Mt. San Antonio College Relays : Everett, Lewis Run Into Confusion and Miss 800 Relay Record

As fast as they are, it appears as if the world-class sprinters from the Santa Monica Track Club cannot escape misfortune.

For the second time this year, they failed to break the world record in the 800-meter relay, and for the second time, they claimed it was through no fault of their own.

In their latest attempt Saturday at the Mt. SAC Relays, it appeared as if an awkward handoff between the third runner, Danny Everett, and the anchor runner, Carl Lewis, did them in. But Lewis and Everett blamed the problem on a failure to communicate by the meet officials.

The Santa Monica team of Lewis, Everett, Floyd Heard and Joe DeLoach won the race easily in 1:20.54, the eighth-fastest time ever, but was unable to beat USC’s 11-year-old record of 1:20.26.

In a meet at Houston earlier this year, a team of Lewis, Heard, DeLoach and Mark Witherspoon was even faster, perhaps faster than the world record, but the actual time will never be known because the automatic timer malfunctioned. The official hand-time was 1:20.4.

After Heard’s exceptional second leg of 19.7 seconds Saturday, Santa Monica again appeared to be in position to challenge the record. But when Everett, running in Lane One near the end of his third leg, began looking for Lewis to make the final exchange, he could not find him.

“I thought maybe he was off the track, still taking his warmups off,” Everett said.

But just as Everett began to panic, he saw Lewis rushing from Lane Four to Lane One. They made the exchange, but only after Lewis almost came to a dead stop. Even with that, Lewis ran his 200-meter leg in 20.0, but he was frustrated afterward because of another failed attempt to break the record.

Lewis said there was confusion before the final handoff because he was under the impression that all of the runners had to remain in the lane assigned to their team. For Santa Monica, that was Lane Four.

Everett said an official told him that he would be allowed to move inside to Lane One only seconds before he took the baton from Heard. The first two runners, DeLoach and Heard, said they were instructed to remain in their lanes.

“This is ridiculous,” Lewis said. “The official told all of us (the anchors from the four teams) to line up in our lanes. I was in Lane Four and all set. But then, one of the other runners yelled, ‘They’re breaking.’ I moved over when I saw Danny in Lane One, but I’m not certain where I was when I got the baton.”

There was some question about whether Everett and Lewis completed the handoff too far down the track to count as a legal exchange, although there were no challenges and Santa Monica was not disqualified. “He (Lewis) could have been out of the zone when I got the baton to him,” Everett said. “I’m not going to say it’s impossible.”

By comparison, the rest of the day was tame, although the same could not be said for the wind.

Texas Christian’s Raymond Stewart, who finished third in the 100 in the 1987 world championships and was a finalist in the 1988 Summer Olympics while competing for Jamaica, won the 100 Saturday in 9.91 seconds. DeLoach, the Olympic 200-meter champion, was second in 9.97. But they had a wind at their backs measuring 5.82 meters per second. The wind has to be under 2.0 meters per second for record consideration.

Larry Myricks, third in the Olympics in the long jump, had a best of 28 feet 5 inches in the long jump, but the tailwind was 2.31. Mike Powell, the Olympic silver medalist, was second at 27-6 with a wind of 2.58.

In other invitational events of note, Nigeria’s Tina Iheagwan, who runs for Mt. SAC, won the women’s 100 over favored U.S. Olympian Sheila Echols in 11.16 with an aiding wind of 6.39; Houston’s Houston Courtney won the 110-meter high hurdles in 13.46 with a tailwind of 4.41; and Kevin Young of the Santa Monica Track Club won the men’s 400-meter intermediate hurdles in 48.95.

Ed Eyestone outkicked Pat Porter in the last 90 meters to win the 10,000 meters Saturday night.

Eyestone, who covered the final 400 in 59.2, ran 28:15.03 to Porter’s 28:15.10. Porter, who has won seven consecutive national cross-country championships, had led throughout most of the second half of the race.

The field of 41 runners passed the 5,000-meter mark in 14:16, but Porter, with Eyestone not far behind, picked up the pace.

Going into the last lap, only Porter, Eyestone and Jay Marden, formerly of California, remained in contention.

The meet continues today with an added starter, Lewis, running in the 400-meter relay. He originally said he had another commitment, but the Santa Monica Track Club’s manager, Joe Douglas, said Lewis decided to remain after his disappointment in the 800-meter relay.

Douglas accepted responsibility for the confusion Saturday.

“All the blame is on my shoulders,” he said. “A few years ago, I would have made sure that all of my runners knew what the rules were before the race. I didn’t do that this time.”

Asked why not, he said, “Because I thought my runners were experienced enough to know that they have to find these things out, and I thought the officials here were experienced enough to tell them. I guess that’s why they call it amateur sports.”

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