail. Not having competed for Jamaica for two years, Mason is eligible for Britain and he has jumped 2.28 twice this season. It was while he was at the 2000 World Junior Championships, in Santiago, Chile, that Mason suffered a bizarre experience that gave him the idea of competing for Britain.
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His father was born in London, but lives in Jamaica, and his mother was born in Jamaica, but lives in London with the athlete’s three brothers, so Mason had dual citizenship. Arriving in Santiago, he had taken only a British passport.
“I did not hold a Jamaican passport, so I went with my British passport and there was a problem about me competing for Jamaica,” Mason said. “I did not understand what was going on and I was thinking: ‘Why not let me compete for Britain since I am here already?’ They managed to resolve it but, since that day, it has been stuck in my head that I want to compete for Britain.”
But, all the while that he was injury-free, Mason was reluctant to serve a mandatory suspension to switch allegiance. The knee injury gave him that chance and Britain a leg up in the fight to become a top nation again.