Johnson Wins Olympic Gold.

Johnson Wins Olympic Gold. American sprinter Michael Johnson broke his own world record in the 200-meter event at the 1996 Summer Olympics, easily winning the gold medal. Johnson also won the gold medal for the 400-meter race, making him the first man to win both Olympic races. . Johnson Wins Olympic Gold For sprinter Michael Johnson it wasn't enough just to win at the 1996 Summer Olympic Games in Atlanta. His mission was nothing short of gaining entrance to the pantheon of great 20th-century runners. By 1995, Johnson was already the first runner in a century to win both the 200 and 400 meters at the World Games. But by becoming the first man to win gold medals in both the 200 and 400 meters, Johnson earned a place of honor beside his lifelong idol, Olympic legend Jesse Owens, who had won gold medals in the 100-meter and 200-meter races at the 1936 Olympic Games in Berlin. Johnson authored his glittering Olympic moments in particularly memorable fashion. To have even a fighting chance in both the 200-meter and 400-meter events, he and his agent had to persuade the International Olympic Committee to change the track-and-field schedule to give Johnson an extra day between the 400-meter and the 200-meter, in order to give aching tendons in his left knee and ankle time to heal. Like all great champions, Johnson didn't let pressure poison his performance. Quite the opposite. "I crave it," he told Sports Illustrated during the competition. "I live for that very moment in the blocks when you may win--but you don't know, and now you're going to find out." Chasing back-to-back golds only intensified that hunger. "It was perfect. It was like one of my competitors coming up and hitting me. I just wish more people thought I couldn't do it. The higher the stakes, the better I am." In the days leading up to the 400-meter event, Johnson meticulously followed his routine, which included listening to jazz before running the 400. Johnson did some improvisation of his own after winning his semifinal heat in the 400 when he tossed his gold shoes into the crowd, forgetting for the moment that their soles were spiked. In the other 400-meter semifinal Johnson's only bona fide competitor, world-record holder Butch Reynolds, suffered a hamstring injury that knocked him out of the finals. In the medal round of the 400-meter, Johnson sailed to an Olympic-record 43.39 seconds--0.2 seconds off of Reynolds's world record. The victory, his 55th consecutive win in 400-meter competition, shook off a personal demon. "I had always been afraid of ending my career without having won an individual gold medal," he told Sports Illustrated. With the weight of one medal tugging on his neck, Johnson had to psyche himself up for the 200 meter. He replaced his jazz tape with "gangsta" rap. Boisterous crowds also did their part to motivate Johnson, chanting "Michael! Michael!" whenever he made an appearance at Olympic Stadium. Commentators hyped the event to the hilt. "There was the pressure from the 80,000 people there who expect you to win," Johnson told Sports Illustrated. "Not to mention having the Olympic schedule changed for you, and all the years of magazine covers, photo shoots, people calling, people calling to try to take off the pressure but making more pressure, and the fact that [Namibia's] Frankie Fredericks and [Trinidad and Tobago's] Ato Boldon were running really, really well. I thought, 'If I don't win this, a lot of things are going to be said that I will not want to hear.'" Johnson eased to victory in his first two preliminary heats. But his body began to rebel. "Since the 200 is more intense attack sprinting, I woke up the day of the semifinal and final with my whole body sore," he said later. Two tendons in his left leg--the Achilles and one behind his knee--were in particularly bad shape. Trainers worked his aching limbs with the intensity of a boxer's corner crew. For the final race, Johnson took his position in Lane 3, aiming an unwavering stare between the parallel white lines. A public-address announcer begged quiet from the restive crowd. Locked into position, Johnson twitched just before the starter's pistol discharged. (He wasn't aware of the slight movement until later, when he reviewed a film of the race.) Johnson rewarded himself with a solid jump but faltered a bit on his fourth step. Fredericks took full advantage, grabbing an early lead. Johnson recovered, first passing Boldon and then, at the 80-meter mark, overtaking the Namibian. A twinge of pain shot through Johnson's right hamstring as he neared the tape (the injury would keep him out of the 4 x 400 relay), but by then victory was secured. He erased the final 100 meters in a blazing 9.2 seconds, leaning into the tape a comfortable 5 meters ahead of the second-place Fredericks. Even Johnson was stunned by the time: 19.32 seconds, a third of a second better than his own world record. The margin of victory was the biggest since Owens's gold-medal performance a halfcentury earlier. "I am rarely shocked by my own performance. And I'm shocked," Johnson told Sports Illustrated. "I can't think what 19.3 really means. It is so much more than I expected or predicted. I can't understand it yet." Clyde Hart, Johnson's coach, shared his awe. "I was in the stands in Mexico City [in 1968] when [American] Bob Beamon long-jumped over 29 feet, and even when he was in the air, you knew it was something special," Hart told Time. "Tonight, the same thing." Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2009. © 1993-2008 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.