John Walker: Kiwi flyer who beat the wind

By RICHARD BOOCK

The wind was eating away at him. It moaned through the streets of Gothenburg, plucking pieces of litter off the ground, whistling at him, almost taunting him. "Forget the record, John," it seemed to squeal. "There'll be no record here."

He knew he was being paranoid. But on the night of August 11, 1975, New Zealand track sensation John Walker was racked with doubt. The world mile record beckoned the next day and he was ready.

But what of the variables? The slow track, the open stadium, the weather ...

"This wind is going to stuff everything up," he told his running partner Rod Dixon for the umpteenth time, and turned away from the hotel window.

Room 347 was basic, with clothes and running gear strewn from wall to wall. Sometimes it wasn't so much a case of finding something clean as finding something cleaner than the rest. But Walker already knew what he was wearing for the record attempt - and the black New Zealand singlet was folded and ready.

As it happened, almost everything went wrong at the stadium.

The wind was still blowing, Walker's prearranged pacesetter turned out to be less than ideal, and the big-chested Kiwi was left to run half the race by himself - urged along by a small, but capacity Gothenburg crowd.

That he was going to win was never really in question. Before this event, the Aucklander had run 13 races in Europe and won 13. He had broken Peter Snell's New Zealand mile record and run a 1500m in 3m 32.4s, which would remain his quickest time over the distance.

Beside the track, other athletes were screaming "world record" at him as he surged around the course, and the 9000 people watching were out of their seats clapping and chanting in excitement. But Walker was still uncertain about his chances as he sprinted to the tape, 46 yards (42m) ahead of Australian Ken Hall.

He knew from the splits that he was on target, but did not know how the last lap had panned out.

It wasn't until New Zealand track journalist Ivan Agnew thrust a stopwatch under his nose and shouted, "Under three fifty," that the 23-year-old knew. He held his head in his hands, sobbed, "My God," and thrust his arms to the sky. He was the fastest miler ever.

The world sat up. Filbert Bayi's record of 3m 51s had been shattered and Walker had become the first man to break 3m 50s for the mile. He finished in 3m 49.4s; in the history of the glamour race only Roger Bannister's 3m 59.4s - the first sub-four minute mile, run in 1954 - rates as a more significant act.

fxdrop,2,100 W E MEET for a chat at his Manurewa equestrian shop, where he perches himself on an old crate and casts his mind back 25 years.

"I can just shut my eyes and recall it all as if it was yesterday," he says. "Date, time, place, the atmosphere, the weather, the crowd. It's all there."

Stricken with Parkinson's disease, Walker is bespectacled these days, and his once long mane of blond hair has been trimmed to a slightly more conservative off-the-collar style. He is methodical in his actions, deliberate with his words, and - despite his sporting success - lives a modest lifestyle with few extravagances.

He was the first man to run 100 sub-four minute miles; he won Commonwealth Games silver and bronze medals for the 1500m and 800m in 1974; he obliterated the mile mark in 1975; the following year he won gold in the Olympic 1500m at Montreal.

Had it all happened 15 years later, the New Zealand Sportsman of the Decade, 1970-79, might have carried multimillion-dollar marketing potential. But things were still far from professional back in the mid-70s, and the rewards meagre.

"I was given a cheque for $800 and a plaque with my name on it," chuckles Walker, who refers to race organisers as "meat promoters."

"We were young and naive. We ran to make a little money to pay for our accommodation, but our chief motivation was to run fast.

"We travelled around by boat, bus, and by hitching rides. We did it tough. We organised everything ourselves and shared squalid little hotel rooms, which were usually covered in our clothes and gear because, well, we were a fairly messy bunch.

"On the day of the race, I had a quiet jog in the morning, then my customary lunch of fish and chips and a Coca-Cola, before heading back to the hotel room for a short sleep in the afternoon. The wind was still blowing, and that was a worry."

He recalls watching Dixon win the 5000m and fellow New Zealander Bevan Smith triumph in the 400m that night. He knew the elements were against him in such an open stadium, but was determined to have a crack at Bayi's record whatever the conditions.

Looking back, he shakes his head at the memory of the race, and particularly at the thought that, despite the magnitude of his achievement, he could have run a much quicker time with more help.

Swedish pacesetter Goran Sawenmark was not as effective as Walker had hoped. Today's rabbits are expected to carry the record-chaser through all but the last 300 yards or so of the mile; sometimes two or three are used to keep the attempt on target.

Sawenmark was supposed to carry the Kiwi through even splits of about 57s. Instead, he ran the first lap in a speedy 55.3s, and was heading for a pedestrian 60s in the second lap before blowing out completely and running off the track.

"I was on my own," Walker remembers. "It was so much harder like that. I wasn't being pushed by anyone, and though I tried to feed off the crowd - who were a pretty knowledgeable lot - I know I could have run a lot faster.

"I was in excellent shape and probably did everything I could in the circumstances. But it was interesting that I ran a faster mile five years later leading all the way.

"That confirmed to me that I should have run faster in Gothenburg. With better assistance I reckon I might have run a 3m 47s or something.

"Yet at the time, the idea of breaking 3m 50s had not seemed realistic to me. I thought I had a chance of beating Filbert's record, but never in my wildest dreams had I considered knocking that much off it."

fxdrop,2,100 I T WAS his secret. He wasn't going to tell anyone about the attempt, and even told the race promoter to keep the plan to herself. So when all hell broke loose on the night of August 12, most of the world's sporting media were caught off-guard.

Walker was so delighted about capturing the record that he was taken unawares as well. The significance of his run took a while to dawn on him and it wasn't until the international press came calling the next day that he started to appreciate what he had done.

In less than four minutes his life was changed for ever. Every media organisation wanted him, from Time magazine, which featured him as its cover story, to Sports Illustrated and Newsweek. Television channels from New Zealand, Sweden, Britain and the United States vied for his time.

For the next week, his life was one long interview. The 48 hours after the record are still something of a blur of phone calls, television appearances, radio interviews, more phone calls, cards and telegrams.

He was exhausted. The response to his record was far bigger than he had ever imagined. Yet he still managed to keep his feet on the ground, and it was a measure of his character that he was running just as well a year later, when he took the Olympic gold medal for the 1500m.

Walker has been back to Gothenburg only once. Despite what happened there 25 years ago, he feels little warmth towards the organisers and even less towards the stadium. In fact, he often finds himself wondering how he could have smashed the record at such an "inhospitable" venue.

His old mate Dick Quax says it is the X factor. He says Walker had an enviable physique for a runner. He had the mental strength to make the most of his abilities and should be rated as one of the country's natural treasures, alongside the likes of Sir Edmund Hillary and Colin Meads.

"What John achieved in Gothenburg 25 years ago was a world first," Quax says. "In my mind, and in the minds of a lot of other people as well, his effort that night was just as significant as Bannister's in 1954.

* The world record for the mile is now 3m 43.12s, set on July 7 last year by Morocco's Hichan El Guerrouj.