The Front Runner

figure, stretched out in full flight, with his long hanging slow stride. His sweaty face was as calm as if he were swinging along a trail in the woods. Mike was yelling hoarsely and jumping half out of his seat. Betsy was shrieking on the other side of me.
    They came streaking down the straight and into the final lap. The bell clanged. Their long legs were devouring the track. Armas was now fifteen yards behind Billy. Billy had forced him to start his kick early, but still ... I started wondering. It was possible that we had gambled wrong, and that Billy should have tried a runaway after all. He possibly was going to kill himself with this last blazing lap, and fade near the finish, letting Armas gun him down.
    Billy turned his head quickly and saw Armas hauling him down. Incredibly he accelerated again. Everyone around us seemed to be going berserk.
    Vince and Mike weren't yelling any more, just sitting and staring.
    "This last lap," said Vince, "is going to be murder. They're sprinting."
    "Yeah," I said numbly, "it looks like it's going to be under 50 seconds. The last mile is going to be under 4."
    I thought distractedly of the rare occasions when a last lap like this was run. Juha Vaatainen in the Helsinki Games 10,000 meter in 1971. Marty Liquori and Jim Ryun in the Martin Luther King Games.
    The two of them swept into the first turn of the last lap. In the infield, the high jumpers had knocked off because they couldn't concentrate. For a few moments, all I could see through my glasses were the two men's
    sweat-soaked backs. Annas' hair flopped wetly, and ahead, Billy's curls lifted moistly.
    Then, as they rounded the turn, their profiles came into view. They were both hurting now, and both blocking that hurt. Armas' face was twisted into a grimace. Billy's face was still smooth, but the pain was in his eyes, in his open mouth with the teeth showing slightly, in the slight rhythmic jerk of his head.
    They stormed into the backstraight, Armas now five yards behind.
    I felt that deep prickling rise of my hackles, as always on the few occasions when Billy really awed me. Actually, they both awed me. We were watching some elemental force of nature, a storm at sea, a volcano erupting, an earthquake.
    So much history, so many lives, went into each of their strides. From centuries of genes and family affairs to the last red corpuscle crammed in at high altitude. In Billy's case, I knew the factors more intimately: the clash about his training, the hills on the Prescott trails, the kiss in the movie theater, my efforts to shield his peace of mind, right down to the tender loving and the massage last night. Even the people who'd hassled him had helped forge his stubbornness. It was all being put together now.
    As his great strides gulped up the backstraight, I could see him again on the Prescott track that first morning, reeling out those beautiful 60-second quarters. I could hear him saying, "I'm thinking of the Olympics," and myself saying, "That's a big order."
    As they went into the last turn, I stood dead silent, with chills running up and down me. They were both splendid as the sun, terrible as an army with banners. There was no doubt in the mind of anybody in that stadium that this was going to be one of the great runs, and a record at the end of it that would stand for a long time.
    As they had peeled out of the last turn, Armas had pulled up to Billy's shoulder. They both looked sick now, both deeply in oxygen debt, both dizzy and calling on the last bit of glycogen. They were both running like animals.
    Armas hung at Billy's shoulder for about ten strides. And then, almost in mid-stride, he cracked. Billy had broken him. With whatever his final fatal edge was, gay desperation or maybe just Vitamin E pills, he had broken the iron Finn.
    Still in control, though dying himself, Billy pulled away. He was a yard ahead, then two yards, as Armas came apart at the seams.
    I felt my muscles go limp with relief. Vince grabbed my arm and shook me with silent joyous delirium.
    The two were halfway down the straight to the finish line, with those two yards between them and Armas staggering, when it happened.
    Later on, in the videotape, I would see it in slow motion. Billy seemed to falter a little, and his head snapped a little to the left. Then his legs gave way under him, just as if somebody had flicked the switch powering his legs to "off." Still burning forward, yet falling at the same time, he slumped slowly,