{"id":28476,"date":"2004-06-01T15:40:37","date_gmt":"2004-06-01T22:40:37","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/trackandfieldnews.com\/?p=28476"},"modified":"2019-03-27T15:43:20","modified_gmt":"2019-03-27T22:43:20","slug":"from-the-editor-may-2004-whats-the-most-popular-event-in-the-sport-the-mile-or-the-100","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/trackandfieldnews.com\/from-the-editor-may-2004-whats-the-most-popular-event-in-the-sport-the-mile-or-the-100\/","title":{"rendered":"From The Editor \u2014 May 2004: What’s the most popular event in the sport, the mile or the 100?"},"content":{"rendered":"

ALL MILING, ALL THE TIME!<\/span> That\u2019s certainly the impression you\u2019ll get from reading the front part of this month\u2019s edition of the magazine, as we take the theme of Roger Bannister\u2019s historic first sub-4:00 mile and continue on through an analysis of what\u2019s up with today\u2019s crop of U.S. milers and then pay a long visit to reigning mile king Hicham El Guerrouj on his home stomping grounds.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a lot of space to devote to one event, but then, the mile is the general fan\u2019s favorite race, is it not?<\/p>\n

It certainly used to be, but I suspect that years of brutal assault by the governing bodies (USATF and NCAA generally choosing to run the no-logic 1500 instead; the high school federation foisting the abomination of the 1600 upon us) have robbed it of a significant part of its appeal. It\u2019s just not the same when milers aren\u2019t running the 1760y (or 1609.44m or 5280ft\u2014your choice) race, the way the gods intended.<\/p>\n

If the mile has been replaced by anything\u2014and there are certainly those who will say it was always secondary thereto\u2014it\u2019s the 100. Americans have always shown a marked predilection for speed events in general and the 100, be it meters or yards, fits the bill perfectly. Run the length of a football field as fast as you can.<\/p>\n

I used to be more of a mile guy, but in recent years I\u2019ve come to fancy the 100 (although as an aside I must say that I\u2019m not sure that I wouldn\u2019t prefer to watch just about any well-contested and well-presented field event to any race). I think my conversion to a century man began when I got deeply into the announcing game, and rather than sparing only half an eye to the early rounds in the straightaway dashing, was forced to watch intently at the big championships.<\/p>\n

You can learn a lot by paying close attention to four rounds of racing over the course of two days. Even if those seemingly by-the-numbers first couple of sessions come out just as everyone predicted, with not a single surprise, you can pick up all kinds of hints as to who is in what kind of shape, whose start has been honed to a razor-sharp edge, who looks gimpy, etc., etc.<\/p>\n

You can learn something from 100s that have just heats and a final, but I think it takes three rounds minimum to get the full picture. And if you\u2019re lucky enough to get to a four-round meet, do yourself the favor of watching all the rounds with a critical eye.<\/p>\n

Of course, you can always get sandbagged. When Carl Lewis and Ben Johnson staged their epic duels of Rome \u201987 and Seoul \u201988 each time I fearlessly predicted after the semis that Carl would eat the Canadian\u2019s lunch, which of course was clearly not the case. And I didn\u2019t even learn the lesson after the first time.<\/p>\n

(By the way, never mind that Ben was dirty; the key here was that he was able to mask his real form so well before the races that counted.)<\/p>\n

Now if only they\u2019d go to four rounds in the mile\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ALL MILING, ALL THE TIME! That\u2019s certainly the impression you\u2019ll get from reading the front part of this month\u2019s edition… Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":2850,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-28476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-features"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nFrom The Editor \u2014 May 2004: What's the most popular event in the sport, the mile or the 100? - Track & Field News<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/trackandfieldnews.com\/from-the-editor-may-2004-whats-the-most-popular-event-in-the-sport-the-mile-or-the-100\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"From The Editor \u2014 May 2004: What's the most popular event in the sport, the mile or the 100? - Track & Field News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"ALL MILING, ALL THE TIME! 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