Three Victories Put Danny Harris Back on the Fast Track : Hurdler: Attitude adjustment helps him return to the form that led to a silver medal in the 1984 Olympics.

The scene at UC Irvine’s track stadium last week was as it usually is each summer morning--tranquil, serene, unhurried. It is within these surroundings that world-class hurdler Danny Harris focuses on his world-class intentions.

“I want to be ranked No. 1 in the world this year,” said Harris, 24. “ . . . And I want it bad.”

Six years ago at the Olympic Games in Los Angeles, Harris, then 18, placed second to Edwin Moses in the 400-meter intermediate hurdles. Three years later, Harris gained more notoriety when he ended Moses’ decade-long, 107-race win streak at a meet in Madrid.

But in the years that followed, Harris, once described as the heir apparent to Moses’ impressive legacy, met bitter disappointment.

At the 1988 U.S. Olympic Trials, Harris finished fifth in the 400 hurdles--missing the team by two places. And in 1989, after moving from Ames, Iowa, to Santa Monica, Harris had his worst season ever.

But now Harris, a three-time NCAA champion from Iowa State who moved to Irvine last fall, is on an upswing.

With a 48.13-second victory at Sao Paulo, Brazil, May 20; a 47.62 at Seville, Spain, May 30; and a 47.77 at Madrid, June 6, Harris is undefeated in 1990 and has the world’s three fastest times of the year.

“I think it’s remarkable for anybody--even Edwin Moses--to run this fast and this consistently this early,” said Jon Hendershott of Track & Field News.

Harris, a former state hurdles champion from Perris High School, is not quite as surprised. Last fall, with a push from his girlfriend, Swedish 800-meter runner Maria Akraka, Harris embarked on a strenuous training program that included 30-minute runs in the morning and longer-distance track workouts in the afternoon.

For Harris, who usually would not train the last three months of the year, this was a significant--and successful--change.

But perhaps more significant was Harris’ decision to adjust his attitude--one that became increasingly depressive after the disappointments in 1988 and ’89.

“It (not making the 1988 Olympic team) was trauma of the worst kind,” said Harris, who re-injured a hamstring in a tune-up race one week before the Trials.

“You know, after you’ve been on an Olympic team--at 18--you know what it was like,” Harris said. “You know what it’s like to get the accolades from the crowd. You know what it’s like when they announce your name as being an (Olympic) team member. You know the process the people go through after you make the team, getting their uniforms and getting their gear. . . . It’s just like (being part of) a special little family.

“I was quite depressed after the Trials. I thought I had done everything I could to prepare myself. . . . For the rest of ‘88, I ran OK. I ended up the season with a 48.04 in Greece. I felt pretty good about that, but the season was over. Everybody else was in Seoul and I was in Ames, watching it on TV.”

A few months later, Harris decided to move from Ames--where he competed for Iowa State and was undefeated in collegiate competition from 1984-86--to Santa Monica, where he hoped new surroundings might help motivate him. But being removed from his coach, Steve Lynn, and from a structured environment, Harris continued to flounder.

“1989 was a terrible year--my worst year I ever had,” said Harris, who was ranked fourth in the world by Track & Field News last year, his lowest ranking since 1984. “Not being focused, not having a coach or a set plan . . . I mean, I would go to practice some days and some days I would choose not to.

“You know when it comes time to race and you know how many days you’ve put into practice, well, when you go out there on the track, confidence is something that you need in abundance. You don’t need to be second-guessing yourself. Well, I found myself many times on the line getting ready to start a race . . . thinking back to that Thursday, those 300s that you missed, wishing you had got them down because you know that you’ll be needing them here in the next 48 seconds.

“Last year, I lost some races that there was no way I should have lost. I’d never run a 50 (second) race in Europe and I don’t think I’ve run more than three 49s. So to have a season like I had last year, it was . . . terrible .”

Harris said the word “terrible” as if he’d like to spit out the word on the track and stomp it with his spikes. But as he looked out on the UCI track, apparently eager to get his morning workout going, Harris paused. In a slow, serious tone, he added:

“But I think that was a really big growth period for me. I did a lot of growing up as a person and as an athlete. Because when you have something that’s taken away from you, I mean, you’ll do either one of two things. You’ll either lay down and let it happen to you, or you’ll get back up and start fighting back.

“And this is my get-up-and-fight-back year right here.”

With that, Harris stood and tossed a stopwatch to a visitor.

“Here, time me, OK?”

It was not an easy task. Harris, running three all-out 200-meter repeats, was drop-jaw impressive, clocking all three 200s in less than 22 seconds.

“You could consider it speed work,” Harris said, still huffing and puffing after he had taken a warm-down lap. “Coming off that turn . . . that felt great. I felt like Carl (Lewis).”

Lewis, of course, is not a name Harris needs to be concerned with. Asked to name his top threats, Harris listed 1988 Olympic gold medalist Andre Phillips, who is currently injured; former UCLA star Kevin Young, the world’s top-ranked intermediate hurdler in 1989, and Jamaica’s Winthrop Graham, who won the NCAA title last year for Texas.

“That’s it,” Harris said.

But what of Moses, 34, who still holds the world record at 47.02?

“Edwin? . . . I think for one race, he can still be as good as anyone in the world,” said Harris, who ran his career-best of 47.48 in placing second to Moses at the 1987 World Championships at Rome, a race considered one of the most exciting of all time. Moses, Harris and West Germany’s Harald Schmid crossed the line in a photo finish.

“In a three-series race, I think (Moses) might have a little bit of a tougher time, uh, because it’s more taxing,” Harris said. “But I think if he got himself in shape and came out and picked his races, I think he’d still be effective. I actually look forward to him coming back for one more year, if not this year then maybe next year. But I’d like to see him out on the track again. . . .

“You know, I never even took a victory lap when I beat Edwin. I think from the moment I crossed the finish line, it was like a dream. Although I realized what I had done, it wasn’t really until the next day, flying back, where it really sunk in. I read the paper on the plane, saw myself in the paper, but it wasn’t really until then that I said, ‘Hey, you’ve done something good , Danny.’ ”

If he again meets Moses, who took 1989 off to work on The Athletics Congress’ drug-testing program as well as a Masters of Business Administration degree, it would probably be at the UCI track, where Moses, a Newport Beach resident, has trained for several years.

Asked if he considered choosing a different training facility, one that might not place him in the sites of a competitor, Harris shrugged.

“It doesn’t matter to me,” he said. “I don’t know if it matters to him. I think it’s big enough for both of us to coexist here. . . . He hasn’t told me to get off yet, at least.”