THE LINFORD CHRISTIE STORY: Tunnel vision with gold in sight

'I didn't see anybody and when I don't see anybody, I know I'm winning'; Britain's greatest sprinter, in these extracts from his autobiography, recalls the pinnacle of his track career when he scaled the Olympian heights in Barcelona

I ARRIVED in Barcelona for the 1992 Olympics three days before I was due to compete. The most I did was a little jogging but otherwise it was a case of having a massage, stretching, and finding my way around. There was not much to see.

The village was terrible and the accommodation was even worse. We had beds so tiny it was unbelievable. My team-mate Colin Jackson and I shared a box room which was so cramped we had to leave our suitcases in the corridor. There were eight or nine people sharing two bathrooms. We had a big metal shutter on our bedroom window but it broke not long after we had arrived, and we couldn't use it. It was an awful place.

Nevertheless, I certainly felt good during the 100 metre heats. I was cruising, running 10.07 seconds in the second round. Leroy Burrell ran 10.08sec and, in the semi-finals, he ran 9.97. I ran l0 seconds dead. I was in control the whole way, whereas Leroy was running really hard.

There were arguments over just who was the favourite. Dennis Mitchell was saying he was the best; Leroy Burrell claimed he was going to win. They asked me who was favourite and I said Dennis and Leroy both were. I wasn't getting into that kind of discussion because I didn't give a damn who the favourite was. Certainly, I didn't want it to be me. I wanted to sneak in around the back. I knew that Leroy had one good race in him so I felt sure he was going to be in the reckoning. In the semi-final, I sat behind him all the way, feeling that I could run past him at any time.

Meanwhile, the British team was in disarray. As I prepared to compete, I had found that there was no physio present. It was a very important race and that's what the physios were supposed to be there for. It reminded me of the time when I pulled my hamstring, went to the room, knocked on the door and the physio came out and said she couldn't deal with me because she was just about to wash her hair! That's one of the reasons why Colin and I prefer, if we can, to bring our own people with us, although it is very hard to get them accredited at the major championships. Colin's coach, Malcolm Arnold, had to give me my massage on this occasion. Now I was ready.

It was an impressive line-up for the 100m final: Frankie Fredericks, Oladape Adeniken, Leroy Burrell, Dennis Mitchell, Ray Stewart, Bruny Surin, Davidson Ezinwa and myself.

Everyone has their own routine before the start of a race, and I decided that I had to make a change to mine in Barcelona. After losing at the World Championships in 1991, when I panicked as Carl Lewis came next to me, I decided I had to find some way of concentrating even more intensely so that I could block out everyone else. If someone came up to my shoulder, then I wouldn't become tense and seize up. My coach, Ron Roddan, summed it up by saying that there was nothing anyone in the other lanes could do to help me win, that I had to forget about them and concentrate on my particular lane.

I had read an article on Carl Lewis in which he had said he didn't go on to the track to race other athletes. He went out to run the best he possibly could and, if he did that, then it should be good enough to win. Barcelona was the first time I went to the blocks imagining my lane was a tunnel, with everything else on either side a blur.

I was going to give it everything, right from the "B" of the "Bang!". I made a good start and, when I got to 60m, I knew I had won. There were still 40m to go, but I just knew I was heading for the gold medal. Everything had gone according to plan. I had been the only guy to go quicker in each round. Ron had always encouraged me to try to build up gradually during the heats, saving the best for the last. And here I was, doing just that.

I can't tell you anything about the reaction of the crowd. You don't hear the noise when you're running. It's like being in a trance. If you hear anything, you are not concentrating. You can see through the side of your eyes when people are getting close. I didn't see anybody and when I don't see anybody, I know I'm winning.

About three or four metres from the line, I started thinking to myself: "What have you done, what are you doing?" I knew from that moment on my life was going to change. Then came a huge anti-climax. There was supposed to be a cloud nine feeling, a sense of walking on air. I was waiting, but nothing was happening. Of course, I was very, very happy. I was happy for Ron, for all my friends and sponsors, all the supporters. This was what they had been dreaming of. To be honest, it was more Ron's dream than mine. The pinnacle of every athlete's career is to be Olympic champion, for every coach it is working with the athlete towards that ambition.

The lap of honour was great. I was looking out for my two friends, Philip and Bernie. They were the only two people in the crowd wearing Linford Christie T-shirts. I saw a few others I knew, including Jackie Jackson, a girl I hadn't seen for years. It is a wonderful feeling having people who you know personally in the crowd.

Receiving the medal on the rostrum was the best part of the whole thing. When I heard the national anthem, it came home to me that I was the reason they were playing it. The stadium was packed to capacity and millions of people all over the world would be listening to this. The British national anthem. I had beaten everyone. There was a lump in my throat but I had to fight it; there was no way I was going to cry. I always remember that Michael Johnson cried once and that the picture was used over and over again. I was not going to give them the chance to do that to me.

People become reflective on occasions like that, but my first concern is to find out if I have run the perfect race. That's my only fear, because the day Ron says "yes, that was perfect", then I will know that I can't run any more. I will have to stop there and then. But you always find fault somewhere along the line; there is always room for improvement. The only problem in Barcelona was that I couldn't find Ron. Unknown to me, he had sprained his ankle getting on to the bus taking us to the stadium that morning and he had been receiving treatment on the physio's couch.

I found him eventually when I got back to the village. It was a great scene, everyone leaping around. And there was Ron, tears in his eyes. I've never seen him like that before, because Ron is the kind of person who shows little emotion. He's a hard guy. It was such a picture to see his face. I was thinking, "stop it or you are going to make me cry". He was so happy.

When I began to wind down, I felt mentally exhausted. It may be 10 seconds but that had been 10 years to me. Mentally, physically and spiritually, it's tough because of the need to dig in, concentrate, avoid mistakes and get everything right. For those 10 seconds you are putting everything you've got in your body into running 100m. People say 100m is not that far. They should try running it. It's a long, long way.

When I went back to my room I thought about it quietly for a while. When they had given me the medal, I had dropped it. There was a dent in it, but that didn't matter. It was a great moment because it is the pinnacle of every athlete's career. I began to think back to the times when I used to say that one day I would become the British champion. People laughed at me because I preferred an easy life rather than going training.

Then the stories start to filter through to the village. There's supposed to have been a Michael Jackson concert at Wembley on the same night as the 100-metre final. Jackson cancelled at the last minute and the crowd was really cheesed off. To help make up for it, the organisers said they were pleased to announce that Linford Christie had just won the l00 metres in Barcelona. Apparently, the place went crazy and the mood was a lot better after that.

A man told me he had been camping with friends and they had been saving up what little battery power they had left just to watch the TV. They went out all day because they wanted to have enough current to watch the race that night. I don't think I have ever won another race which has given such pleasure.

Christie on dope-testing

Athletes

losing

faith in

system

OFFICIALS don't really understand how embarrassing it is for the athletes when they have to perform in the dope room, although I appreciate that close observation is necessary. It has been said, for example, that women have been caught concealing condoms of urine inside them; others have used catheters direct into their kidneys and so on. The worst, almost unbelievable scenario, concerned the athlete who was caught with someone else's urine in his mouth.

But that does not take away from the fact that the athlete has to go in and pee in front of someone. It's difficult enough for men but twice as bad for women, as officials have to stoop to all sorts of levels to make sure there is no foul play. It is all a part of being an athlete, something which you have to learn to put up with - but can't.

The system should protect the innocent, but it doesn't. I thought that the more I competed and the more I was tested, the better chance I would have of proving that I am clean. But it has reached the stage where I feel like the more I compete and take part in tests, the better chance there is of being set up.

Everybody who gets caught on drugs will say they haven't taken anything. You can catch them with a needle in their arm and they will tell you somebody threw the needle!

Medicines such as Night Nurse are banned. Half the population, when ill, will take Night Nurse or something similar. We are not allowed to do that yet the people who criticise and judge athletes can. As soon as athletes catch a cold, they are supposed to steam it. But athletes can't afford the time out and they can't train with a cold. They need to get rid of it as quickly as possible. You would think, with the sophisticated testing available these days, that officials could tell the difference between someone taking medicine to help a cold and someone taking an abundance of ephedrine to enhance performance.

There has been talk about regular blood tests - which is fine. If it is possible to go back two years and tell what an athlete has been taking, then why not? If they can go so far as determining who has fathered a child or who your ancestors were, then why not use blood tests in athletics on a random basis? It would cost money but if the sport is to be kept clean, then drastic steps need to be taken.

ln major championships, for example, it should be compulsory to have all eight finalists take a blood and urine test. As an alternative, test the first four finishers in the final and random test a couple of others. In my opinion, that's the only way to have a fair system.

The whole set-up needs overhauling. We need expert opinion to say whether or not five parts per million of ephedrine really would enhance an athlete's performance. Does it need, say, 50 parts? Who knows? The problem is that the athletes are losing faith. We have no confidence at all in the system; my experiences have proved that. It is bad enough to have to go through the embarrassing procedure but at least at the end of it, athletes deserve a consistent and fair system. I am all for having drug tests. But not the shambles we have at present.

Christie on a season of conflict

Pay row

and a

matter of

principle

COLIN JACKSON and I had a problem with the British Athletic Federation in 1995. In effect, the federation wanted me to take a pay cut. They had given other athletes rises, but they forgot that athletes talk among themselves. They offered Colin a rise from what he had earned in 1994. Why then should I have taken a cut? It was a matter of principle and I refused.

Ian Stewart, the promotions officer of the federation, had been negotiating on behalf of the BAF with Sue Barrett, our agent, about appearances in Britain. Certain figures appeared in the press and these details had to have come from the BAF. The line was that I had been asking for too much money when there was no cash available because they had been using what they had for the benefit of athletics.

Then the BAF decided that John Regis, who is also part of our Nuff Respect agency, had been overpaid during the previous two years and they were going to make a cutback. Here was the guy who had run the fastest 200m time in the world, the Commonwealth silver medallist.

We pointed out that if the people at the BAF were saying they were saving money in order to give it to the up-and-coming athletes in the form of training grants or whatever, then we would accept that. But they weren't doing that. So we refused to run.

The problems with the BAF meant we missed the Gateshead meeting. None of us would run without the other. If John Regis wasn't going to run, then I wasn't going to run. If Colin wasn't going to run, John wasn't going to run, and vice-versa. lt did not start as a personal issue but some people in the federation began to take it that way.

We had bills to pay. We had commitments. We had to get ready for the championships, so we signed a deal to run in Paris, where I won the 100m. We competed in a few more events and, not long after, there was the meet at Crystal Palace, a so-called Grand Prix One event which would require a good entry if it was to keep its status. By now the BAF was starting to panic.

The BAF wanted me to run, but I had already competed in the 100m and 200m in Lausanne. There was no way I was going to run, because I was tired. As far as I was concerned, the BAF should have realised that, long before engaging in a very strange negotiation. It was as if someone offered, say, pounds 1 to do a job and you responded by saying it was worth pounds 2. It is then up to the other party to say whether or not they can afford pounds 2. The BAF responded by doing the equivalent of reducing the original offer to 50p! It seemed like they were trying their luck.

Then the BAF found pounds 12,000 - and offered all of it to Colin, presumably in the hope that he would accept it. The rest of us would have got nothing. For the first time we stuck together, although everything in the newspapers simply referred to Christie, Christie, Christie. I was prepared for that.

'To Be Honest With You', by Linford Christie (pounds 16.99), will be published by Michael Joseph tomorrow

In tomorrow's Independent: 'The worst day of my life'