Coaching and Care of Athletes

CHAPTER XIX DISTANCE AND MARATHON RUNNING So far as amateur athletes are concerned 'distance running' may serve as the generic term for all races from the 3 miles and 5000 metres (3 miles I88 yds.) to the full Marathon course of 26 miles 385 yds. (42 kilometres I95 metres). The standard track-racing distances are: metric measure : 5000 metres = 3 miles I88 yds. o ft . 8! ins., and IO,ooo metres= 6 miles 376 yds. I ft. 2! ins.; British measure: 3 miles, 6 miles, and IO miles. Distance running calls for sustained and well-controlled speed, great powers of endurance, and that courageous but equably patient kind of temperament which enables a man to face with fortitude long and very arduous training and to display in com– petition that stern determination by which he carries on long after all else save the will to do so is gone. Distance running is a sport essentially for the well-matured athlete. Hannes Kolehmainen, of Finland (Plate VII, Fig. 20), in I9I I won the English 4 miles championship in 20 mins. 3·6 secs . A year later at Stockholm he provided the outstanding sensation of the Vth Olympic Games. He won his heat of the Io~ooo metres in 33 mins. 49 secs., having eased up to smile atJ. Keeper, of Canada, who was second. He won the final in 3 I mins. 20·8 secs. by a street from Tewanami, the United States Indian runner. He sauntered through his 5000 metres heat in I5 mins. 38·9 secs., J. Bouin, of France, winning his heat in I5 mins. 5 secs., while the great British runner Sergeant G. W. Hutson had qualified in third place in an earlier heat. · With ·three such men in the final something sensational was expected . It came, for Kolehmainen, showing I4 mins. 36·6 secs. for a new Olympic record, beat Bouin, the world's record-holder, with Hutson third and Bonhag, U.S.A., fourth. Jean Bouin and George Hutson both fell on active service during the Great War. Not content with even so much glory as he had gained already, the distinguished Finn, although failing to lead his countrymen to victory in the 3000 metres team race, hjmself established an Olympic record of 8 mins. 36·8 secs . for the distance. Finally, at 255