America at Large:With the Millrose Games celebrating its centenary at Madison Square Garden tomorrow night, organisers trotted out the old and the new by inviting Eamonn Coghlan and Bernard Lagat to break bread at the New York Track Writers' luncheon in Manhattan this past Monday, writes George Kimball.
A four-man posse has been assembled to chase defending champion Lagat around the track for 11 laps in the tomorrow's centrepiece race, the Wanamaker Mile, and almost incongruously, given the history of the storied race, there's nary an Irishman among them.
"I really think Eamonn is the greatest performer in Millrose history," said Howard Schmertz, the long-time meet director.
"There's not a week that's gone by since I last won the Wanamaker Mile in 1987 that somebody hasn't made a reference to the Wanamaker Mile or the 'Chairman of the Boards',"' said Coghlan on his return to New York. "To be somewhat singled out as one of the great legends has been an honour for me."
For four decades Irish runners virtually ruled the event. Beginning with Ronnie Delany's four wins from 1956-'59, Coghlan's unsurpassed seven between 1977 and '87, Marcus O'Sullivan's five from '86-'92, and Niall Bruton's two in 1994 and '92, indoor track's most famous race seemed the special province of athletes from Ireland.
Since Delany, Coghlan, and O'Sullivan were all products of Villanova University's successful track and field program, one might be inclined, if one didn't know better, to ascribe their success in the most famous of all indoor events to their legendary coach and mentor, Jumbo Elliott. But the fact is none of the aforementioned trio ever won a Wanamaker Mile in Villanova colours.
Elliott traditionally considered athletics a team sport, and preferred to enter even his collegiate stars in multiple relay events.
It is probably an arguable proposition that Jumbo's stature as a "maker of milers" and the Spartan training conditions at Villanova paved the way for that trio's subsequent success. Until The Pavilion was constructed in 1986, Villanova runners trained through the winter on a rickety board "indoor" track which was actually outdoors. The athletes themselves had to chip away ice and snow prior to their daily workouts.
Delany's four Wanamaker triumphs came after his collegiate eligibility had expired - and three of them came after his triumph in the Melbourne Games of 1956. Although Coghlan was undefeated in four years as a US collegiate miler, he didn't win his first until 1977, over a year after he had graduated from Villanova.
O'Sullivan actually ran in the Wanamaker Mile as an undergraduate, but only after Elliott had died and then after Coghlan had prevailed upon Schmertz and procured an invitation for the young Cork runner. O'Sullivan's first win, two years after he had graduated from Villanova, came at Coghlan's expense.
In 1986, O'Sullivan seized the lead with two laps to go, and at the bell lap held a scant two-metre lead on the Chairman of the Boards. When O'Sullivan held off Coghlan to win, it appeared to have signalled a changing of the guard. The cognoscenti reckoned that, at 34, Coghlan's best running days might be behind him. O'Sullivan's first Millrose win set the stage for the 1987 Wanamaker, a race that remains a classic 20 years later.
Coghlan had been seriously injured when he was attacked by a dog in the Phoenix Park on Stephen's Day of 1986. With multiple wounds gouged out of his leg, it was initially feared the episode would cost Coghlan the entire indoor season, but he battled his way back to toe the line with his conqueror just six weeks later. With two laps to go in that race, an Irishman was in the lead - but it wasn't O'Sullivan and it wasn't Coghlan. Ray Flynn had pounced the leader, the Spaniard Jose Abascal, and was steaming away in front. Coghlan was on Flynn's heels, with O'Sullivan warily charting Eamonn's progress.
On the final back straight, Coghlan erupted with a surge that caught O'Sullivan by surprise, and opened up such a decisive gap before O'Sullivan even realised what had happened that he was beyond catching. Coghlan won in 3:55.91. O'Sullivan was second and Abascal third as both Flynn and Steve Ovett finished out of the money.
"Every time we came into a turn, Marcus went high and I went low," Coghlan recalled on Monday. "Marcus made a move with a lap and a half to go, but with one lap left I did something I'd never done before and went past Marcus, in one move, on the turn. I can still remember the noise of the crowd wooing me on."
It was the last of Coghlan's Wanamaker wins. It was assumed at the time by eclipsing Glenn Cunningham's six, Coghlan had carved out a Millrose record that would never be broken, but with the 32-year-old Lagat poised to win his fifth tomorrow night, the Chairman's standard could be threatened in the next few years.
Lagat, who won the 1,500 metres silver medal in Athens behind Hicham El-Gerrouj, competed for Kenya in the Olympics, but as a naturalised citizen is listed as one of three Americans in the field.
Two years ago Lagat ran 3:52.99 to shatter Coghlan's 24-year-old meet record. Last year he won his fourth when he outdistanced Kenenisa Bekele to win going away in 3:56:85 - after hitting the half-mile split in 1:53.7.
"I think Bernard is one of the few milers to come on the scene since the Coghlan/Sullivan/Flynn era who really appreciates the Wanamaker Mile and the history and tradition that goes with it," said Coghlan. "He has more respect for it than other milers around the world. I think what really motivates Bernard for running indoors and at the Garden is to win eight Wanamaker Miles," said Coghlan, before adding, with a smile, "He has four more to go, by the way."
