Walt Murphy is one of the finest track geeks that I know. Walt does #ThisDayinTrack&FieldHistory, an excellent daily service that provides true geek stories about our sport. You can check out the service for FREE with a free one-month trial subscription! (email: WaltMurphy44@gmail.com ) for the entire daily service. We will post a few historic moments each day, beginning February 1, 2024.
This Day in Track & Field–May 19
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By Walt Murphy’s News and Results Service (wmurphy25@aol.com), used with permission.
1956–-Duke’s Dave Sime ran 9.3 for the first time at the Carolinas AAU meet in Raleigh to equal the World Record for the 100-yard Dash (he would run 9.3 twice more). The record for the metric version of the 100 was also equaled on this day when Bobby Morrow ran 10.2 at the South USA meet in Houston. Morrow would go on to win 3 gold medals (100, 200, 4×100) at the Melbourne Olympics later in the year, while a previous injury forced Sime to pull up in his heat of the 100 at the U.S. Trials. Both men are members of the National Hall of Fame.
Sime, who would win a silver medal in the 100 at the 1960 Olympics, was an “accidental” sprinter who excelled in baseball, football, and basketball in high school. Working out with the track team to get in shape for baseball during his freshman year at Duke, his speed caught the attention of track coaches Bob Chambers and Al Buehler. “I never saw anything like him,” Buehler said. “He could really move. We timed him in the 100-yard dash on a field that wasn’t groomed, and he ran the distance in 9.8 seconds. We knew he could do better after some training, and we were ecstatic. He had enormous talent and intelligence and was a hard worker.” Read more at the link below.
NY Times Obituary:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/16/sports/dave-sime-once-the-worlds-fastest-sprinter-dies-at-79.html
Sime & The CIA!:
WR Progression (100m): https://worldathletics.org/records/by-progression/16647
1963—Arizona State’s Henry Carr ran 20.4 in Tempe, Arizona, to set an American Record for 200 meters. The following year, Carr would win Olympic gold in the 200 and 4×400 in Tokyo.
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