Michael Johnson (athlete)

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Medal record
Michael Johnson (athlete)
Men's Athletics
Competitor for the  United States
Olympic Games
Gold	1992 Barcelona	4 x 400 m relay
Gold	1996 Atlanta	200 m
Gold	1996 Atlanta	400 m
Gold	2000 Sydney	400 m
World Championships
Gold	1991 Tokyo	200 m
Gold	1993 Stuttgart	400 m
Gold	1993 Stuttgart	4 x 400 m relay
Gold	1995 Gothenburg	200 m
Gold	1995 Gothenburg	400 m
Gold	1995 Gothenburg	4 x 400 m relay
Gold	1997 Athens	400 m
Gold	1999 Seville	400 m
Gold	1999 Seville	4 x 400 m relay

Michael Duane Johnson (born September 13, 1967 in Dallas, Texas) is a retired American sprinter who holds the current world records in the 200 meters, 400 meters, and 4 x 400 m relay. He also has run the fastest 300 meters of all time, an event not recognized by the IAAF. He won four Olympic gold medals and was crowned world champion nine times.^[1]

He is the only male sprint athlete in history to win both the 200 m and 400 m events at the same Olympics, a feat he accomplished at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta, Georgia. Johnson is the only man to successfully defend his Olympic title in the 400 m.

Johnson was noted for his unique running style. His upright stance and very short steps defied the perceived wisdom that a high knee lift was essential for maximum speed.

[edit] Early life and career

Johnson was born and raised in Dallas as the youngest of five children, and attended Skyline High School and Baylor University.^[2] At Baylor, Johnson was coached by Clyde Hart, and he won several NCAA titles in both indoor and outdoor sprints and relays.^[1] He prepared for the 1988 Summer Olympics in Seoul, but developed a stress fracture of his left fibula before the U.S. Olympic Trials began. He did not qualify in the 400 m and he withdrew from the 200 m.^[2]

Johnson graduated from Baylor in 1990 with a bachelor's degree in business, as the first athlete ever to hold the #1 world ranking in both the 200 m and the 400 m.^[2] In 1991, he won the world 200 m title in Tokyo by the largest margin of victory since Jesse Owens won the event in the 1936 Summer Olympics.

Two weeks before the 1992 Summer Olympics began, Johnson and his agent both contracted food poisoning at a restaurant in Spain.^[2] Johnson lost both weight and strength. He was the favorite to win the 200m going into the Olympics, but he could do no better than sixth in his semifinal heat, and failed to reach the 200 m final. Nevertheless, he was able to race as a member of the 4 x 400 m relay team, which won a gold medal and set a new world record time of 2:55.74.

He won the 1993 U.S. title in the 400 m, and followed it with world titles in both the 400 m and 4 x 400 m relay. His 42.94 second split time in the 4 x 400 relay remains the fastest 400 meters in history.^[1] At the 1995 World Championships in Gothenburg, Johnson won his first 200 m and 400 m "double". No elite-level track athlete had accomplished this in a major meet in the 20th century.^[2]

[edit] Atlanta Olympics

In 1996, Johnson ran 19.66 seconds in the 200 m at the U.S. Olympic Trials, breaking Pietro Mennea's record of 19.72, which had stood for 17 years. With that performance he qualified to run at the 1996 Summer Olympics in Atlanta and prepared to attempt to win both the 200 meters and 400 meters events, a feat never before been achieved by an athlete.^[2] (Two women have won Olympic gold medals in both races in the same year: Valerie Brisco-Hooks in the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, and Marie-José Perec, in the same 1996 Olympics in Atlanta.)

Johnson entered the Olympic finals donning a custom-designed pair of gold-colored Nike racing spikes made with Zytel, causing him to be nicknamed "The Man With the Golden Shoes". Sources differ on the exact weight of these shoes; the manufacturer of the spikes claims they weighed 3 ounces (85 g) each,^[3] while other sources state each shoe weighed about 94 grams (3.3 oz).^[4] The left shoe was a US size 10.5 while the right shoe was a US size 11, to account for Johnson's shorter left foot.^[3]

On July 29, Johnson easily captured the 400 m Olympic title with a time of 43.49 seconds, almost one full second ahead of silver medalist Roger Black of Great Britain. At the 200 m final on August 1, Johnson ran the opening 100 meters in 10.12 seconds and achieved a peak speed of over 40 kilometres per hour (25 mph). He finished the race in a world record time of 19.32 seconds, shattering the previous record he had set in the U.S. Olympic Trials - the largest improvement ever on a 200 m world record. Some commentators compared the performance to Bob Beamon's record-shattering long jump at the 1968 Summer Olympics in Mexico City.^[1] The fastest 200 meters run since then is 19.62 seconds, by Tyson Gay on June 24, 2007, 0.30 seconds slower than Johnson's record.

After the 1996 season ended, Johnson received the James E. Sullivan Award as the top track and field athlete in the United States, and was named ABC's Wide World of Sports Athlete of the Year. In August, HarperCollins published his biographical/motivational book, Slaying the Dragon: How to Turn Your Small Steps to Great Feats.

[edit] The world's fastest man

In 1997 Johnson began appearing in television advertisements in which he was billed as "the world's fastest man" as a result of his 200 m world record, despite the fact that the 100 metres world record holder, at the time Canadian Donovan Bailey, was typically given that unofficial title.

In a publicity stunt in June 1997, he raced against Bailey in a 150-metre (164 yd) race at the Rogers Centre (then SkyDome) in Toronto. The event was unsanctioned, and its unique course consisted of 75 meters of curving track and 75 meters of straight track. The race was billed as a competition for the title of "World's Fastest Man". It failed to live up to expectations when Johnson pulled up with an injured quadricep while Bailey had the lead at the halfway mark. Bailey easily won the race and the $1.5 million prize that came with the victory. That same year, Johnson won his third 400 m world title in Athens.

At the 1998 Goodwill Games in New York, Johnson anchored the U.S. 4 x 400 m relay team with Jerome Young, Antonio Pettigrew, and Tyree Washington to a win and set the current world record of 2:54.20.

[edit] Later career

Johnson was plagued by injury in 1999, and his following season was troubled with two injury scares that limited him to just four 400 m races before the 1999 World Championships in Seville. Were it not for an IAAF policy that allowed automatic entry to defending champions, he could not have raced in Seville since he failed to compete in the U.S. trials due to his injury. He recovered and won his fourth 400 meter world title with a new world record time of 43.18 seconds. He later ran the last leg of the 4 x 400 m relay for the ninth World Championship gold medal in his collection.

After qualifying for the 2000 Summer Olympics in the 400 m at the U.S. Olympic Trials, Johnson injured himself in the 200 m final while racing in a highly anticipated matchup against the 100 m and 200 m world champion, Maurice Greene. The injury prevented a defense to his 200 m Olympic title.

Johnson ended his career at the 2000 Summer Olympics by winning gold medals in the 400 m and the 4 x 400 m relay, which brought his total number of Olympic gold medals to five. Johnson has run 200 m under 19.80 seconds six times, and he has run the distance in less than 20 seconds 23 times. He holds 11 of the top 50 200 m performances of all time.^[5] Johnson has run 22 400 m races in under 44 seconds; he holds 24 of the top 50 and 7 of the top 10 400 m performances of all time.^[6]

[edit] After athletics

Since retiring from competitive track, Johnson has worked as a television commentator, often for the BBC in the United Kingdom, where he also writes a column for the Daily Telegraph. He also has served as the agent for Jeremy Wariner, who won the gold medal in the 400 m at the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens. Wariner, like Johnson, ran collegiately at Baylor University for coach Clyde Hart, and Johnson serves as a consultant for Baylor's track athletes. He was elected to the United States Track and Field Hall of Fame in 2004, where his 200 m performance at the 1996 Olympics was named the greatest track and field moment of the last 25 years.^[1]

In June 2008, Johnson voluntarily returned the 4 x 400 m relay gold medal he earned in the 2000 Olympics after Antonio Pettigrew, who ran the second leg, admitted he took performance enhancing drugs between 1997 and 2001.^[7] Pettigrew made his admission while giving testimony in the trial of coach Trevor Graham for his role in the BALCO scandal. The three other athletes in the relay, Jerome Young, Alvin Harrison and Calvin Harrison, have subsequently served drug bans and/or have admitted taking drugs.^[8]

Johnson currently lives in Mill Valley, California, with his son.^[1]

[edit] Personal bests

Date	Event	Venue	Time
June 15, 1994	100 m	Knoxville, Tennessee	10.09
August 1, 1996	200 m	Atlanta, Georgia	19.32
March 24, 2000	300 m	Pretoria, South Africa	30.85 WB
March 4, 1995	400 m Indoor	Atlanta, Georgia	44.63
August 26, 1999	400 m	Seville, Spain	43.18

[edit] Achievements

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Profile by International Olympic Committee

Awards
Preceded by Roger Kingdom	Men's Track & Field Athlete of the Year 1990	Succeeded by Sergey Bubka
Preceded by Kevin Young	Men's Track & Field ESPY Award 1994	Succeeded by Dennis Mitchell
Preceded by Cal Ripken, Jr.	Associated Press Male Athlete of the Year 1996	Succeeded by Tiger Woods
Preceded by Dennis Mitchell	Men's Track & Field ESPY Award 1996 – 1997	Succeeded by Wilson Kipketer
Preceded by Haile Gebrselassie	Men's Track & Field Athlete of the Year 1996	Succeeded by Wilson Kipketer
Preceded by Maurice Greene	Men's Track & Field ESPY Award 2000	Succeeded by Maurice Greene
Preceded by Simon Hughes	RTS Television Sport Awards Best Sports Pundit 2003	Succeeded by John Francome
Sporting positions
Preceded by Robson da Silva	Men's 200m Best Year Performance 1990 – 1991	Succeeded by Mike Marsh
Preceded by John Regis	Men's 200m Best Year Performance 1995 – 1996	Succeeded by Ato Boldon
Preceded by Francis Obikwelu	Men's 200m Best Year Performance 2000	Succeeded by Joshua J. Johnson