40th Anniversary of Curtis Mills world record NCAA victory
Jun 22, 2009 | Track and Field
June 21, 2009
June 21st marked the 40th anniversary of the world record Texas A&M's Curtis Mills set in winning the 1969 NCAA 440 yard dash in Knoxville, Tennessee, over a pair of Olympic medalists in Lee Evans and Larry James, who had claimed gold and silver in the 1968 Mexico Olympics the summer before.
Following is part of the meet recap from Track & Field News along with the event review of the 440 by Dick Drake that appeared in the July 1969 issue of the magazine.
1969 NCAA CHAMPIONSHIPS - Sophomores Dominate
Knoxville, Tenn., June 19-20-21 - There was something very sophomoric about the 48th NCAA championships - but it had nothing to do with the performances. Many of the achievements were superlative for an all-collegiate field, and it was the second year students who overwhelmingly dominated the headlines.
As usual, there were many ingredients that went into making of this meet. But it remained for a virtually unknown soph to snag the story of the meet as he set the sole outright world record and beat the Olympic gold and silver medalist in the process. Texas A&M's Curtis Mills calmly and smoothly but with speed to spare toppled the world quarter-mile standard by a tenth with his 44.7 and shunted Lee Evans to second and Larry James to fifth.
Nine of the 18 individual titles were taken by sophomores. Besides Mill's amazing performance, other top achievements by sophomores included John Carlos' double sprint wins of 9.2 and 20.2, and Marty Liquori's upset of Jim Ryun in the mile with a 3:57.7 clocking.
440 Yard Dash - Dick Drake, Track & Field News
"It was a helluva run." That's how journalism major Curtis Mills, an aspiring sportswriter, says he would have written the lead in a story about his world record quarter-mile race here. And indeed it was. For it only amounted to the most shocking performance of the 1969 track season.
Olympic champion Lee Evans came to Knoxville psyched for the race, "I'm here to break the world record," he had announced. But Mills was keyed to win, and he told some people so. "There's no pressure on me. I still haven't seen my name in any papers. I'm in better position than Lee Evans and Larry James. You wait and see. My name will be in the headlines."
The 6-3 Texas A&M sophomore came to the meet unbeaten with a best of 45.9. He improved his time in the heat to 45.7 as he picked off Olympic silver medalist Larry James with a powerful homestraight surge. The Villanovan held off Michigan State's Bill Wehrwein by a tenth in 45.8. Evans came on strong coming off the final curve in his heat with a seasonal best of 45.4 to edge Southern Cal's Edesel Garrison whose 45.5 duplicated the frosh record. Seven athletes from the smallish field of 18 recorded PRs in the heats. Idaho State's Larry Lewis ran a non-qualifying 46.0.
Even though Wayne Collett (220), Gary Wombie, Dave Morton (relay) and none of Rice's runners competed, the final stacked up as the best in collegiate history as the athletes lined up this way: Garrison, Len Van Hofwegen, Evans, James, Turner, Mills, Wehrwein and Al Coffee. The race was delayed for the benefit of TV, then to avoid the cheering for Bob Seagren's 16-8 and finally a false start.
James, who wouldn't have qualified for the final if there had been three rounds since his plane was late, charged away from the blocks as if to burn off late-finishing Evans. By the top of the first curve, he had already made up the stagger on Turner. He held a three yard advantage at the furlong reached in 21.0, four-tenths ahead of Evans in fifth and seventh-tenths ahead of Mills in virtual last.
By the top of the last turn, All Coffee had caught James and Evans moved even with both 10 yards into the homestretch. As both challengers paid for their early madness and faded, Evans looked a sure thing to keep his one-lap record clean for the year. But then Mills, with the same instant speed Evans had used to discourage James, moved past Evans perhaps faster than the San Jose Stater has had the misfortune of witnessing in the past four years.
And Evans could not respond to Mills' challenge. He had keyed himself too closely to beating James and watching out for Garrison. He had never even met Mills, but then most of the track world had never heard of Curtis.
Mills' 44.7 clipped a tenth off the world record set by Tommie Smith in 1966. Evans, the world standard bearer at 400 meters at 43.8, finished .39 seconds back, according to the Bulova phototimer, for a 45.1 PR rather than the 45.2 assigned by the officials.
James faded to fifth in 45.8 as Wehrwein and Garrison slipped past 45.7 clockings.
Evans said: "About the first thing I thought after the race was that I'd get my picture in Track & Field News losing again."
