GREATEST MILER EVER

Evening Star, Issue 22444, 15 September 1936, Page 4

GREATEST MILER EVER

AMERICANS ENTHUSE OVER LOVELOCK “AN AUTOMOBILE TO BEAT HIM” The Reichs Sportfield dressing room, with the flag of “ Neussland ” on its door, was a madhouse (cabled Henry M'Lemore, from Berlin to the ‘ Brooklyn Times Union,’ on August 7, after Jack Lovelock, the New Zealander, had won the 1,500 metres flat race at the Olympic Games at Berlin in world record time). That is, as near a madhouse as a half-hundred wildly excited subjects of Edward VIII. could make it. In the centre of the little cement - walled room, which reeked with liniment, was Jack Lovelock, looking for all the world like the last man in the world you would name as the world’s greatest miler. But as he stood there, his blonde curls dishevelled and with a shy grin on his face, that’s just what he was. For, a few minutes before, with one of the largest sports crowds in history looking on, he had outraced the pick of the world to win-the Olympic 1,500 metres championship. Behind him when he broke the tape in world record time, vainly trying to match the power in his slim, girlish legs, were such barrel-chested powerhouse runners as Glen Cunningham of the United States, Luigi Becalli of Italy, Archie San Romani of the United States, Paul Edwards of Canada, and seven others. PRETTY HOT IS RIGHT. “ You were pretty hot to-day, weren’t you?” said the American reporter. Lovelock grinned. “ I was a bit wound up, wasn’t IP” he answered. “ And perhaps it’s well that I was, for that was a pretty brisk bit of business out there, wasn’t it?” “ Do you think you could have run it faster, Jack?” someone asked. “No; I don’t think so,” the little New Zealander answered. “ Then, why did you look over your shoulder in the stretch? That must have slowed you up a bit when you saw you were in safety?” “ No,” Lovelock answered with a grin. “ I always have to peek, you know. It’s very satisfying when you’re ahead.” “ Listen, Jack,” said the American reporter, “ quit stalling and tell us • what we want to know. Could you have run a faster race than you did?” Lovelock smiled, and, turning to the British reporters, said: “ These American reporters! They will pin you down. They’ve had me at Princeton •and now they have me at Berlin. Well, I’ll say this much. I knew I could run to a world record to-day. I didn’t know if it would be good enough to win; but I knew someone would have to do mighty well to beat me. There’s no telling what would have happened in the stretch had we been all together.” COACHES SING PRAISES, There wasn’t an American coach who saw the race who didn’t say that Lovelock, in winning, was the “ hottest ” thing he ever saw on the track, and that he finished with lots of run in his legs. Frank Welch, who coaches San Romani, said it was the greatest performance he had seen in all his years of coaching, and that he was proud his boy could finish as well as fourth in such a field. “ Good God.” Welch said, “ I clocked him at 56 for his last quarter. You can’t beat that in an automobile!” Lovelock, who must have been kidding when lie allowed Sidney Wooderson to beat him three times in England prior to the Games, was never worse than fourth at any time in the race. He took complete charge 300 metres from home when he turned on the heat to sail by Cunningham and move to the top of the pack. He never was headed. After breaking the tape he swept along halfway around the track, still in beautiful stride. “ There’s no use saying that I am not disappointed, for you know this is the second time I have broken the world record for the 1,500 and still finished second,” Glen Cunningham said. “ Billy Bonthron did it to me in Milwaukee two years ago, and now Lovelock does it to-day. But I don’t guess a man has much right to complain when he runs a 3:48.4 race.”-