Walker settled near the back, stayed away from any trouble, eased to the lead at the bell, before lengthening his stride about 300m from home, the mane of blond hair flying, racing on into history.
He had the race in hand, although his .10s margin over fast-finishing second placegetter Ivo van Damme of Belgium might suggest otherwise.
The time of 3m 39.17s didn't matter a jot.
Walker had a cherished medal around his neck and he put his views succinctly at the time.
"Every record set in Montreal will eventually be broken and forgotten.
"The gold medal is the thing they can never take away from me," he said.
Two years earlier, Walker and Tanzanian Filbert Bayi had engaged in the fastest 1500m of all time, both breaking the world record at the Commonwealth Games in Christchurch. Indeed that race produced five of the seven quickest times ever.
But Bayi was missing in Montreal, the black African boycott over the All Blacks' 1976 tour of South Africa hitting hard. The athletic world was deprived of a fabulous duel.
Still, in the space of nine Olympic Games, the silver fern had crossed the line first in the classic middle distance discipline on three occasions.
Dick Quax and Rod Dixon, Walker's contemporaries on the world's tracks, gave New Zealand a powerful presence for a decade.
Walker, the first runner to break 3:50 for the mile, at Gothenburg, Sweden in 1975, went on to produce 100 sub-four minute miles, his 100th fittingly at Mt Smart Stadium.
Not that it's strictly relevant, but he looked the part too.
Just as Peter Blake somehow suited the glamorous, windswept image of the sailor taming the world's oceans, so Walker was a spectacular sight on the track.
John became Sir John in June 2009, the first New Zealander to be knighted once the National Party restored the honour in the Queens Birthday honours after a nine-year absence.
Within weeks, Dr Snell became Sir Peter, joining Sir Murray Halberg to complete a set for New Zealand's living Olympic running champions.
