The Best There Ever Was

There something just not right about track and field getting started at a Summer Olympics and Don Wittman not there to tell us all about the wonder of it all.
With all due respect to Mark Lee, a fine broadcaster in his own right, it says here that Wittman will always be the gold standard in track and field play-by-play. And Lee. we have no doubt, knows all about the enormous shoes he's being asked to fill at the Beijing Games.
Wittman died of cancer earlier this year at age 71, just seven months before these Olympics. Though he was better known to many as CBC's voice of the CFL and curling for so many years (he was also a mainstay on Hockey Night in Canada), Wittman became the authoritative voice of CBC's track and field coverage at the Summer Olympics. Arguably two of the biggest moments of Wittman's 40-plus years in the broadcast biz occurred at the Games track: Ben Johnson's steroid-tainted 100-metre triumph over Carl Lewis in Seoul in 1988, and Donovan Bailey's victory in the same event eight years later in Atlanta.
We also remember with fondness Wittman's line a week later, when the Canadian men's 4x100-metre relay team stunned the heavily favoured Americans in their own backyard. Wittman spoke for a nation when he said "oh, if you're a Canadian, you've got to love Saturday nights in Georgia."
More to the point, you had to love it best when Wittman and his esteemed analyst partner, Geoff Gowan, formed the finest track and field broadcast combination you'll ever want to hear.
In a nice tribute, CBC reminded us of all of this and so much more before the track competition in Beijing officially began earlier tonight. Wittman, you know, is looking down and smiling from his broadcast booth in the sky, loving every night of it in China, as long as there's a track meet to watch.
Yes, Ron MacLean, you had it right: Wittman is truly the best there'll ever be.