Fast Runner Is an Even Faster Talker

If you’re going to talk the talk, you’d better be able to walk the walk.

That is track coach John Smith’s philosophy about the sprinters on his HSI team and the media.

“I give them the green light,” Smith said when asked about the bold predictions that proteges Ato Boldon and Maurice Greene have made over the last season and a half. “All I tell them is, ‘Just back it up,’ . . . and so far, they’ve been able to do it. I mean, Ato came up short last year [in the 100 at the World Championships] but his teammate won. And then [Boldon] went out and won the 200.”

That teammate is Greene, a 23-year-old Kansas City native who showed flashes of brilliance in 1995 and ’96 before establishing himself as one of the world’s elite sprinters last year.

Greene, who will run the 200 meters and a leg on the HSI 400 relay team in the Mt. San Antonio College Relays on Sunday, posted personal bests of 9.86 seconds in the 100--that won the world title--and 19.86 in the 200 last year and predicts he will run 9.76 in the 100 this season.

That is nearly a tenth of a second faster than the world record of 9.84 set by Canadian Donovan Bailey in the 1996 Olympic Games, but the 5-foot-9, 165-pound Greene says he feels no pressure to live up to his fast talk.

“I feel like you only put pressure on yourself,” he said. “Pressure is created by yourself when you believe like you’re not capable of doing something. If you feel like you’re very capable of doing it, there is no pressure on you. You have nothing to worry about. I have no problem with saying that my goal for the 100 this year is 9.76. I plan on running 9.76, hopefully faster, but that’s just a goal I have set for myself.”

Considering Greene’s accomplishments already this year, that goal may not be so far-fetched.

He tied the world indoor record in the 60-meter dash with a 6.41 clocking in Stuttgart, Germany, on Feb. 1, then lowered it to 6.39 two days later in Madrid.

He then went to Australia and ran 10.06 in the 100 in Melbourne on Feb. 25 and 9.99 in Sydney three days later.

The 9.99 clocking made him the first man to break 10 seconds on Australian soil and the 10.06 left Bailey a distant third in 10.36.

Bailey then withdrew from the Sydney meet and said that he had bruised a heel in a meet in North Shore City, New Zealand.

“I never should have run in Melbourne,” Bailey told reporters. “I just wasn’t ready.”

Those comments still irk Smith, a 1972 Olympian in the 400 while at UCLA.

“If you’re not ready to run, don’t show up,” Smith said. “The fans pay their hard-earned money. They work all week long and they come out there to watch you run and you’re going to say that you’re trying to get ready? No. If you’re not ready, don’t show up. If you show up and you get beat, take it like a man. If not, shut up and go back to practice.”

Greene doesn’t seem as bothered by Bailey’s comments as Smith was, but he does say, “If you’re not capable of running 100% when you step on the track, do not step on the track. When you step on the track, the fans don’t care where you are in your training. They want to see you run the 9.9 or the 9.8 that you are capable of running every time you step on the track.”

Winning the world title last year eased Greene’s disappointment at failing to make the U.S. Olympic team in 1996.

It also made him a hometown hero in Kansas City--he threw out the ceremonial first pitch in the Royals’ home opener last week--and changed his tax bracket considerably.

But Smith says Greene’s work ethic hasn’t changed, pointing out that Greene came back from a monthlong break after last season with the same tenacity he’d displayed before.

“He’s been pulled in a lot of directions,” Smith said. “So I was very pleased and very proud of him and how he’s been able to get on the track and conduct himself the way he has.”

Greene says he’ll break 20 seconds in the 200 at Mt. SAC on Sunday if the conditions are good, but he’s not making any world-record predictions.

First off, Michael Johnson’s 19.32 clocking at the ’96 Olympics might stand for a decade or longer.

Second, Greene says he has a lot to learn about running the half-lap race, although he is tied for ninth on the all-time list.

And there is still work to be done in the 100. Greene says he needs to get stronger and to perfect some of the technical details, but if he ever puts it all together, watch out.

“I believe in five years that we should be running 9.6s,” he said. “But it’s going to take time to get to that point.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Mt. SAC Relays

* Where: Mt. San Antonio College in Walnut.

* When: Friday, 9 a.m., middle schools; 4:30 p.m., university-open division; 7 p.m., open distance carnival. Saturday, 8 a.m., high schools; 7:30 p.m., international distance carnival. Sunday, 9 a.m., university-open division; noon, international day of champions.

* Tickets: $8 Friday and Saturday, $12 Sunday.