Friday, April 16, 1954
'Needles' Nieder Depends on Stitches
If Bill Nieder, Kansas' new weight giant, doesn't come apart at one of his 148 seams, he likely will become the best shot putter in Jayhawk history even before his sophomore year runs out.
Fact is, you can repeat that statement for the discus also. He raised some eyebrows at the Texas Relays with a 51-1 $ \frac{1}{2} $ cast to bag a surprise second in the shot. He went unplaced in the discus, but threw 142-5 in his first competitive effort with the college platter.
But what of the seams? By actual count Nieder has acquired 148 stitches during his career. This started with an 18-stitch fall down a grade-school fire escape when Nieder was an 11-year-old in New York city, the family's former home.Latest was the 44-stitch job on his right knee following a severe football injury in last autumn's opener against TCU.
Certainly, this projects Nieder as the most embroidered athlete outside a professional hockey rink.
Here is the play-by-play box score on the big sophomore's major darning jobs;
44 itches right knee-operation following football injury against TCU last month.
18 scalp—fell off fire escape as 11-year-old.
5 left wrist -plunged arm through glass door in high school scuffle.
11 right wrist—compound fracture as senior in high school when he entered the prompt leap-for-distance contest out of swings at South park in Law-
rence.
3 right knee—fell on gravel on day of game, as high school senior. Played game.
5 cheek-kickoff collision, spring football. 1953.
9 right elbow—slipped off back of chain in Junior high school printing class.
9 right arm—lacerated on sideline marker, spring practice, 1953.
9 left wrist - fell through back door of
suitcase. Right wrist - he stumbled
with shot in hand.
Upon the first item of this list hangs Nieder's current shot-put tale. The 6-2 210-pound Lawrence native was under surgery seven hours following that opening fractas in Fort Worth last September. He was hospitalized so long he dropped out of school during the first semester. When he started indoor workouts he could bend his right leg—the
University Daily Kansan
power leg since he is a right footed shot-putter—no more than 20 degrees.
When he fired that 51-½ heave at Austin in the Friday preliminaries he still was bending his right leg no more than 85 degrees. Furthermore he is getting only 61-per cent power out of the hinge. He is now up to 55 pounds of lift in Trainer Dean Nesmith's resistive exercise program. He can hoist 90 pounds with his left.
Nieder's peg not only was almost three feet beyond his best previous competitive mark, but it was within six inches of KU's all-time outdoor record of 51-7, which Elwyn Dees, a sawed off husky from Lorraine, set 20 years ago.
Oddly, Nieder, like Dees, is a one-time holder of the national prep record. Bill held the mark at 60-9/2 for two weeks before Leon Patterson, then of Taft, Los Angeles, high now of USC, moved it out one-half an inch. Dees' prep throw of 58-10 in 1930, survived for 14 years, and still is the Interscholastic Kansas Relays standard.
Nieder not only is rangy, with long arms and legs, but he owns a tremendous powerful upper body. You can take a step either direction on his shoulders, or stand in the shade cast by one of his hands. His forearms are thick despite their length.
No wonder Coach Bill Easton was moved to remark on the plane trip home . . . "If Bill continues to improve, and that knee comes around, he'll be the best weight man Kansas ever had. Maybe he'll be the best The Big Seven ever had."
Nieder's discus effort at Austin also was his all-time collegiate best, and within eight feet of his top high school throw, with the lighter platter, of course.
Two items have changed Nieder's form, from the standard sideways approach, to a modified lay-back style employed by such current greats as Darrow Hooper, formerly
of Texas A&M, and Parry O'Brien present world record holder of USC. One was his knee injury; the other a chat with Hooper at the 1953 Kansas Relays.
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The O'Brien-Hooper form calls for the rear foot to be pointed directly away from the direction of the throw. When the forward kick is started, the rear leg is turned only 90 degrees. This is a minimum twist of the knee, far less strain than Nieder's former technique. Because he cannot bend his leg even 90-degrees Nieder must compensate for the long layback with a backward rocker step before he explodes forward.
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Nieder picked up several tips from Hooper in their informal clinic last spring. Since then he has studied stills and movies of the mighty Cadet.
One of his stablemates, Morris Kay, last year's football co-captain, it tutoring the big rookie in the discus. Kay attended summer school at Minnesota last year, where he worked out under Jim Kelly, the silver-haired Gopher coach who tutored such greats as Bob Fitch and Fortune Gordien, present world record holder. Kay learned the Minnesota-whirl from Kelly and now is teaching it to Nieder and his other two mates, Dick Knowles, and Gene Blasi.
Don Cockell, British empire heavyweight champion, today rejected a $25,000 offer to meet Tommy (Hurricane) Jackson.
Page 2
Mashburn Threat to Hurdles Record
J. W. Masburn, former 440 great at Oklahoma and now enrolled at Oklahoma A&M, is the heavy favorite to win the 440-meter hurdles and possibly shatter the Relays record of 52.5 set by Lee Yoder of the University of Arkansas in 1952.
Mashburn ran the 440 as low as 46.8 while competing as a freshman at Oklahoma. He is also the national AAU 440 champion, was a member of the 1952 Olympic team
but didn't compete in i and KU decathlon champion. Also competing in the event are Bil Duncan of Missouri, Dick Fowler of Iowa, Jerry Mills of Drake, and Jay Chance of Oklahoma Baptist.
Duncan was second in the Missouri valley AAU last year. Fowler was fourth in the event here last year; Mills finished third in the Drake Relays last year in 54.5.
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