Forgotten White Athletes?

Speaking of the call . . . "I've just been informed by Brendan Foster, that's a new Gateshead Harriers record."
You think?! Longest jump ever, and it's a new record for the Gateshead Harriers track club back in England. Hilarious! But he says it completely matter of fact.
 
jacknyc said:
Speaking of the call . . . "I've just been informed by Brendan Foster, that's a new Gateshead Harriers record."
You think?! Longest jump ever, and it's a new record for the Gateshead Harriers track club back in England. Hilarious! But he says it completely matter of fact.
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That's funny. The English are the best at dry understatement, whether meant seriously or as comedy. That was the basis of a lot of Monty Python's humor.
 
Somehow came across this guy, Doug Hawken, who I had never heard of.
Here he is in 1969, beating future Olympian and WR record holder, Eddie Hart.
Hawken ran a 9.2 for 100 yards in this race.
I wonder what happened with his career?
 

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jacknyc said:
Somehow came across this guy, Doug Hawken, who I had never heard of.
Here he is in 1969, beating future Olympian and WR record holder, Eddie Hart.
Hawken ran a 9.2 for 100 yards in this race.
I wonder what happened with his career?
Click to expand...

Wow another name I have never heard of. Might try to research it more sometime soon. We had so many great sprinters from the past but it's hard to find much info on them before the internet age. I thing sites like wayback machine and internet archive are great for
researching.
 
Here's a description of the race.
Not only did he beat Eddie Hart, but he ran him down!
After junior college he attended ASU.
 

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Great race! Thank you for sharing.
The German men used to be very, very good in many track events.
Unfortunately, they have fallen off a cliff over the past 20 or so years.
 
The white guy in this race was a genuinely excellent 200m sprinter long before Lemaitre, Guliyev etc moved the goal posts. Watch his race as he finishes 3rd to the two match-up favourites.

The race starts just before the 14 minute mark

 
mastermulti said:
The white guy in this race was a genuinely excellent 200m sprinter long before Lemaitre, Guliyev etc moved the goal posts. Watch his race as he finishes 3rd to the two match-up favourites.

The race starts just before the 14 minute mark

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I remember Kevin Little very well as I was a big fan of his. He was in the Sports Illustrated Article about "What Happened to the White Athlete".

Michael Johnson always ran as straight up as any sprinter. It almost looked like he was wearing a back brace. To be fair both of the top
2 sprinters in this race had countless rumors about p.e.d.s. Kevin Little never was mentioned with any of that

Thanks for posting this race. I enjoyed taking a trip down memory lane.
 
John Teeters should have stuck with sprinting. If he was in Europe or other places I'm sure he would have. The guy just was
built like the Incredible Hulk. He ran 10.01 wind legal and 6.52 in the 60 meters. What could have been?

 
This is a video about Phil Shinnick, a long jumper who jumped a world record in 1963 that was never recognized because the officials forgot to turn on the wind gauge. However, in 2021, after 58 years, his record jump was finally recognized. Very interesting!
 
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what a great story....to wait 58 years to finally get the recognition for what he achieved is amazing!
 
sprintstar said:
what a great story....to wait 58 years to finally get the recognition for what he achieved is amazing!
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I suspect some of us who follow track on this site will remember Phil Shinnick's grandson, Zach Shinnick, was California state high school champion in the 400 in 2017. He ran a 46.1 and then just after graduation ran a 45.2 to win a U.S. junior championship. He also ran a 10.5 100 while at Damien High School, an all-boys Catholic school in SoCal. His career at the University of Southern California was ruined by a series of injuries and the Covid shutdown.
 
Zach Shinnick was definitely an up and comer until injuries and Covid shutdowns. I think he had potential to go into the high 43's or at least very low 44 in the 400m.
 
Was watching one of the old "To Tell The Truth" episodes from 1957 and one set of contestants had Bobby Morrow in it. Easy to tell which guy is Morrow by how cut he is with very little excess.

 
HaywoodZarathustra said:
Was watching one of the old "To Tell The Truth" episodes from 1957 and one set of contestants had Bobby Morrow in it. Easy to tell which guy is Morrow by how cut he is with very little excess.

Click to expand...

For over 30 years after Jesse Owens' performance at the 1936 Olympics there were plenty of world class White American sprinters, and of course Europeans too. Bobby Morrow was one of them in the 1950s, as was Christian McCaffrey's grandfather Dave Sime.

But it started changing in the 1960s, about the same time Sports Illustrated and the rest of the media began lionizing black athletes in general and denigrating White ones. Richmond Flowers was the favorite to win gold in the 110 meter hurdles in Mexico City in '68 before getting injured, but when he played in the NFL he was a safety not a cornerback. And his son was totally screwed over the NFL despite being a tall and fast WR.

By the '70s it was mainly the Russians and some other Euros who were the best White sprinters. Americans went 40 years without Olympic gold in the sprinting events until Jeremy Wariner broke through in '04, to less than overwhelming media interest.

I like to say that one day circa 1985 White Americans became unable to run the ball or catch it, or play defense, as the Caste System solidified its agenda and m.o. The same thing happened in sprinting some 20 years earlier. And the obvious juicing of so many Jamaicans and others hasn't helped.
 
The only white American sprinter to speak of in the 1970s, was Mark Lutz.
He was from Minnesota and ran for the University of Kansas.
He made the 1976 US Olympic team in the 200m, but unfortunately didn't perform well at the Olympics (injury?).

Here he is at the 1973 USA Championships in 220 yard dash.
He finishes a close 2nd to Steve Williams.
 
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