In short, the first athlete to break three minutes and 27 seconds for the 1,500 metres outdoors was Moroccan middle-distance runner Hicham El Guerrouj. On July 14, 1998, at the so-called Golden Gala – which, at the time, was the second in a annual series of outdoor track and field meetings, known as the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) Golden League – at Stadio Olympico, Rome, El Guerrouj ran the 1,500 metres in 3:26.00.
In a nigh on perfect race, Kenyan pacemaker Robert Kibet took the field through two laps in 1:50.8, half a second or so ahead of world record schedule, and countryman Noeh Ngeny led El Guerrouj through 1200 metres. Heading down the back straight for the last time, El Guerrouj, who had been ‘supremely relaxed’ up to that point, kicked for home and came home in splendid isolation, 50 metres ahead of a world-class field. Confusion reigned, albeit briefly, when the trackside clock failed to stop, but it was soon clarified that El Guerrouj had not only beaten, but smashed, the previous world record, 3:27.37, set by Algerian Noureddine Morceli in Nice, France three years earlier.
His confidence burgeoning, El Guerrouj said afterwards, ‘My dream is to run 3:24. I hope to do it before this season is out; if not, God willing, I will be back to do it here next year.’ Of course, he didn’t and he wasn’t, but the world record he set in Rome still stands, 25 years later. El Guerrouj also paid homage to his boyhood hero, countryman Said Aouita, and the previous world record holder, saying, ‘Before it was Aouita’s time, then it was Morceli’s, now it is Hicham’s time. We are all Moslems, all brothers.’
It is worth noting that, while the PGA Tour was founded in 1929, recording hole-by-hole scores did not become a matter of course until 1983. Nevertheless, the record high score on a par-4 hole was 16, achieved by Korean American professional Kevin Na on the 474-yard ninth hole on The Oaks Course at TPC San Antonio during the 2011 Texas.
On April, 2014, during the first round, Na drove into the trees on the right of the ninth and, having deemed his ball unplayable, took a stroke and distance penalty and returned to the tee. Lo and behold, his second attempt landed in almost identical spot, 10 yards into the trees, albeit in a barely playable, stony lie. Playing four, Na moved his next shot less than six feet and, to add insult to injury, his ball richoted off a tree and struck him, costing hime a further penalty stroke.
Another unplayable lie cost him yet another penalty stroke, his seventh shot again richoted around in the trees and his eighth, a left-handed air shot, was followed by four more fruitless attempts before he finally made solid contact. When he did, he moved his ball fully 48yards, albeit into primary rough, after 13 shots, alhtough caddie Kenny Harms confessed, ‘I have no idea what you have’, on the walk to the green. Following review, it turned out that an approach shot, plus two putts – including a missable five-footer – made a 12-over-par total of 16 strokes or, in other words, a duodecuple bogey.
Na later joked, ‘…maybe I should give it a fist pump when I made that five-footer; it could have been a 17.’ Certainly his record high score did not adversely affect career because, on October 2, 2011, he won his first PGA Tour event, the Justin Timberlake Shriners Hospitals for Children Open at TPC Summerlin in Las Vegas with a record low 72-hole total of 261 (23 under par).
In National Football League (NFL) terms, a team is said to have completed a ‘perfect’ season if it goes through the entire season, including playoffs, without losing or tying a game. Nowadays, the NFL season consists of an 18-week, or 17-game, regular season, followed by four rounds of playoffs, the last of which, of course, is the Super Bowl.
In the early days of the NFL, or the American Professional Football Association (APFA), as it was known for the first two years of its existence, several teams were named champions after completing undefeated, but not ‘perfect’ seasons. Playoff games did not become a feature of the NFL until 1933 and the first Super Bowl was not played until 1967 but, even so, Akron Pros (1920), Canton Bulldogs (1922, 1923) and Green Bay Packers (1929) went through whole campaigns without losing a game. They did, however, draw at least one game on each occasion.
Likewise, the Chicago Bears (1934, 1942) and the New England Patriots (2007) completed ‘perfect’ regular seasons, but lost in the playoffs. Thus, the only team in NFL history to complete a ‘perfect’ season remains the Miami Dolphins who, on January 14, 1973, beat the Washington Redskins 14-7 in Super Bowl VII at the Los Angeles Coliseum to finish the 1972 season 17-0-0. Placed first in the American Football Conference (AFC) East, unsurprisingly, with a record of 14-0-0 – having clinched the title in week 10 – the Fins subsequently beat Cleveland Browns and Pittsburgh Steelers in the playoffs en route to the Super Bowl.
According to the Laws of Cricket, as laid down by the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), a cricket pitch is a rectangular area measuring 22 yards, 66 feet or 20.12 metres in length and 10 feet or 3.05 metres in width. The extremities of the pitch are defined by bowling creases, marked by white lines, 8 feet and 8 inches or 2.64 metres long, drawn through the centre of the stumps at either end, and two imaginary lines, parallel to, and 5 feet or 1.52 metres either side of, a third imaginary line connecting the centres of the middle stumps at either end. Historically, the bowling crease was the line from, or behind, which the cricket ball must be bowled but, nowadays, has nothing to do with bowling.
A cricket pitch also features one popping crease and two return creases marked, like the bowling crease, by white lines, at each end. The popping crease takes its name from a peculiarity of early cricket known as the popping hole. As the name suggests, the popping hole was a hole cut into the pitch, into which a batsman had to place, or ‘pop’, his bat in order to complete a run or a fielder had to place the ball in order to complete a run-out. In the interests of safety, the popping hole became the popping crease.
The popping crease is marked parallel to, and 4 feet or 1.22 metres in front of, the bowling crease. Physically, it is marked to at least 6 feet or 1.83 metres either side of the imaginary line connecting the centres of the middle stumps at either end, but, for practical purposes, is considered infinite in length. The return creases, on the other hand, are marked at right angles to the popping crease, 4 feet and 4 inches or 1.32 metres either side of the aforementioned imaginary line and extend from the popping crease to, at least, 8 feet or 2.44 metres behind it. They, too, are considered infinitely long.