One,Two and Three-Lap Wonders

As a child, athletics was one of the few sports where I would get to see black faces on screen. Boxing was another, and those Bank Holiday Harlem Globetrotters basketball specials featuring the incomparable Meadowlark Lemon, but Olympics and other European meetings worked wonders at bringing multiculturalism to a land where racism remained rife. For example, I remember warming to the likes of Kenyan runner Kip Keino, Tanzanian miler Filbert Bayi and Ugandan hurdler John Akii-Bua.

In the Seventies, I remember when the American 400 metre hurdler Ed Moses was literally unbeatable for almost ten years. It’s astonishing to think that between August 1977 and June 1987, he won 122 consecutive races. Imagine what it must have been like for other athletes lining up against him week in week out, knowing before the start that they had zero chance of success. I tend to nurture a natural antipathy towards American athletes who in the UK seem to be accorded far more glory and publicity than they merit. Nevertheless, in Moses’ case, it was thoroughly justified. Unlike runners like Carl Lewis, he was so cool and dignified about it, taking success in his (very long) stride.

I was less enthusiastic about Michael Johnson in the 1990s. I find it hard to like anyone who feels compelled to run in gold shoes but when it came to watching him run the 200 and 400 metres, opening up impossibly vast gaps ahead of the field with that weird upright stance and choppy stride, even I had to admire the man. 

The sport was also a shop window for sportsmen from the Communist world, including sprinters like Valeri Borzov and Renate Stecher from the USSR and East Germany. Occasionally an athlete from Cuba would take centre stage and I remember being struck by Alberto Juantorena at the Montreal Olympics. With a frizz seemingly as wide as his lane, he possessed a power and giant stride which nobody else could match. Unusually he took gold in the 400 and 800 metres, a rare combination.  Sadly injuries restricted his opportunities thereafter but he was an instant hit for this fifteen year-old.

He wasn’t in top condition to defend his titles in Moscow four years later but by then all eyes – especially those in Britain – were on two of our own middle-distance men. It says much about the instant gratification of modern audiences that the 100m dash has taken over. Once all the tendon-stretching tension and grimacing on the blocks end in hush, ten seconds is all it takes to release a rampant rush of energy and adrenalin for the runners and spectators alike. However, in the ‘70s and ‘80s, the so-called ‘Blue Riband’ event was the 1500 metres. While most sports events span a few hours, days even, athletics is capable of squeezing so much into such a short time. Like a perfect pop song, three and a half minutes was enough to incorporate distinct phases: cagey build-up, acceleration (and maybe a few dramatic trips), the promise on the final bend and the heart-pounding, leg-trembling finale.

Between 1979 and 1984, not only over 1500 metres but also the 800, Sebastian Coe and Steve Ovett made for great box office, not only in the UK but around the world. In July and August each year, they would treat us to tantalising attempts on world records, the paying spectators bashing the advertising boards with abandon, and raising the roof to inspire the Brits to go faster and faster.

The problem was that they would always avoid each other on the circuit. The summer of 1981 was particularly memorable when it came to middle-distance running. Amidst the frenzy surrounding Botham’s Ashes by day, the August evenings would feature some incredible races around Europe. Coe won the European Cup 800m for Britain in Zagreb then came an extraordinary sequence of mile records. Ovett owned the best time until Seb broke the world record at the Weltklasse in Zurich. A week later Ovett, on his own throughout the last lap, grabbed it back in Koblenz. Two days later, it was Coe’s turn, this time in Brussels. Who knows how quick he and Ovett would have run had they gone head-to-head?

At the time, the two Brits also held the world records for 800m (Coe) and 1500m (Ovett) as well as various minor distances like 1000m and Coe’s time of 1;41.73 stood for sixteen years, those figures engrained on my brain for all time. Ovett wasn’t the last British record holder, though. That achievement went to Steve Cram, although his ‘metric mile’ standard lasted a mere six weeks in 1985. Peter Elliott and Tom McKean also flew the flag with some success into the Nineties but by this time the middle-distance axis had already shifted decisively towards Africa, especially the north. Throughout the Eighties and Nineties, Said Aouita, Noureddine Morceli and the astonishing Hicham El Guerrouj dominated the middle distances and the latter’s 1500 metres time of 3 minutes 26 has survived almost two decades. The latter was as supreme in major competitions as the IAAF Golden League and is one of the few whose reputation can match those of Coe and Ovett who so lit up my summers for several years.