King Carl Faces End of Reign : Track and field: Lewis says he is ready to beat Christie, others, as World Championships begin.

Is he still King Carl, worthy of the hundreds of thousands of dollars he receives for appearing in European track and field meets and the attention he gets from hundreds of reporters who attend his news conferences? Or is he approaching the eve of his abdication, leaving his title as the world’s fastest man to another sprinter, perhaps one even older than Carl Lewis?

These questions should have definitive answers by Sunday night, when the final of the 100 meters is scheduled in the fourth World Championships at Gottlieb Daimler Stadium. But for clues, Lewis suggested watching the first and second rounds of the event this afternoon, the opening day of competition in the nine-day meet involving 1,862 athletes from 189 countries.

“I don’t see how you can look at anybody as the favorite until after the first two rounds,” Lewis said at a news conference Thursday attended by about 400 members of the media, twice as many as listened to Primo Nebiolo, president of the International Amateur Athletic Federation, 24 hours later in the same hall. “You can watch people run, and then you can start forming opinions.”

Except perhaps for Lewis, virtually everyone else who follows the sport has already done that. All three 1992 Olympic medalists--Great Britain’s Linford Christie, Namibia’s Frankie Fredericks and the United States’ Dennis Mitchell--have their supporters, as do reigning U.S. champion Andre Cason and Nigerian Daniel Effiong.

And, of course, as does Lewis.

His presence among the current group of elite sprinters is based not so much on his performances this year--he is 0 for six in the 100 and two for 11 in races up to 400 meters--but on the simple fact that he is who he is.

“Carl is always the man to beat,” said his Santa Monica Track Club manager, Joe Douglas.

A more objective source, respected Italian track and field reporter and historian R.L. Quercetani, recently wrote a magazine article titled, “Carl Lewis, the Greatest Ever.”

If he had been able to earn a living in the sport, Jesse Owens might eventually have been as accomplished, Quercetani wrote, but Lewis is “lucky enough to live in an era in which his abilities have been adequately rewarded in financial terms, (and thus) has enjoyed international glory for well over a decade.”

Quercetani’s evidence:

--From 1984 through ‘92, Lewis won nine Olympic medals--eight gold, one silver.

--From 1983 through ‘91, he won nine World Championship medals--eight gold, one silver.

--He has equaled or broken world records in three events--the 100 meters, the 400-meter relay and the 800-meter relay.

--He won 65 consecutive long jump competitions from 1981 to ’91.

--He holds half or more of the top 10 performances in four events--the 100 meters, 200 meters, long jump and 400-meter relay.

Although Lewis maintains that he does not favor one event over another, it is in the 100 that he has made the most impact. Not only is he the world record-holder at 9.86 seconds, he won the event in all three previous World Championships. The only other athlete competing here who can make the same claim is Ukrainian pole vaulter Sergei Bubka.

“People are coming into my domain, and I have to show them that I am still there,” Lewis said Thursday. “It is important to run well here.”

Considering that Lewis recently turned 32, it is natural to use his age as the reason he has not run particularly well so far this season. But he points out that no one talks about the age of Christie, who does not appear to have slowed since winning the gold medal in the 1992 Olympics at Barcelona. He is 33.

“I can call him Pops,” Lewis said.

Perhaps more pertinent than Lewis’ age is the back injury he suffered in an automobile accident in February. That forced him to concentrate on only two events this year, the 100 and the 200, both of which he will run here, and to forgo the long jump. The first visit he made after arriving this week in Stuttgart was to a chiropractor.

But Lewis also said this is the only meet this year that has captured his full attention. Like Jack Nicklaus in the later stages of his career, Lewis has eyes only for the majors.

“When you’ve been to three Olympic Games and three World Championships, it’s not easy to focus on the invitationals,” Lewis said. “My focus is on the Olympics and the World Championships. Now that I’m here, I’d like to show my stuff. I haven’t done that the whole season.”

He has raced twice since against Christie, losing both times, on July 30 at Gateshead, England, where they each received $150,000 for appearing, and on Aug. 4 at Zurich, Switzerland. In fact, Lewis was third in both races.

“In Gateshead, I stepped off a plane and had a 35-degree temperature change and ran in less than 12 hours,” Lewis said.

“I made a couple of missteps in Zurich. If I hadn’t done that, I would have had a better shot. I’m not taking anything away from Linford. But he felt he had something to prove this year. He’s had more motivation than I have up to this point. This will be a better test of our abilities.”

Christie has made it clear in the past that he is not particularly fond of Lewis, but the Jamaican-born British sprinter did not argue with that analysis during a Friday news conference attended by only a handful of reporters.

“Of course, Lewis is a very experienced, big-occasion athlete,” Christie said. “I am not going to write him off.”

Neither will his Santa Monica teammates.

“We kid him sometimes about his age, call him ‘Old Man,’ and stuff like that,” said sprinter Leroy Burrell, 26, who had the world record in the 100 before Lewis broke it. “But we don’t do it too much. He can still run us down.”

For how much longer?

Having already said that he wants to compete in the long jump through the 1996 Olympics at Atlanta, Lewis has not indicated that the end is near in the sprints, either. Indeed, he is now rediscovering the 200 after not competing in that event in a major competition since 1988. Even with a bad back, he has the world’s fastest time this year, 19.99 seconds.

“I’ll run as long as I’m fast, I guess,” Lewis said. “I would hate to go now because we’re just starting to make some real money.”