OLYMPIC GAMES

Hokitika Guardian, 5 November 1936, Page 2

OLYMPIC GAMES

J. E. LOVELOCK’S IMPRESSIONS

AUCKLAND, NOv. 3

Discussing the Olympic Games, J. E. Lovelock, the renowned New Zealand athlete, said he regarded Jesse Owens, the American negro winner of three Olympic gold medals, as a wonderful athlete. “His running is so smooth,” said Mr Lovelock, who also expressed the opinion that V. P. Boot, the Dominion’s 800 metre s representative, was a fine runner, with a great deal of natural ability. “When Boot arrived in London I could give him perhaps as much as lO.vds in 300yds,” the champion said, “but later on he'had improved so much that there was little Between us in training runs over this distance.

“Matthews is also a splendid performer, who should go a long way. Both these young runners did well at the Games, but they had not enough time for sufficient preparation. The difficulty of scanty experience also had to be contended with . It was a very trying ordea] for Boot and Matthews to race in that stadium before over 100,000 people.” When asked how long he actually trained for the Olympic Games, Mr Lovelock said that his schedule occupied but three months, which he considered the correct period for an individual starting from a normal state of good health. He remarked that' in London, where everything was so much hustle and bustle, one soon got out of the best condition. “Tn the early stages of niv preparation T varied my work a great deal,” the champion said, “and ran quarter-miles, two miles and three miles, just working round about my distance all the time.” “The modern Olympic Gaines,’ continued Mr Lovelock, “were now Becoming too serious an affair and were to grandiose and complicated. There should.be a wholesale simplification—a cutting down of the entire programme.” He contemplated the 'possibility of negro competitors sweeping all before them at future Olympiads and said that undoubtedly these coloured Americans would next be running in distance events. “Physically they have everything necessary for success,” he stated, “but the one thing that will handicap them will be tactics. An instance of this was provided in the final of the 800 metres, won by Woodruff. He i s an athlete capable of breaking the world’s record time, but his poor tactics in the running of that race prevented him from setting a new mark.”