OLYMPICS ‘88: A PREVIEW : THE RECORD MAKER : As Seconds Are Ticking Away, Canada’s Big Ben Johnson Tries to Regain His Timing for Olympics

Before I was big, nobody had time for me. Now I am big, everybody want to ride the big train. --Ben Johnson, world record-holder at 100 meters

Ben Johnson is supposed to be here but he’s not. He is in Italy. Before that he was spending a great deal of time on the Caribbean island of St. Kitts.

After Italy he was in town for a while. He gave a press conference and everybody came. Johnson told how he was going to smash Carl Lewis and what a joke it was that anyone would even think Lewis could beat him.

Of course, this was before the world’s fastest human had come back from his injury. This was the heady between time--after the world record and before the joke smashed him .

BEFORE

The Ben Johnson myth has reached such proportions that it is possible to put forth almost any implausible story and people will nod and say, “Yes, I can believe that of Ben.”

For example. There is the story of young Ben growing up in Jamaica. He loved to swim. One day Ben was swimming in the ocean and saw a small shark. The shark began to swim toward him. Ben, frightened, swam furiously to shore and out-raced the shark.

It is a true story.

That harmless story has been refashioned somewhat. In the European press, where Johnson has an image of heroic stature, it now goes that young Ben rode a killer shark to Canada and, upon arrival, ate it for lunch.

The real Ben Johnson-growing-up story is fairly tame. Johnson was born in Falmouth, on Jamaica’s north coast. He was the second-youngest of six children and was an unremarkable child. In fact, baby Johnson was a weak infant, born during an epidemic.

Ben Johnson Sr. built the family house himself--four bedrooms and two baths. Outside were chickens and ducks and everywhere were mango trees.

Ben Sr. had worked for 30 years for the national telephone company, JAMINTEL. He and his wife Gloria were known as hard-working, religious people. Like many Jamaicans they wanted more for their children and they looked to North America to provide it.

So Gloria Johnson left Falmouth and alone headed for Toronto, where she knew no one. She worked for two years, first serving food in a cafeteria then as a cashier at the Canadian Institute for the Blind.

She sent all the money she earned to Jamaica and in 1976 her children came to live in Canada. Little Ben’s first request was to be taken “to the place where the Olympics are being held.” The family couldn’t afford to take him to Montreal, but he burned to watch his sprint heroes, Hasely Crawford of Trinidad and Donald Quarrie of Jamaica.

Beginning in 1977, Johnson competed in track and field in school and at the club level. But he hated to train. His coach, Charlie Francis, encouraged him to lift weights. Johnson hated it.

By then, Johnson, 18, was a Canadian citizen. He was selected to the 1980 Canadian Olympic team but didn’t go to Moscow because of the boycott.

By 1984 Johnson was in the Olympic final. He said he intentionally false-started to throw off Carl Lewis but if anyone was to rattle it was Johnson, who got a slow start and ended up with a bronze medal.

Johnson felt he had let his country down and promised to do better the next time. He promised his mother he would do better. Johnson is unashamedly close to his mother, Gloria. They live together in Toronto.

It is Gloria who has supported Ben through the lean times, who he completely trusts.

“What she says is the law,” Johnson said. “If she doesn’t want me to do something, I don’t. If I get married and the wife doesn’t get along with my mother, it’s too bad--the wife goes.”

It was reported that Gloria Johnson saw nothing of her son’s world record race in Rome--she was praying with her eyes closed.

THE RECORD

The last time a Canadian sprinter was expected to do well in a meet in Rome the year was 1960 and the man was the late Harry Jerome of Vancouver. He blew his hamstring in an Olympic semifinal.

Johnson came to the 1987 World Championships in Rome in much the same postion, but unlike Jerome, Johnson’s devastating hamstring injury did not occur in Rome but four months later.

The talk last summer was centered on the showdown between Johnson and Carl Lewis. Johnson had been openly bitter that Lewis had retained his No. 1 world ranking, despite Johnson’s better times and head-to-head victories.

Both sprinters swept into Rome with all the fanfare of starlets descending on Cannes.

Lewis, as ever, out-glitzed the competition. He held his press conference at an opulent villa. Johnson held court from a more modest downtown hotel. The hotel manager apparently got caught up in the pre-race hype--he told Johnson that if he won the 100, the room would be free. The world championship rate.

Johnson seemingly ended the war of words with a magnificent race that, in retrospect, was nearly perfect. Johnson used a newfangled start to launch him into the first 10 meters of the race. His time of 9.83 seconds shattered Calvin Smith’s world record of 9.93. So fast was the race that Lewis, who finished second, ran a 9.93.

It would have been expecting too much to think that the controversy would end at the finish line.

There was the controversy about Johnson’s start. It was so fast that to the naked eye it appeared Johnson may have jumped the gun. That swirled for a few days.

Lewis and his coach Tom Tellez, studied the tapes of the start and determined it wasn’t a false start.

“Ben’s hands are off the ground before anyone moves,” Tellez told reporters at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Indianapolis. “The naked eye says he’s jumping, but he’s not putting pressure on the foot blocks until after the gun. And it’s the sensors in the blocks that detect a false start.”

Then there was the flap about drugs. Lewis charged chemical warfare, saying that some champions at the meet were using drugs. He did not name names but Johnson had an idea who Lewis meant.

It all mattered little. Johnson had won. Johnson had the world record. Johnson was new. The world was interested.

“It’s been busy as hell since Rome,” Larry Heidebrecht, Johnson’s manager, said recently. “There are so many things to do, so many commitments. If he did everything that’s requested of him, he’d never be able to stop.”

Johnson’s endorsements continue despite a noticeable stammer. He wasn’t born with it, he developed when he was 12 by mimicking his brother.

“As long as he’s relaxed he’s fine. When he get’s excited, it’s a problem,” Heidebrecht said.

Last February Johnson signed a $2.5 million, five-year contract with the Italian athletic shoe company Diadora. The contract is believed to be one of the most lucrative individual deals in track and field.

“Ben has six major deals in Japan since Rome,” Heidebrecht said. “A lot of those deals have played out. We shot some commercials.”

Among the major sponsorship deals Johnson has is a commitment to Mazda International, an oil and gas company, Visa credit cards, a real estate company and, the natural, Johnson’s Wax.

In Canada, Johnson endorses Toshiba electronic products, Purolator Couriers, a vitamin, a grocery store chain, and a manufacturer of outboard motors.

“We are told that Ben creates a very powerful impression on the screen,” Heidebrecht. “His body build is so powerful. A lot of the endorsements are tied in to the power and strength.”

They love Johnson in Japan, formerly the territory of King Carl.

“He is modest and soft spoken, I think that’s why they love him in Japan,” Heidebrecht said. “That goes over well there. A lot of people in Japan don’t like the image of Carl. One other person has the visibility in Japan . . . Paul Newman.”

THE REMATCH

There were several imperatives for Johnson on his return to competition. First, he needed to show he had not lost his greatest asset, his hulking strength. Instantly, on sight, that point was made. Johnson was even bigger and stronger than before the injury. In the weeks that he was unable to run, an antsy and driven Johnson hit the weightroom with zeal.

By appearing strong and healthy, Johnson retained an important psychological edge against his competitors. Lewis is 6-feet 2-inches, 174 pounds and is by no means small. But the burly Johnson is bigger. Calvin Smith, who had the world record before Johnson, is a diminutive 5-9, 145.

Johnson had first injured his left hamstring at a race in West Germany in February. That ended his indoor season. Then, May 13 in Tokyo, Johnson suffered a cross-wise tear six inches above his knee. The total rehabilitation took more than six months.

It was also important that Johnson run well. He didn’t have to win races, but he needed to look good while losing. Johnson had to run as if, given a few more weeks to come back, he could win. Johnson needed to look as if he would be invincible at Seoul.

That didn’t happen. His first race in Europe was at altitude in Sestriere, Italy. Lewis was there but money had kept the two apart.

Neither man would run in the same race until the price was right. So, they ran in the same meets but not the same distances.

Lewis ran a strong 200 in the fastest time of the year. Johnson won the 100 in 9.98. He was not pleased with the race, in which his form deteriorated and eventually left him.

Furthermore, in the more important psyching game with Lewis, Johnson had to admit that Lewis looked much better in his race. The comparisons seemed to grate on Johnson and made him grumpy.

“But I’ll be in the right condition too, at Seoul,” Johnson said. “What counts is what we do at the Olympics, and there is no point in talking about it now.”

Something else happened in Italy. Johnson acquired an entourage. It started with a silver-haired gentleman everyone knew as The Count.

“He said to Ben, ‘You must go to this club, use my name,’ ” said one person who was traveling with Johnson. “He’d say, ‘You must meet this woman, she’s fabulous.’ There started to be a lot of late nights. Ben doesn’t know how to say no to this kind of thing. And no one around him was helping him.”

So, Johnson went to the clubs and met the fabulous women. He played at night and ran races on the weekends. Some people wondered how this new Concorde life style would aid in his comeback. Some people were saying that an athlete coming off an injury needed to be in bed sleeping at night, not using The Count’s name at clubs.

“Ben got into this European life style of a star,” said Jim Christie of the Toronto Globe and Mail, who has written Johnson’s authorized biography. “Whether it was being imposed upon him or whether he enjoyed it, doesn’t matter. It was not good for him. He had complained in the spring that he had too many endorsements and too much of his time was being taken away from training. Now, here he was doing it to himself.”

Another Jamaican was watching with concern. Quarrie, who commands respect from Johnson, pulled the young sprinter aside and gave him a verbal lashing.

“After Zurich I had a good talk with him,” Quarrie, who now lives in Montebello, said recently. “I thought he was a little too relaxed. He could have been better prepared. He wasn’t focused. The kind of money that has entered into the sport does distract you a little.”

Johnson’s management/coaching/medical team appeared similarly distracted. His coach Charlie Francis brought his fiancee on the tour. Dr. Jamie Astaphan, Johnson’s physical therapist, brought his son. Heidebrecht, Johnson’s manager, was forever on the phone, making deals. No one was talking to Johnson.

Finally, at one of the tour stops, Johnson summoned his girlfriend from Toronto, waiting for three hours at the airport.

“Even with all these people, Ben was alone as ever,” Christie said.

The next stop was Zurich, Switzerland on Aug. 17, site of the celebrated rematch. Although it was widely reported that Lewis and Johnson were paid $250,000 each to run the 100 there, coaches and agents who were there say the actual figures were closer to $25,000. Most agents and managers love it when these inflated numbers are thrown around. They believe it tends to legitimize their clients.

There was another motivation. Both sides had been negotiating for a match race or series of races in Japan after the Olympics. Both sprinters have endorsements in Japan. If the Japanese thought Johnson and Lewis were getting a quarter of a million dollars to run in Zurich, they would have to at least match that.

The much-hyped rematch did have enticing elements. Johnson had beaten Lewis in their last six meetings, dating to 1985. Johnson, of course, has rights to the title of the world’s fastest man and is always a target to be knocked off. Also, in contrast to his predecessors in the event, Johnson was shaping up as the brooding, quiet champion.

Lewis would never be accused of that. Such is his marquee value that even his record against Johnson was not enough to make him the underdog. People will pay money to watch Carl Lewis do just about anything. The Lewis mystique is not about records, it is about style.

The pre-meet hype nearly backfired when the made-for-ABC-TV match was overshadowed by another race at Zurich. Butch Reynolds broke the world record in the 400 meters, a record that stood for almost 20 years, before the 100 ever got off. The crowd’s excited reaction took a little of the edge off the 100.

Lewis and Johnson were next to each other in the middle lanes. As the starter called the runners to their marks and set, Johnson reacted to a photographer’s flash and jumped. He was charged with a false start. One more and he would be disqualified.

Johnson vigorously argued the call, saying he was distracted by the flash. He may have spent too much emotional energy in arguing. At any rate, everyone knew that Johnson was unlikely to get one of his famous explosive starts. He had to start conservatively.

He did. His start was so safe that both he and Lewis--who is not known as a fast starter--got out at the same time. Johnson drew away and forged a modest lead, but by three quarters through the race Lewis was in full acceleration.

As Lewis slid past Johnson, the Canadian began to tighten and struggle with his upper body, the sure sign of the end for a sprinter. First Lewis, then Calvin Smith passed Johnson, who had practically stopped running. Lewis ran a 9.93, the fastest legal time of the year.

Lewis raised his arms in triumph nearly two meters before the tape and after the race played the crowd like the pro that he is. Johnson was subdued. Such antics from Lewis had infuriated Johnson in the past but seemed to have little effect in Zurich.

He said only, “A man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do.”

Johnson ran in one more race, getting third in a 100 at Cologne, West Germany. That was then end of the tour. It was announced that Johnson’s doctors had ordered him home.

Ross Earl summed up the view from inside the Johnson camp: “Europe was a disaster.”

THE AFTERMATH

When he was 12, Johnson and a friend were walking down a street in Jamaica. From the dark recess of a doorway anold man called to him. The old man was a fortune teller. He examined Johnson’s hand and proclaimed, “One day you will be famous and travel the world.”

It has all come to pass from that spare prophecy.

“I don’t think he has enough guidance to get him through it unscathed,” Christie of the Globe and Mail said. “He came out of it physically quite well, it seems. In terms of the training side, he didn’t have the necessary guidance.”

There were some internal problems this year. There was the summit meeting in Padova, Italy where Johnson was doing promotional work for Diadora. Johnson and Francis got into a heated argument. Little was resolved.

Turmoil in the Johnson camp became public in late June and early July. Johnson told reporters that he was breaking off with Francis, the only coach he has ever had, and announced he would coach himself.

Further, Johnson intimated he wanted to break with Heidebrecht, who is under contract to Johnson through 1992. Johnson was reported to be concerned that Heidebrecht, who is based in Virginia, could not help him as much as Canadian-based agent might.

There was another summit, this time in Toronto. It was held on a holiday, Dominion Day, July 1.

According to Ross Earl, there were a series of short meetings where all the players sat down and hashed it out--Johnson, Heidebrecht, Astaphan, Glen Calkins, Johnson’s agent for Canadian deals and Earl.

“The problems were all because of bad communication,” Earl said. He said none of the meetings lasted more than 45 minutes.

One example of miscommunication was the controversy over whether Johnson should go to Europe with Francis’ Mazda Track Club. Johnson wanted to continue his rehabilitation with Astaphan, whom others on Johnson’s club had taken to calling the Witch Doctor.

Francis wanted Johnson to travel with the team and get his medical help from masseur Waldemar Matuszewski and chiropractor Morris Zubkewych.

Someone whispered in Johnson’s ear that Francis and Co. really wanted him along as a meal ticket. They told Johnson that Francis would be able to negotiate for more money for the team if Johnson were along.

Johnson said his feelings were hurt when, while he was in St. Kitts for rehabilitation and the team in Europe, no one called to check on his progress.

“As long as I was running and making money, those guys were fine,” Johnson told the Toronto Globe and Mail. “But I needed a coach more when I was hurt than when I was running fast. I was in St. Kitts trying to work out on my own, taking two treatments a day from the doctor, and no one called from Europe to even ask how I was doing. That was it.”

That didn’t help to warm relations.

Things got positively frosty when the Canadian Track and Field Assn. sent a press release mistakenly identifying Johnson’s injury as a tendon tear, which is a far worse injury than a small muscle tear.

“That press release caused havoc in Europe,” Earl said. Francis and Heidebrecht had decided to not withdraw Johnson’s name from meets until the deadline day.

“The Europeans were smart enough to know what a tendon injury was. They looked at Charlie and Larry and thought, ‘These guys are lying to us. Johnson will never run again.’ They had wanted to keep all doors open, and it backfired.”

Some of the problems this summer were a result of Johnson’s own irresponsibility. At one point, according to Earl, Johnson told Heidebrecht he would go to Finland for a promotion. Then, one day after the deadline to back out, Johnson decided he didn’t want to go.

“It was done poorly,” Earl said. “Ben at that particular time was not prepared to be flexible at all.”

It seemed that at times Johnson was either getting little guidance or conflicting information from too many sources.

“It is very easy to confuse Ben,” Earl said. “You can talk circles around Ben. He’s apt to be confused and apt to say ‘Yes’ to something. Then he thinks you’ll go off and do the best for him. It didn’t always happen.”

Canadian media interest was intense. Never had there been such a track and field star. At a parade in Toronto 15,000 people turned out to cheer the new world champion. Johnson said at the parade, “I hope I won’t be famous and poor. I want to be famous and rich.”

Things were happening fast. Johnson was described by Members of Parliament as, “Our own genuine Canadian hero.” He was awarded by the government the prestigious Order of Canada.

Reports surfaced that Johnson was having tax problems. The reports had been consistently denied by the Johnson camp but Earl acknowledged there was something to the rumors.

“We had a tax man in place,” Earl said. “That person attempted to take control of more than taxes.”

Johnson fell behind in paying his taxes and, after Rome, filed two years worth of returns a bit late.

No sooner had that negative press been squelched than rumors circulated of Johnson’s extravagant spending. True, the world’s fastest man likes fast cars. He has owned two Corvettes and now drives a Ferrari Testa Rosa, one of the world’s most expensive high performance cars.

Earl admitted that Johnson did quite a bit of shopping this summer. Johnson carried around a lot of cash--money that he had made from promoters. Earl said that when Johnson returned to Canada from Europe, he was carrying more than $200,000 in cash. There were a few thousand dollars worth of customs duties to be paid on items Johnson bought.

Johnson is building a 7,000 square-foot house for himself and his mother in Unionville, north of Toronto. The two-acre lot cost $350,000.

Runaway spending is the hallmark of an athlete who has had little and suddenly has much. In Johnson’s case, there is some concern about what will happen when the flow of money stops.

“His feelings were hurt earlier this year with tensions with his management and coach,” Christie of the Globe and Mail said. “When they had that blowup, I had this awful feeling that they all took a step back and said, ‘OK, you want to run things, you run it.’ No one is going to say no to the boss. He’s doing whatever he wants right now.”

One of his advisers responds by saying, “Ben doesn’t want a baby sitter.”

Johnson is traveling far out in uncharted waters. No Canadian amateur athlete had ever risen to this prominence. He has no point of reference. He has no countryman to turn to and ask, ‘What did you do when this happened to you?’

“Being the first has made it difficult,” Christie said. “This guy needs someone to sit there and hold his hand and tell him left from right sometimes.”

There has been little hand-holding for Johnson. It has been finger-pointing.

In mastering the 100 meters, everything is timing. In mastering his life and the turmoil of the last year, Johnson’s timing has been way off.

And, with the Games opening Saturday, Johnson has precious little time to get his timing back.