Snell the legend who walked among mere mortals
Awander through history much further than the middle distances Peter Snell owned, it’s hard to convey what his final hitting of the tape means to those of his era, to those of his sport.
He lived among us. He was one of us. So much of that has emerged over past days, as runners shared their memories of the greatest New Zealand runner.
It’s said if you can remember the 1960s, ‘‘then you weren’t really there’’. Snell was an exception to that rule. He was impossible to forget.
A photo of an exhausted Snell looking at the stopwatch he stopped at a world record 3min
54.4sec at Cooks Gardens in Whanganui in January 1962, remains etched upon the mind, nearly 60 years on.
A week later, Snell smashed the world records for the 800m and 880 yards. His 1min 44.3sec
800m is still the fastest over the distance on a grass track, and remains the New Zealand record.
But Snell worked his magic in New Zealand. He had a New Zealand coach, he trained on New Zealand roads, he was born in Opunake, he was one of us.
He spread his gold across the land, to places you would never these days imagine a global superstar setting a spiked foot.
Since Snell’s death one friend has talked of seeing his father – international Barry Jones – race Snell at Bunnythorpe in Manawatu¯ .
And getting thrashed. Another friend posted photos of a track-suited Snell on a visit to Stratford High School in the mid 1960s. He raced against the school’s 4 x 440 yard relay team. And thrashed them.
And even if Snell didn’t come to your town, his feet and feats inspired in other ways. In the case of one obsessed Waikato kid, that involved setting up ‘‘world records’’ for circuits of the childhood home.
Round and round he would dash, recreating Snell’s gasping exhausted checking of dad’s watch, which had a second hand. I was not D B Clarke, or C E Meads. This kid was P G Snell.
At Mt Albert Grammar, there was more distant following in the massive cinder-grabbing footsteps of the great man.
There, athletics guru and maths maestro Herbie Towers – perhaps spoiled by having Snell pass through MAGS – shook his head at the poor times clocked in the senior 1500m final (I was second, if you were wondering).
Keith Livingstone, a national class distance runner in the 1970s and 1980s, visited Snell in Dallas, where he found the three Olympic gold medals so cherished in New Zealand.
They weren’t in the garage, with his other trophies ‘‘they were in a small porcelain dish in an overhead cupboard unit in the kitchen, unpolished.
‘‘I definitely got the impression of a happy and contented man totally comfortable with his life in the leafy suburbs in Dallas.’’
Writer, English professor and New Zealand cross-country representative Roger Robinson said ‘‘the loss for running and for New Zealand is irreparable’’.
So, so right. For one last time, we have seen the black singlet of Snell disappear into the distance.
Long may he run.