Athletics of To-Day 1929

The Short Middle Distances 7 r from start to finish, while the half mile affords the runner but little space for letting up or easing his muscles by changing his method of striding. I suspect shrewdly that it was his long association with A. G. Hill that made that doyen of British athletic coaches, the late S. A. Mussabini, disagree with all other coaches when he said that a man who wanted to run a half mile in 2 mins. should aim at a first quarter in 63 secs., for, primarily, Hill was a mile runner before anything else. There is one danger which the quarter-miler type encounters, and which has cost some runn rs dearly. It is the temptation to train at distances short of the full half mile, and to trust to the excitement of the actual race t carry them through to the tape in winning form. In Igz6, D. . A. Lowe was persuaded to train for an attempt upon the 6oo yards world's record at Stamford ridge on June 26th. He achieved his purpose and set up n w figures, but when he ame to race against Peltzer in the A.A.A. Half Mile Chan1pionship a w k later it was obvious that although he could eclip e Ted Meredith's ten-year-old figur s, he had not the stamina to stave off th German's challenge, when the latter rac d past him to establish an even more sensational world's r cord. . eltz r was, I think, lucky to beat Lowe in the A.A.A. Half Mile hampionship of Igz6, d spite the tim , I min. SI! secs., f~r the G rman ma e no sort of showing in distance races in the ninth lympiad at Amst rdam, I928. Apart from the fact that Lowe had committed the fatal rror of training for that 6o yards attempt n record, the championship race was not run to suit him. Ev ry Engli hman who figured in the final :vas playing for his own hand, as th y w re entitled to do, and, In consequence, Low had to tak th 1 ad and cut out his own pace and, incid ntally, ltzcr's, from start to fini h. At Amsterdam it wa far otherwi e, for W. G. Tatham and · tarr paved th way admirably for a great Briti h vict ry. t the aris lympiad, I924, a man had to do something b tter than I min. 5 s cs. to tak a semi-final of th 8oo In tr s, while Lov him elf was hard pushc in returning I min. 52f s c . in th final to beat . Martin, witzerland, and . .