The Golden Days...
Jim Ryun, in 1966, brought the world record for the mile back to
the United States for the first time since 1937. His time of 3
minutes 51.3 seconds, made on July 17, at Berkeley, Calif.,
smashed Michel Jazy's previous mark of 3 minutes 53.6 seconds by
2.3 seconds. He was timed at the quarter mile posts in 57.6
seconds, 1 minute 55.5 seconds, and 2 minutes 55.3 seconds. Ryun
also set a world record in the half-mile of 1 minute 44.9
seconds, and a U.S. record in the two-mile of 8 minutes 25.2
seconds
Only one other athlete, sprinter Tommy Smith of San Jose
State College, seriously challenged Ryun's supremacy on the
track. Smith set four world records at 200 meters and 220 yards.
On May 7, he lowered the standard for the straightaway race from
20 seconds to 19.5 seconds, and on June 11 he ran around a full turn in
20 seconds to take .2 (two tenths) of a second off the world record. Both
marks were set at 220 yards, thus automatically applying to the
shorter 200-meter distance (218 yards 2 feet 2 inches).
Smith also excelled as a member of the U.S. team that set a
world record for the 1,600-meter relay with a clocking of 2
minutes 59.6 seconds. His 400-meter leg of the relay took only
43.8 seconds, at that time the fastest ever. Smith also set a
world record of 44.5 seconds for 400 meters in 1967.
Too Heavy a Weight
to Pass On?
The United
States has long ceased to be a power in international
weightlifting. When the opposite was true, John Davis, a Black
heavyweight from Brooklyn, ruled the world. Davis won the
heavyweight gold medal in 1948 and 1952. To date, he is the
United States' only black heavyweight weightlifting gold medalist.
Additionally, he was undefeated in all competitions between 1938
and 1952. The United States has not had a heavyweight gold
medalist in weightlifting of any persuasion since Paul
Anderson in 1956, and there has been no gold medalist in
any weight class since 1960.
Things
That Make You Go Hmmmm....
Milt Campbell, silver medalist
in the decathlon in 1952 and gold medal winner in 1956 (Rafer
Johnson won the silver medal), is the
only decathlon champion to hold a world record in an
individual event. In 1957 Campbell ran 7.0 seconds for the 60
yard indoor high hurdles and 13.4 for the 120 yard outdoor high
hurdles. Also, he is the only United States decathlon
champion to be a national champion in high school: Campbell
was national champion and record holder in the 180 yard low hurdles and national
record holder in the 120 yard high hurdles (13.8
in 1952).
When he won
the silver decathlon medal in 1952 he had just finished his
junior year in high school (Bob Mathias was the winner with his second gold
medal.) Campbell was also All American in high school football,
All-American in high school track and field, and All-American in swimming, and
he was voted the greatest high school
athlete in the world. He also played two years of professional
football with the Cleveland Browns and eight years in the
Canadian Football league. A high hurdler by specialty,
Campbell only competed in the decathlon during the United
States Olympic trials and the Olympic games. Yet ESPN did not include him in their
list of the top 50 athletes of the century, while Mathias and
Johnson were included.
According to David Wallechinsky
(The 1992 Book of the Olympics) Lentauw and Yamasani,
(that is all that is known of their names) two Zulus, were the
first Black Africans to participate in the modern Olympics.
Their participation in the 1906 marathon was not planned as
they were in St. Louis as part of the Boer War exhibit and
they entered the event without any
type of training. Lentauw lost a lot of time when he was
chased off course and through a cornfield by two large dogs,
yet he managed to finished ninth.
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