| Medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
| Men's athletics | ||
Representing  Australia | ||
| Commonwealth Games | ||
 | Cardiff 1958 | One mile |
Mervyn George "Merv" Lincoln (22 November 1933 –1 May 2016) [1] [2] [3] was an Australian middle-distance runner who won a silver medal in the mile run at the 1958 British Empire and Commonwealth Games and twice competed in the Summer Olympic Games.
Merv Lincoln was born in Leongatha, Victoria [1] and raised in Wodonga, where for many years in his honour there has been a Lincoln Causeway adjacent to the Hume Freeway. [2]
He qualified for the 1500 metres final at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, finishing 12th. [1] He was tipped as a potential successor to the retiring John Landy as Australia's leading miler; [4] however, newcomer Herb Elliott defeated him at the 1957 national championships. [5]
Lincoln ran his first four-minute mile on 23 March 1957, the eleventh man in the world and the third Australian to accomplish that feat. [6] His time of 3:58.9 was less than a second short of Landy's world record of 3:58.0. [7] Despite his loss to Elliott at the Australian championships he did also win a national championship mile that year, winning the United States championship race as an outside competitor. [8] Track & Field News ranked him #7 in the world for 1957, one place below his Australian rival Elliott. [9]
Lincoln reached his peak in 1958 but was overshadowed by the rapidly improving Elliott. [10] The Australian team of Elliott, Lincoln, and Albie Thomas swept the medals in the mile at the British Empire and Commonwealth Games in Cardiff, Lincoln running 4:01.80 for silver. [11] He set his personal mile best of 3:55.9 in Dublin on 6 August 1958, [6] finishing more than a second under Derek Ibbotson's world record of 3:57.2 yet still only being the runner-up as Elliott won in a new record time of 3:54.5. [12] Track & Field News ranked Lincoln as second in the world that year; however, that proved to be the last time he was ranked among the world's top ten, [9] and at the 1960 Olympics in Rome he failed to qualify from the heats. [1]
He was coached by the Austrian-born Franz Stampfl, a bitter rival of Elliott's coach Percy Cerutty. [13] Stampfl stated Lincoln only trained one hour a day, in contrast to the harder training of Elliott. [13]
A four-minute mile is the completion of a mile run (1.6 km) in four minutes or less. It translates to a speed of 15 miles per hour (24 km/h). It is a standard of professional middle distance runners in several cultures.
Sir Roger Gilbert Bannister was an English neurologist and middle-distance athlete who ran the first sub-4-minute mile.
Herbert James Elliott is a former Australian athlete and arguably the world's greatest middle distance runner of his era. In August 1958 he set the world record in the mile run, clocking 3:54.5, 2.7 seconds under the record held by Derek Ibbotson; later in the month he set the 1500 metres world record, running 3:36.0, 2.1 seconds under the record held by Stanislav Jungwirth. In the 1500 metres at the 1960 Rome Olympics, he won the gold medal and bettered his own world record with a time of 3:35.6.
Ronald Michael Delany is an Irish former athlete who specialised in middle-distance running. He won a gold medal in the 1500 metres at the 1956 Summer Olympics. He later earned a bronze medal in the 1500 metres event at the 1958 European Athletics Championships in Stockholm.
Ronald William Clarke, AO, MBE was an Australian athlete, writer, and the Mayor of the Gold Coast from 2004 to 2012. He was one of the best-known middle- and long-distance runners in the 1960s, notable for setting seventeen world records.
The world record in the mile run is the fastest time set by a runner in the middle-distance track and field event. World Athletics is the official body which oversees the records. Hicham El Guerrouj is the current men's record holder with his time of 3:43.13, while Faith Kipyegon has the women's record of 4:07.64. Since 1976, the mile has been the only non-metric distance recognized by the IAAF for record purposes. However, in international competitions such as the Olympics the term "mile" almost always refers to a distance of 1,500 meters, which is 109.344 meters shorter than an Imperial mile, even though four "full" laps of a 400 meter track is equal to 1,600 meters.
John Michael Landy was an Australian middle-distance runner and state governor. He was the second man to break the four-minute mile barrier in the mile run and held the world records for the 1500-metre run and the mile race. He was also the 26th Governor of Victoria from 2001 to 2006.
George Derek Ibbotson was an English runner who excelled in athletics in the 1950s. His most famous achievement was setting a new world record in the mile in 1957.
David Wesley Santee was an American middle distance runner and athlete who competed mainly in the 1,500 meters and mile events.
Brian Stanford Hewson was a middle-distance runner who represented Great Britain at the 1956 and 1960 Olympics. He won the gold medal in the 1500 metres at the 1958 European Championships.
Franz Ferdinand Leopold Stampfl MBE was one of the world's leading athletics coaches in the twentieth century. He pioneered a scientific system of Interval Training which became very popular with sprint and middle distance athletes. His most striking success was the world's first sub-four minute mile by Roger Bannister in 1954. Stampfl was posthumously awarded the World Athletics Heritage Plaque as a "legendary and pioneering coach" on 26 September 2019.
Percy Wells Cerutty was an Australian athletics coach in the 1950s and 1960s.
Arnold Milton Sowell is a former middle distance runner from the United States, who represented his native country at the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne, Australia. He finished fourth in the Men's 800-meter race.
Albert George "Albie" Thomas OAM was an Australian middle- and long-distance runner who set world records at two miles and three miles. He was born in Hurstville, New South Wales.
The men's 1500 metres was an event at the 1960 Summer Olympics, held on 3 and 6 September. Thirty-nine athletes from 25 nations competed. The maximum number of athletes per nation had been set at 3 since the 1930 Olympic Congress. The event was won by Herb Elliott of Australia, the nation's second victory in the 1500 metres and first since 1896. Michel Jazy of France took silver, the third time a French athlete had achieved that mark. Hungary won its first 1500 metres medal with István Rózsavölgyi's bronze.
Jodi Elkington-Jones is an Australian athlete who has cerebral palsy. She represented Australia at the 2012 Summer Paralympics and has also competed in two Commonwealth Games, winning gold in the 2014 Games in the F37/38 long jump. She represented Australia at the 2016 Rio Paralympics in athletics.
Chris O'Hare is a Scottish middle-distance runner who competes in the 1500 metres. He has represented Scotland at the 2014 Commonwealth Games and Great Britain at the 2016 Olympic Games.
Tracy Evans Smith is a former American distance runner. He was a member of the 1968 U.S. Olympic Track and Field Team, competing in the 10,000 meters. He was ranked multiple times by Track & Field News as the No. 1 U.S. 5,000- and 10,000-meter runner in the mid- to late 1960s, and was a six-time AAU National Champion from 1966 to 1973, winning outdoors in the 3-mile, 6-mile and 10,000 meters, and three times in the indoor 3-mile. He was a three-time world record holder in the indoor 3-mile.
James John Bailey was an Australian middle-distance runner. He reached semifinals of the 800 metres event at the 1956 Summer Olympics. While running for the University of Oregon under Bill Bowerman, he was the 1955 NCAA Champion in the mile. He would become the first of a string of sub-4 minute milers under Bowerman.
Oliver 'Olli' Hoare is an Australian middle-distance runner who primarily competes in the 1500 metres. He notably won the 1500 m at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in a Games record of 3:30.12.
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