Rowing and Track Athletics (extract)

Distance Runs and Distance Runners 333 on what he's got left." Of the quarter-milers who followed Meyers and who were anywhere near to his class, Wendell Baker was the first, and, for many years, the most notable. At the intercolle– giates Baker won the quarter only once, in I 88 5, and then in the slow time of 54f seconds - a commonplace enough record on paper compared with three consecutive victories of his college mate, W. H. Goodwin, who immediately preceded him, and the three straight firsts of that other Harvard quarter-miler, S. T. Wells, who immedi– ately followed him. But Baker's speed had been convincingly proved on other tracks and in the shorter distances at Mott Haven, and he decided to try, on July 1, 1886, at the Beacon Park track in Boston, to break the world's amateur record. Meyers held it at that time with his quarter in 48f seconds. The course at Beacon Park was nearly straight-away and of dirt, which, when in perfect condition, many runners have preferred to cinders. The upper layer was scraped away and the surface made smooth and hard. Baker sprinted the first two hundred twenty yards alone, and then a pace-maker lifted him over the re t of the dis– tance. At three hundred fifty yards the time was 37 seconds, at four hundred yards 43 seconds, and at the finish 4 7f seconds. While warming up for the trial Baker split his running shoe slightly, and in the middle of the quarter the split spread