Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-12-22
MAKING ABIGMISTAKE
METHOD OF SELECTING MARA
THoN RUNS FOR oLYMPAID.

NEW YORK, December 2l.-The Am
erican Olympic committee certainly has
its troubles with the announcements pre-
paratory to making up the team to send
to London next summer. Only a few
weeks ago the announcement of NJ. P.
Halpin. as team manager, brought out
a howl of disgust from a large part Of
the athletic public This will subside
in time, only to be succeeded by a series
of criticisms similar to those flung at
the same committee that sent the team
to Athens in 1906. .. ..
The Olympic committee is profting by
one great mistake of the 1905 European
invasion, however. in the matter of pick
ing the team. This year the men will
be picked on actual condition and per-
Torrance, instead Of by reputation, az
was the case in 1006. This will insure
the team against a bevy of overfed cham
pions, as was the Athens team in 1906
when fully one-half of the men were in
deplorable athletic condition when they
sailed for Greece.
There is one thing on which the Olympic
committee is going to slip up, however,
and that is the Marathon race. A perusal
of the committees minutes reveals the
following paragraph:
1.-The committee decided not to hold a
preliminary Marathon race. A fifteen
mile run in the east and another in the
west will be held and the committee will
pick from the contestants the men who
will represent America in the Olympic
Marathon race. The date and place for
the above two events have not been Sc
lected yet"
If this plan is carried out America
will surely not have a show in the Mara
thon. The men who can win Marathon
races are not fast enough to figure in a
15-mile race, and the men who will win
the 15-mile trials will not last through
twenty-siX miles and 600 yards.
In the Athens Marathon of 1906 there
were half dozen men who could have
beaten Sherring at fifteen miles, and bad
ly too. In the actual race Daily of Ire
land, Blake of Australia and Billy Frank
of the United States were way ahead of
the little Canadian at fifteen miles, but
he made cart horses of them in the dis
tance that remained
Men like John j. Hayes. Bob Fowler,
Albert Carey and Sidney Hatch do not
get going until they have passed the
20-mile mark and they will be COM
pletely outclassed at the shorter distance
and kept off the team by men who are in
capable of running the real Marathon
distance.
1t is hardly possible that the committee
is baking at a real Marathon trial be-
cause of the fear of injuring the runners
chances in the big English race. Experts
agree that good, hard race a week
before sailing. followed by the ensuing
rest during the voyage, would be more
Of a benefit than detriment to the con-
dition of the men.
The British Olympic Association and
the Amateur Rowing Association have
decided upon Tuesday. July 2S and the
following days as those On which to hold
the rowing regatta in connection with the
Olympic games in England. The events
will be contested on an upstream course
of mile and a half at Henley. Entries
from the English clubs will close on
June 30; from clubs belonging to Canada,
Germany. Holland and Belgium on June
10, and from all others Oh June l.