Johnson Doubles His Fun : Track and field: He adds victory in 200 to that in 400, the first to do so in U.S. Championships since 1899. Powell beats Lewis in long jump.

Today’s track and field trivia question: Which occurs less often, victories in the 200 and 400 meters by the same man in the same championship meet or competition between Mike Powell and Carl Lewis in the long jump?

In front of 16,583 and network television cameras, also a rarity in recent years at a track meet in this country, both happened Sunday on the final day of the Mobil USA Outdoor Championships.

The answer by a few years, give or take a century, is the 200-400 double, which is not surprising because the man who achieved it within a three-day period here, Michael Johnson, is fast becoming the answer to many questions about the sport.

For instance, who is gifted and personable but also willing to speak his mind enough to begin attracting fans, sponsors and media back to the sport?

In becoming the first man in the U.S. championships since Maxie Long in 1899 to win both events, Johnson, 27, of Dallas ran the fourth-fastest time ever, 43.66 seconds, Friday in the 400 finals, then returned Sunday to win the 200 in the world’s fastest time under all conditions this year, 19.83. Because he was aided by a wind of 3.5 meters per second, over the legal allowable of 2.0, the time is tainted, but it is apparent he is ready to challenge the 1979 world record of 19.72 set by Italy’s Pietro Mennea.

As for the anticipated duel with Mike Marsh, the 1992 Olympic champion in the 200, it was all but over before it started. While Johnson was in Lane Five, Marsh was in Lane One because his semifinal time did not allow him to draw for one of the preferred middle lanes.

Marsh’s manager, Joe Douglas, protested, but while he might have been correct that USA Track & Field officials created the situation by bungling the management of the earlier rounds, they went by the book in assigning lanes for the final.

Running in Lane One in the 200 is difficult on an old track, like the one in Hughes Stadium, because of the tight curve--so difficult that, according to track and field historian D.H. Potts of Santa Barbara, no man has won the event starting from there in a major championship since Eddie Tolan in the 1932 Los Angeles Olympics.

“The only place I’d take Lane One is on the moon, and even then it would be tight,” said Mel Rosen, U.S. men’s coach in the 1992 Summer Olympics.

Marsh, who finished sixth in the 200 in 20.35 after winning the 100 Friday, did not complain, saying that he had “no regrets, no excuses,” but Douglas said, “I just want to congratulate [USATF] on one of the greatest hatchet jobs I’ve ever seen.”

The other highly anticipated matchup Sunday was almost as anti-climactic, but neither Powell nor Lewis was expected to do much more than they did in the long jump.

Competing for the first time this year after breaking a bone in his foot in a taekwondo accident, Powell jumped 28 feet 3/4 inches on his first try. Then, believing his place among the top three and a berth in the Aug. 4-13 World Championships in Sweden was assured, mentally took the rest of the day off. No one came closer to him than Lewis at 27-8 3/4.

It was only the fourth time they have met since their historic confrontation at the 1991 World Championships at Tokyo, where Powell broke Bob Beamon’s 23-year-old world record and Lewis’ 10-year, 65-meet winning streak.

Powell has beaten Lewis in four of their last five competitions.

Besides Johnson, other double champions were Jackie Joyner-Kersee, who added the long jump title Sunday to the one she won Thursday in the heptathlon; and Gwen Torrence, who won the 200 Sunday after winning the 100 Friday.

UCLA’s John Godina entered the meet with a chance to become the first man to win both the shotput and discus since USC’s Parry O’Brien 40 years ago. But Godina finished second in both. On Sunday, he was runner-up to Georgia’s Brent Noon in a reversal of their recent NCAA results.

Roger Kingdom, two-time Olympic champion in the 110-meter hurdles who is staging a serious comeback at 32 after dealing with injuries for the last four years, took a significant step forward with his victory over promising Allen Johnson.

But 38-year-old Ruth Wysocki, who did not compete much on the track for the last five years, did not fare as well, finishing fourth in the 1,500 behind Regina Jacobs, Suzy Hamilton and Sarah Thorsett. Wysocki might have been drained by her semifinal Friday, when she fell, got back up and rallied from far behind to finish fourth.