Athletics of To-Day 1929

Athletics of To-day prowess to our unbelievers. In England he acclimatised far more quickly than do most Americans and won his first quarter mile over here by eleven yards in 49! secs., beating all British records. At the English Championships a fort– night later at the Aston Track that unlucky Englishman, W. P. Phillips, made him do 48-! secs. for a three yards victory in the quarter mile. Before going home he cut down twenty– two competitors in a half mile race and established a world's record of I min. 56 secs., which r mained unbroken until he covered the distance in I min. 55t secs. at Birmingham in I884. He made two other visits to England, in I884 and I885, defeating all our best runners, and in I886, in America, over– came the great W. G. George at half, three-quarter, and one mile. From r879 to I885, when he turned professional, Myers won an American Amateur Championship each year and in some years held several. He made twenty-two amateur r cords from 50 yards in St secs. to I mile in 4 mins. 27! secs., including hurdle races at 220 and 440 yards. Myers's mother died early of consumption, and he himself never carried an ounce of superfluous fat. His height was 5 ft. 8 ins. and his weight a trifle und r 8 stone. He was, in appearance, a light running machine made up of phenomenally long legs attached to a di proportionat ly short body, and the more tir d he became the more his long strides 1 ngthen d out. It was his custom, wh n heavi r m ninth middle of a race were taking a" breather," to hoot away and op n up a gap of half a dozen yards. At his best h could proba ly have b at n 48 secs. for a quarter mil . H died inN w York on th eve of his forty-first birthday in I8gg, from a relaps following an attack of pneumonia. My rs was follow d by a succession of gr at athlet s who had appreciated the lesson he taught. On a straight-away course at aeon Park, near Boston, in I886, W nd ll aker, the famous Harvard quarter miler, returned 47! secs., Maxey Long, ew York A. ., subsequently reducing the straight-away record to 47 secs. fiat at Guttenberg, N.J., in Igoo, aker