'WELL RUN', read the headline on the front page of yesterday's Gleaner. It perfectly encapsulated the life of Herbert Henry McKenley, O.M., the great Jamaican icon whose clock stopped at 85 on Monday evening.
What a wonderful run it was by Herb, one of the true pioneers and great contributors to the rich history of athletics in this country.
As one of the country's great athletes, he also served as president of the Jamaica Amateur Athletic Association (JAAA) and national track coach.
I had the distinction of meeting the great man while at Calabar, where he had excelled in not only track and field, but football and cricket, in which he actually led the Sunlight Cup bowling averages and went on to make the All-Sunlight team.
Gave time endlessly
We would cross paths for a number of years at the playing field where 'Herb Mac' appeared to live, as he gave his time endlessly in enhancing the skills of the school's athletes.
Herb Mac was head coach of the track team, but given his fatherly support and words of wisdom the football and cricket teams coached by Clive 'Bunny' Marshall, Fitz Coleman and Leslie Wright on which I played, and other boys playing other sports, found out he was very much their coach and mentor as well.
That caring extended to others who never played sports as well, because he was so connected to life at the school that it would be difficult to find a student who attended Calabar during his tenure who never had a one-on-one with the great man who coached the school to 14 Boys' Champs titles, the last coming in 1997.
Quite strange is the fact that McKenley won only one race at Boys' Champs - the 440 yards in 1939. He was adjudged to have actually broken the record, but when the distance was measured, it was found to be one yard short.
A sprinter of no ordinary feat who holds a number of firsts on the track, McKenley, a Rotarian presented with its Medal of Honour for service to the club and this country, played a huge part in putting Jamaica's name on the map.
World record run
McKenley
He is the first Jamaican to have set a world record, when he clocked 46.3 seconds over 440 yards, and the first man to run a sub-46 second time for the 400 metres after registering a hand-timed 45.9 in the United States.
At the 1948 Games in London, he finished second in the 400 metres to compatriot Arthur Wint, in a race McKenley was heavily favoured to win. He actually looked a winner as the athletes headed down the top of the homestretch, but ran out of gas to the long-striding Wint who finished in 46.2 seconds, just ahead of McKenley who hit the finish line at 46.4.
McKenley also ran in the 200m final in London, where he placed fourth.
At the next Olympics in 1952 in Helsinki, Finland, McKenley would win gold in the 4x400 metres relay and be declared second in two races that were decided by a photo-finish.
In the 100 metres final, the Jamaican and American Lindy Remingino hit the tape at the same time in 10.4 seconds, but Remingino was declared to have crossed the tape first.
Here, one must note how long Jamaicans have been losing out those gold-medal spots when hitting the tape simultaneously with United States athletes. Oh yes, it started long before Merlene Ottey of another great generation won a couple of Olympic silver medals in like fashion.
Interestingly, McKenley said in an interview afterwards that he was told by an official he had won the race, before the result wa later.
Fantastic performance
McKenley was to suffer the same fate in the 400 metres final in Helsinki, this time to his country-man, George Rhoden.
Both men clocked an identical 49.9 seconds, but for the second time at the Games, the Jamaican was faced with bitter disappointment with second place.
The 4x400 metres relay repre-sented McKenley's last hope. Not surprisingly, it led him to produce one of his most fantastic perfor-mances in what must still rank as one of the greatest ever 4x400m Olympic duels.
Arthur Wint (46.8) led off Jamaica's team and ran an almost even first leg with the United States' Ollie Matson (46.7), who secured a slender advantage.
The Americans put daylight between themselves and Jamaica on the second leg with Eugene Cole (45.4) opening a 15-metre gap on 200m sprinter Leslie Laing (47.0).
Cole passed over to Charles Moore with the United States seeming home and dry.
But McKenley, also called 'Hurricane Herbert', ran the race of his life in a then unheard of 44.6-second third leg to catch Moore (46.3) and hand over to 400m champion Rhoden a one-metre lead on Mal Whitfield.
Rhoden held that one-metre advantage to the finish to land gold as both teams smashed the then world record by almost five seconds.
To this day, McKenley remains the only man this century to have won Olympic medals in both the 100m and 400m, and the only man to have run in all three sprint finals (100, 200, 400) at the Olympics.
Highest level
In an interview posted in The Gleaner on February 27, 1997, McKenley listed that 4x400m gold as his "greatest achievement".
He said: "My greatest achieve-ment in track and field has to be when I won the relay gold medal in Helsinki, because once you get in sport and realise that you have some potential to go to the highest level, an Olympic gold medal has to be the goal. As a coach, the desire is no less in that I am seeking to develop someone to at least equal my achievement."
He coached Dennis Johnson when he was in high school, as he went on to run 9.5 seconds over 100 yards. Johnson later equalled the world record, running 9.3 seconds in San José, California, on March 11, 1961.
He also coached Merlene Ottey for a short period, during the latter part of her high school years and three months before the Olympics in Moscow.
Many other national and Calabar athletes would benefit from McKenley's unending desire to give of himself, especially in track and field. Well run, Herb Mac!
audley.boyd@gleanerjm.com
