Ran 3:57.2 to set the mile wr in 1957.
http://www.examiner.co.uk/sport/famous-huddersfield-olympic-athlete-derek-12650745
Ran 3:57.2 to set the mile wr in 1957.
http://www.examiner.co.uk/sport/famous-huddersfield-olympic-athlete-derek-12650745
He was a year or two younger than Ed Whitlock
High quality indoor footage:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=245&v=-fcy2f68idI
That is some old school indoor.
Pratfall at 1:45!
He false starts at 2:40
Pirie must have hated racing him.
Very, very sad to read this. Never saw him run but thanks to his autobiography, "The Four Minute Smiler" he was one of my running heroes when I first started running in the early 1970s. The book is virtually unobtainable these days but if anyone has a copy for sale I am definitely interested!
At the back of the book were a year's training schedules. Typical 1950s stuff, intervals almost every day, getting progressively faster as the summer months get closer. If Ibbo followed these schedules, or anything like them, he trained bloody hard!
Couple of quotes from the book I still remember very clearly; "Cross country running lays the foundations for fast miles" and "the only way to success in running is blood toil and sweat". He also talks about the period before his WR mile when he even ran to and from the training track, often arriving home almost too tired to undress and climb in the bath!
Finally, 3:57.2 on the White City cinders is no mean feat! Only a few British athletes will run a superior mile this year!
Post war Britain had some pretty dismal decades. I think the middle distance heroes provided a little bit of reaffirmation of national greatness. Hard to understand that today.
notrump wrote:
Post war Britain had some pretty dismal decades. I think the middle distance heroes provided a little bit of reaffirmation of national greatness. Hard to understand that today.
That and skiffle music!
Don't want to get all ventolin, but that track looked like crap. Had to be close to 3:50 effort on a modern setup.
When I started running in 1972 I was coached by a former international sprinter Malcolm Yardley. He talked about running at White City, where Ibbotson set his WR. he said the atmosphere was fantastic for big meetings with a decent crowd - but that the track was, indeed as you say, "crap"!