Athletics: Wing not Frankie's style

By Suzanne McFadden

Message for Jonah Lomu: be thankful that Frankie Fredericks, one of the world's fastest humans, quit rugby because it was too boring.

Fredericks, sprinter extraordinaire, played on the wing for his school rugby XV in Namibia.

"I only played a few games because it was quite boring waiting out there for the ball," he said after flying into Auckland last night.

Fredericks won't need to wait for the ball to show off his skills here at two track and field meetings over the next week.

Today he is ranked the world's No 1 man over 200m and has run the most sub-10s 100m in history (25 to be exact).

It wasn't his aversion to playing rugby which converted him to sprinting at the age of 16. It came from a falling-out with the ball game he loved most - soccer.

"I grew up in a neighbourhood where it was easy to get a football," he said. "We played in the streets with four tin cans."

And, yes, he was the fastest man in the team. "I scored all the goals, too," he says with a flash of his broad grin.

Fredericks played for Namibian age-group teams and made the national senior side, when it was known as South West Africa.

But brains got the better of him. At Concordia School, where the top intellectual percentile of Namibian children are sent, Fredericks' soccer career ended.

"None of the others were interested in sport. They were `The Brains'," he said.

"I grew up with a tradition of competing to the best of my ability. We'd play soccer and lose 0-6 and they would be happy because they had more brains.

"I just couldn't take it. So I finished with soccer and to do something individual."

Just as well. Fredericks, now 31, is undoubtedly the most famous Namibian on the planet.

But that was a bone of contention before last year's Commonwealth Games, when the Prime Minister Hage Geingob was quoted saying super welterweight boxer Harry Simon had outclassed the sprinter. Fredericks withdrew but later had a change of heart.

So what would Fredericks, well-spoken intellectual that he is, think of a career in politics after sport?

"I would love to work for my people, and give advice to people in power. But I don't want to be in a system of manipulation. I wouldn't want to be put in as an MP and then be a pawn. I always want to be able to speak my mind."

When Fredericks retires from running - some time in the next millennium, but he won't say when - he wants to devote his time to running a foundation for underprivileged African teenagers, giving them both sports and education opportunities. He is launching the project in April.

There is a distinct lack of athletics tracks in Namibia - only one synthetic circuit - so he never gets to compete at home.

"But that's not a bad thing. There's a lot of internal pressure when you run at home and that's when you don't do your best. I'm quite fortunate that I never have that pressure," he said.

There is pressure, personal pressure, to win an Olympic gold medal. He owns four Olympic silvers - "people always say the bridesmaid thing to me."

He is leaning towards specialising in the 200m at Sydney 2000, but he can't get the 100m out of his system.

"My best time of 9.86s is just two-hundredths of a second off the world record - that's why I'm hanging in there.

"When you're the quickest over 100m you can say you are the fastest human in the world. Over 200m I don't know how to sell myself - the world's fastest ... what?

"But I'd trade all the world records for an Olympic gold medal. And I know 32 is the perfect age for a sprinter." Cue the brilliant smile again.

Fredericks will run in the 200m at the Porritt Classic in Hamilton on Friday, and the 100m at the Robin Tait Classic at Sovereign Stadium next Wednesday.

Pictured: Frankie Fredericks. HERALD PICTURE / BRETT PHIBBS