Lawson aiming at 1st Big 8 distance slam
By Ron Hanson
No one has ever won both the mile and two mile indoors and the mile and three mile outdoors in Big Eight track history, but this weekend at the Big Eight Conference outdoor championships at Columbia, Mo., KU's John Lawson has a chance.
Only the third man in the history of the league to have the opportunity, Lawson got his distance string started with a record 4:04.6 in the mile and a 3:08.5 two mile in the same indoor meet this year.
Lawson will be faced with some stiff competition in the mile, too. Kansas State's Conrad Nightingale is the reigning NCAA indoor mile champion, and another Cowboy, Tom Von Ruden, is the national indoor 380 champion.
THE JAYHAWK senior is the defending champion in the three mile outdoors and also the current record holder for that distance. His strongest competition in the three mile is expected to come from Oklahoma State's Chris McCubbins. It was McCubbins who pushed Lawson to his 14:09.6 record last year. McCubbins best time is 14:15.8.
NIGHTINGALE'S best mile this year was a 4:05.7 and Von Ruden's was a 4:06.6. This season in outdoor track, Lawson's top
mile run was a 4:03.1 clocking in a dual meet against Southern Illinois.
Added to the already speedy mile field at Saturday's league meet will be Missouri's Bill Wells, and Nebraska's Orlando Martinez. Both of these runners have been timed under 4:10 this year and are strong contenders to break the 4:04.9 Big Eight championship record.
The 880 yard run field for the league meet will see two OSU halfers in the role of favorites. John Perry and Jim Metcalf have times of 1:49.3 and 1:49.5 respectively so far this year. The meet record is 1:49.0.
KU'S TOP candidates for the 880 are Lowell Paul and Allen Russell. The activity of these two men on the Jayhawk's twomile and distance medley relay teams more than make up for the fact that they have not run the 880 too much this year.
The king of Big Eight hurdles, Jim Miller, has graduated. He held the American record for the 330 intermediate hurdles as well as the conference mark for this event and 120 highs while running for Colorado.
TAKING MILLER'S place as the top hurdler in the Big Eight is Kansas State's Harold Wooten. The Wildcat has 'run the 120 high in 14.1 which is only one-
tenth of a second below the record set by Miller. Wooten is also the best 330 intermediate hurdles runner in the conference with a time of 37.6 this year.
His strongest competition will probably come from MU's Garet von Netzer in the 120 high hurdles and Nebraska's Dave Kudron in the 330 intermediate.
Von Netzer has run just as fast as Wooten in the 120 highs and Kudron has shown a time just three-tenths of a second behind the Kansas State ace in the 330 intermediate.
KU is not expected to be among the contenders in the hurdles competition at the Big Eight meet.
Grid eleven to scrimmage
The Kansas Jayhawks will hold their fourth controlled scrimmage of spring practice this Friday afternoon at 4 p.m. in Memorial Stadium.
PATRONIZE KANSAN ADVERTISERS
The scrimimage had originally been scheduled for Saturday afternoon at 1:30.
Daily Kansan
8
Thursday, May 12, 1966
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