ben johnson's high school times

Members Area Race Reports
1

I was looking through some OFSAA results (provincial high school championships) and found this

http://www.geocities.com/ofsaaresults/Page30.jpg

Ben did 10.55 as a senior in high school, Charlie do you remember any other of ben’s times throughout high school? FAT/wind legal.

Also any idea what happened to that Atlee Mahorn guy, he dominated high school track but what happened to him after that?

2

What is a “Midget Team”??

3

point totals for midgets from diff. schools

midgets are grade 9s
juniors gr 10s

4

They seldom had electronic timing in HS meets then so he had only one that I remember (as listed) but he won Mansfield Relays in 11.1 (as it turns out that was run from the 110m hurdles line on a freezing day) to win by a city block. He ran 10.31 wa at Nationals in his junior year and in the summer of his last HS yr he ran 10.25 legal at the World Cup trials in Venezuela.
As for Atlee, he won a medal at the World Champs at 200m in 1991 in Tokyo and still holds the Canadian record of 20.17, set into a strong headwind there. He’s an investment banker now and recently moved back from Florida to take a position at TD Wealth Management in Toronto. Ange press-ganged Atlee into giving us a hand at our community May fair track meet. He was also elected to the Board or Athletics Canada recently.

5

Interesting. I was looking at eliteyouth.com and walter dix was running 11.2-11.3 I believe as a 14 year old and Tyson gay was running 21.5 in his senior year, impressive… but not so exceptional.

Though Ben’s 10.31!? junior year?? 16 years old? I know wind aided, but unless thats like 4-5m/s wind, then thats monstrous.

6

It was 3.1 (as I remember) at the 1980 Oly Trials and he was 18 (HS used to be 5 yrs in Ontario but is now 4 yrs as in most places).

7

Has Atlee become more “diplomatic” or is still as outspoken as ever. Note that I don’t consider his tendency toward candor to be a bad thing. He’s certainly a very intelligent guy.

8

I’m sure he is at work, but, as you can imagine, I’m not invited to any AC board meetings!

9

I can’t think of a federation that couldn’t use a person of Atlee’s intelligence and perspective born from experience. Hopefully people in AC will actually listen to him.

10

Hey! Come to think of it, since Atlee works for TD Wealth Management, I’m not invited to his work either!!

11

Jeez, are you even allowed to tell people that you know him? :wink:

12

Charlie,

Off the top of your head, do you remember his times when he first started to train with you? How quickly did he progress to sub 11?

Thanks

13

It’s all there in Speed Trap (e-book available in the site store) he started at 11.8 and 24.1.

14

I just did! It is such a small world that the head of his bank’s wealth management division has twins in my son, James’, class and used to play football in the CFL. Anyway, he’s been seen having burgers with us at the Rebel House in the neighbourhood.

15

Was he 15? or 14? when he started. I’ve read speed trap just forgot lol.

16

Thanks. I must have missed those times in the book. In the SPP download vid you spoke about Ben doing 4x6x60m. Were you using those at this point in his development? Or were you still doing the longer stuff early on?

Thanks again!

17

Is it better to go longer early on? :S

18

From my own experience, not really Not for speed anyway. My question for CF was really wanting to know when they had started doing longer SE2 type runs (300-600M)

I find that kids (14yo and under) respond way better to nothing longer than a 150 for Spec. Endurance and 15-20m for speed. That’s how I train my daughters and some other youth athletes. And they keep improving every year while everyone on their old track club is still running the same times from several years ago. My oldest (12yo) can go all the way up to a 800m when she does her pentathalon and all she does is short stuff. Although, she’s pretty active and gets fit from other things.

19

I see. Im 16, but I have a problem with slowing down too much in the 100 and also 200 endurance simply seems weak vs. guys my speed, so running 250-300m good idea? for spec. end. I

20

Well how fit are you? I think Charlie sums it up best “why fight for tenths at the start when you can gain seconds through general conditioning” Im starting to realize with my kids that its more about fitness than it is about spectacular programs on paper…

Special Endurance has to be built up. Dont show up at the track and start running your 200m close to your race times out of the blue!!!you need a base general fitness before you start doing this stuff.