Crossing the Bar

For some reason, the year following an Olympiad is usually one for track's record books. Olympic medal winners seem to work extra hard to prove that their victories were no flukes; the losers muster extra energy to prove that their defeats were. Thus, in 1961, after the Rome games, no fewer than eleven major world marks were shattered. In 1965, after Tokyo, another 14 fell.

The same pattern has emerged in 1969. At the recent N.C.A.A. championships in Nashville, Tenn., an unknown 440-yd. runner named Curtis Mills streaked across the tape in 44.7 sec., .1 sec. under the two-year-old world mark. The first black trackman in the history of Texas A. & M., Mills whipped the Olympics' top two quarter-milers --Lee Evans and Larry James. Villanova's Marty Liquori, who finished dead last in the 1,500-meter finals in the 1968 Mexico City Olympics, defeated World Record Holder Jim Ryun after nine tries in the mile run.

The most heartwarming heroics of all were performed at the Sacramento Invitational by Pole Vaulter John Pennel. With both legs bandaged to protect painful shin splints, Pennel cleared the bar on his second attempt at 17 ft. 10 1/4 -- a new world mark by Win. It was the ninth time that Pennel has broken the world record in a career plagued by injuries and hard luck. He went into the 1964 Olympics with a wrenched back and finished eleventh. During the finals in Mexico, he was twice thrown off balance, pole in hand, by a mad flourish of trumpets heralding an awards ceremony. On his second try he cleared what was ultimately the winning height of 17ft. 8 1/2 in., but the jump was nullified because his pole passed under the bar. That pointless rule had already been repealed--effective May 1, 1969; Pennel finished fifth. Nearing 29, he realizes that he will be too old to take a shot at the 1972 games--but he has one more important bar to cross. "I was the first guy to top 17 ft.," he says. "Before I retire, I want to be the first to top 18ft."

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