Bredin on Running & Training

18 RUNNING AND TRAINING. of running and runners extending more or less over the last fifteen years, which is likely to prove instructive or interesting. I now make this remark owing to the fact that, in regard to one or two important subjects in connection with quarter-mile races, and how to train to run them, my opinion coincides with that of the writer of the volume on athletics in the Badminton Library (which I have read both with interest and pleasure on more than one occasion), although by no means with those apparently maintained by the great majority of writers on athletics; for, with regard to the theory that a sprinter should make the pace through– out a race of two furlongs, instead of waiting on slower men more endowed with staying power, I rnay quote the following example. After a match at this distance against Downer, in the course of which he dashed away from the start and established a lead of some six yards in the first 300, eventually winning by about four yards, I received numerous letters from old runners asking me how I could account for the extraordinary policy of a fast sprinter running as Downer did on that occasion, instead of allowing me to make the pace and thus reserving his speed for the finish of the race. My answer to this question I will shortly relate. I presume a mile race to be the most important, second on the list stands the sprint, and next to it the quarter. A quarter of a mile has no doubt gained the reputa– tion of being the most trying race of those at all recognised distances in which the athlete takes part, owing to the fact that the majority of runners compet– ing therein are sprinters, and strictly speaking 300