| John Walker (runner) |
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Walker is best known for winning the Olympic Games 1500 meters in 1976 . Unfortunately, this achievement was somewhat overshadowed because 22 African countries boycotted the games to protest against a tour of South Africa by the " All Blacks ", the New Zealand national Rugby team. Walker had already achieved world prominence in 1974 when he ran 2nd to Filbert Bayi in the Commonwealth Games 1500 meter at Christchurch, where both runners beat the existing world record. Although it seemed the boycott denied Bayi (who was Walker's main rival) the opportunity to challenge for the 1500 meter title, it's unknown to many that Bayi would never have competed as the Tanzanian at the time was suffering from a severe viral infection. Walker had also defeated Bayi in a number of races over 1 mile & 1500 m leading up prior to the 76' Olympics. Throughout his career as a world-class miler Walker was coached by Arch Jelley, school principal and middle distance runner himself, whose work with runners has been typified by meticulous training programmes on a scientific basis and effective communication in person. Walker held the world mile record with a time of 3:49.4 minutes set at Göteborg on August 12 , 1975 , bettering the previous time set by Filbert Bayi . It was the first time the 3 minutes and 50 second barrier had been bettered & was 10 seconds faster than Roger Bannister 's historic first sub 4 minute mile of 3:59.4 run twenty years earlier. The record lasted until July 17 , 1979 , when it was beaten by Sebastian Coe . Walker also held the world record for 2000 meters, running 4:51.4 in on 4 August , 1985 . Walker later became the first to run 100 sub 4 Minute Mile s in a closely fought and contentious battle with Steve Scott . In 1996 , Walker announced that he had Parkinson's Disease . |
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