Cross Country

A pistol crack set 129 pairs of legs into motion. For 200 yd. the pack of runners awkwardly angled across the springy turf like a vast centipede, then spread-eagled as the pace slackened. The legs plodded up Van Cortlandt Park's hilly course, coasted around to the starting field. Spectators, paying little attention to the wiry, green-jerseyed leader, No. 129, carefully watched Pennsylvania's smooth-striding Gene Venzke in 15th place.

Up the same incline again panted the long, wavering line. Suddenly the pace stepped up. A mile from home, Venzke was slightly in the van. Easily No. 129 shot forward. Venzke tried to match the spurt. For a few seconds they ran neck & neck. Then No. 129 torpedoed ahead, breezing by the tape 20 yd. in the lead. Time: 26:23.6.

No. 129 was Michigan State's 140-lb. John Edward Bechtold. A resident of New York's Bronx, he returned almost unknown last week to his old stamping ground to win Intercollegiate Association of Amateur Athletes of America's 5-mi. cross-country run. Judges, amazed at his unexpected victory, were further amazed that four of his teammates had also finished among the first eleven, had won the team title for the third straight year.

Five days later another Midwestern team made Easterners look sick & slow. Sloshing over the same field, Indiana University's four-man team finished 1, 2, 3, and 5 in National Amateur Athletic Union's 10,000-metre run. Winner was stocky Donald L. Lash, who trotted home in the excellent time of 32:42.6. Seventh was Thomas C. Ottey, intercollegiate champion in 1933 and 1934. Since the Hoosiers did not run five men, team honors fell to Millrose Athletic Association for the fifth time in six years.

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