Word: tellez
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Before the 200-meter race something special seemed afoot, but Lewis could rouse only victory. One of his legs was complaining quietly and he decided, "I just want to get the race over with." He looked tired to Tom Tellez, his Houston coach. "He wasn't smooth. There's been a lot of pressure on him. Only Jesse Owens would know how Carl Lewis feels after the last few years of expectations." The 19.80 Carl dashed off was no embarrassment though. Only Pietro Mennea of Italy (19.72) and Lewis himself (19.75) have run the 200 in a faster...
...Lewis prepares for his final workout, the stands at the Santa Monica track are empty save for the security guards who only have eyes for stray spectators trying to pass through the chain-link fence. A female hurdler sprints along one side of the track. Lewis, his coach Tom Tellez, and Carl's friend Kirk Baptiste, a University of Houston sophomore who will run the 200 meter, set up shop on the opposite side. "Carl, go grab the tape measure!" Tellez yells from the stands. Lewis ambles over to the tape...
...first activity of most workouts. But Lewis does not normally jump in practice; he merely runs through the paces of his approach. This final workout lasts 40 min. During that time, he takes only three runs. He is in action for a scant total of 30 sec. But Tellez, as serene as his student, intends the last few workouts for fine-tuning, not of the body so much as of the mind. Until now Lewis felt that his efforts had been 99% physical, a mere 1% psychological. "At the Olympics it is 100% mental," he says, "because there is nothing...
...Tellez, who has coached Lewis for five years, observed, "Carl has taught me that the human body is an amazing machine and that the mind and its awareness are such important things. This is the closest I've seen him come to being perfect. He's on the edge of something phenomenal in all of his events." Said Lewis: "I was always relaxed as a sprinter, but I didn't understand it. Coach Tellez taught me the importance of relaxation in competition. It's realizing when you hit full speed that you only have to maintain...
...months earlier, University of Houston Head Coach Tommy Tellez had changed Lewis' approach style. Using his extraordinary 8-ft. stride and ability to hit 22 m.p.h., Lewis now starts a precisely measured 167 ft. 6 in. behind the takeoff board, farther than any competitor. Forward velocity-not height-makes for distance, believes Tellez, and Lewis defies gravity by continuing to run almost straight off into the air, pedaling furiously for balance, not unlike Wile E. Coyote going off a cliff in a Road Runner cartoon. "It's my best attribute," he says. "In basketball I could hang...