WOODERSON ANGRY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 20 June 1939, Page 5

WOODERSON ANGRY

WILL NEVER RACE IN U.S.A. AGAIN COMPLAINT OF BUMPING IN MILE EVENT. AMERICAN PRESS JIBES. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. NEW YORK, June 19. The English runner, S. U. Wooderson, who on Saturday ran fifth and last in the Princeton invitation mile event, which was won by the negro, ('buck Kenski*, is returning to England on -June 28. He declined to compete in the national championships on -July 3. “1 will never race in the United Slates again,” he declared today. “If it hadn’t been for that bumping, which threw'me,off my stride, I would have won the race,” he said. “I was feeling fine and waiting for the final straight to uncover my finishing run; Remember, the rules require two yards’ racing room.” Wooderson will possibly get' a chance of revenge in the White City in August, as the American team is going to the Continent shortly. The American Press agrees that Blaine (who finished fourth and who. Wooderson alleged, crowded him into the rail in the last half-lap) was shoulder-to-shoulder with Wooderson at the turn, but some contend that the Englishman merely misjudged his step.

The New York “Herald-Tribune” comments in an editorial: “It is an exception when an English athlete lives up to the advance publicity. We are not very good at fencing, Soccer, driving automobiles around sharp turns, or tossing flags in the air, but for the most part our track and field individuals, swimmers, rowers, polo players, golfers, tennis players and prize-fight-ers are a bit better than the best of the rest of the world.

“We feel our guest can do better when he is , less frightened, when .-.the weather is cooler, or if he isn’t bumped at the last turn, but Saturday's race was properly with Wooderson last.”

The athletics writer of the New York “Times” says: “Wooderson could not have won. He played into the hands of the Americans by setting the pace for all but the last 220 yards.” The ’“Times” quotes an unidentified competitor as saying that he saw Rideout a foot ahead at the bend and Wooderson run into him.

Jack Miley, writing in the New York “Post,” observes: “The English don't need any help in defeating themselves. They have got what it takes to wind up as the losers. The British polo team has been beaten in two straight games in ignominious fashion, which is as it should be as the English play polo as they do everything else —sitting down.” “All runners bear wide when they feel someone sprinting up to pass them,” says the athletics writer of the “Daily News.” “A European beat Hill in the Los Angeles Olympic Games with the same finish, but the American did not holler foul. To be a champion one runs with the head as well as the feet.”

Writing for the “Daily Mirror,” Bob Considine says: “There probably hasn't been a first-class mile in years that did not have a certain amount of elbowing and ‘gangway buddy’ to it. It is unfortunate that it should have happened to Wooderson, whose appearance British writers invested with as much unfair importance as the German journalists heaped on Schmeling’s second bout with Louis. Our milers are too selfcentred to have ganged on Wooderson. There isn’t one of them who would spike his mother if the old lady got in the way of his winning.”