The UK's two premier middle distance athletes of the time had avoided each other for some time... No longer. The Clash of the Titans in the Moscow Games 800m final.
I was there. Managed to get seats in third row at first bend where Decathlon was taking place. We shouted and asked Daley to move a few feet and the legend gave us a thumbs up and he did! Saw 1500 on the Saturday as well but as Irish, was devastated with Coughlan coming fourth in 5000. Think paid £300 for bad tickets in 1979 but got brilliant tickets by selling a pair of Levi’s . Those days will never return
I agree. This was the great race of the modern era. It is impossible to explain to a young person today how these 2 were household names throughout the world for a couple of years, how obsessed we all became. That Ovett was the son of a market trader who sold bacon is just the icing on the cake of this incredible story.
Everyone talks about Coe running badly but Ovett was in some shocking positions on that first lap. Coe went to sleep in the 3rd 200m and gave it to Ovett. I think Ovett would have won anyway, he had the experience and racing knowledge.
Yes I agree. It has sort of gone down as gospel that Coe ran a terrible tactical race, but is that really so? By that token Dave Wottle had run an even worse tactical race 8 years previously, but still came through to win.
@@geekpie100 Wottle ran a perfectly well judged race. Coe should have seen the pace was slow plus Ovett was boxed & put the hammer down at the bell. He’d lost before he started because he was scared.
Amazing. After all these years. Coe was manhandled out of the race. They couldn't do that to Ovett and Ovett hustled his way through the opposition and then went for it. What a race! Two class acts and Coe went on to win the 1500, beating Ovett. A complete reversal of form and expectation. Magic!
Yes. Beforehand, the received wisdom posited that Coe was the favourite to win the 800 Metres race and Ovett was the favourite to win the 1500 Metres race. So Coe showed real guts to come back again a couple of days later and win the 1500 Metres, having picked himself off the floor. But two great athletes in a great era.
@@oleggorky906 I also read that others , as well as Ovett himself , thought that maybe he lost a little edge going into the 1500 mtrs . Mainly because the pressure was off having already won a gold . Whether this was true or not , we'll never know. But if so , Ovett losing a little focus and Coe being so determined to not go home empty handed MUST have played a part .. no matter how small .
Warren did Ovett a huge favour by accelerating at 1:01; that finally gave Ovett the space he needed. Coe's "purist", non-contact race has left him in a bad position at 1:01. Coe tries to run like Mercury; Ovett runs like Hercules.
I remember watching this huddled around the TV as a kid with the whole family. I was rooting for Coe. My old man was rooting for Ovett. I still remember the tension - these guys had avoided each other in the run up to the Olympics. Both were household names in the UK. It was the day of reckoning. Happy days.
I used to see Coe on his training runs when he lived in Sheffield.He ran past me once (November 1979, the year that he broke all those world records).What a sight: slim, elegant, graceful and almost silent. Both he and Steve Ovett were truly magnificent.
I couldn't get enough of these 2 and I was a high school runner in Reno Nevada. Coe was my idol and I won large school (AAA) State in 83. Thanks Seb! Also, my coach was from England and a Ovett fan, definitely not a Coe fan lol
@@christopherlerude4 Lol. I was rooting for Coe back then as a kid, but I think I'd be an Ovett fan if I was rooting now. I was thinking of the 80 Olympics and how pissed US athletes must have been with the boycott.
@@britbox4517when the bbc and itv shared coverage of the F.A. Cup final always watched the beeb simply because of Coleman and when motson took over switched to Brian Moore , how spoiled were we in those days ?
@@edwardcooper5479 Yep,lots of good commentators.I thought Brian Moore was excellent with the ITV football coverage, and not to forget Peter Jones on Radio 2. I thought Ron Pickering was a pretty decent athletics commentator also.
SavageArfad in fairness whoever gets to the front on the last bend (at their peaks) and kicks...is the winner. People talk about how they both managed to cock up their favoured races. I think their supreme confidence in their own ability cost them I.E.. Coe let Ovett get too far in front because he thought he could out-kick anybody...Ovett never saw how far back Coe was in the 800 so he never felt Coe’s kick and I think Ovett went into the 1500 thinking he had Coe’s number thus underestimating Seb’s kick and allowing him to move to the front and kick first....Incidently, Jurgen Straub...Stasi National doping programme as was Olaf Beyer Euro 800 metres final in ‘78.
I remember the line in news report that 'they both got it wrong' ie. Ovett won Coe's pet event - the 800m and Coe won Ovett's - the 1500m. What a time the late 70s and early 80s were for middle distance running. Juantorena, Coe, Ovett, Walker, Scott, Maree, Boit and then Cruz.
Coe was a beaten man before the gun, and by the tape he realised it. Ovett was the master of this race, and I honestly believe he lost the 1500 metres because he couldn't be arsed. David Warren ran a cracking race here too.
Ovett said that after the 800m his attitude was "I've won my gold, I want to go home." and he didn't have the same edge in the 1500m. Coe said he felt exactly the same way after winning the 800m at the European Championships in 1986.
Ovett is sensational, boxed badly twice. Coe does exactly what Coleman tells him not to do; he is obsessed with Ovett and forgets to treat it as a race with 8 athletes, so he has too may to get round when Ovett finds himself in the clear and accelerates, blue eyes like chips of ice.
Almost as fast as the almighty Jim Ryun at Dusseldorf, W.Germany in 1967 when he ran the last lap of his 1500m World Record in 49.8 sec and the last 100 meters in 11.6!! Ryun had the best kick of any middle distance runner!
Yeah and Steve shook his hand after the 1500 victory but Coe avoided eye contact on the podium for the 800 when he shook his hand begrudgingly. My dad supported Coe up to that moment. After that he rooted for Cram and Ovett
@@steffanhoffmann8937 Well, certainly Peter Coe (Seb's dad and coach) greatly admired Ovett. There is another video somewhere on RU-vid of a less important race showing Peter on the infield congratulating Ovett for a race victory at a meet in which Seb raced a different event. Peter Coe spoke very highly of Ovett.
Despite Ovett's obviously natural talent and dominance at the 1500 between 1977 to at least 1980, where Coe put doubts into his mind, he just didn't regard running as a life and death matter and as did Send still does. Coe knew that Steve could win anyway he liked to, so more things could go wrong for him and it bloody did. Forget his non sleeping etc, but he learned his lesson and never fucked up again, so his father's bluntness did combine with his fast tempo and kick to ensure that his mind was never blurred ever again!
That is indeed amazing. The adrenaline levels must have gone through the roof with the bumping, but he somehow kept it together. It's like a superb pin-table, Wizard, Fireball, Magic City or World Fair.
I was a huge fan of Coe as a child and it was almost as if Steve Ovett was the enemy for beating him, even though he was British. Of course I was too young to know about politics at the time so I had no idea that Coe would turn out to be a horrible Tory. I look back and wish I’d supported Ovett.
it’s difficult to overtake on the bends in a bunched up race. Coe needed to put himself in a better position before the bend before the back straight. He was convinced he could sail through the field in the last 200 because he’d done that time after time in 1979, but never against Ovett.
That's true. He made up a lot of distance against the other athletes in the straight but Ovett had a similar kick to Coe. I still can't believe how he got so far back since he was in a better position than Ovett earlier in the race. It was like he was running in a daze.
What happened between 1:55 and 2:05 (youtube time, not race time)? We will never really know, because the Moscow cameras were badly set up for that stretch. It seems to me to be the key to understanding this race. At some point in those 10 seconds Warren accelerates. Coe is so busy watching Ovett that he isn't watching the leader, but the move by Warren is key because it breaks things up and gives Ovett space. Apparently Ovett got bladdered after this race. It would be nice to think he raised a toast to Warren.
@@bfc3057 it’s sad because Ovett was in such strong shape prior to LA, it’s a shame he picked up a respiratory infection. Also if the Olympics were in 1977 and not 1976 he’d be a double Olympic champion at 1500m & 800m. He was absolutely brilliant from 77-81 prior to his knee gate-rail injury.
Coe was too nervous in this final. Several days later, he won the 1,500-meter final, with East Germany's Jurgen Straub accelerating from 800 meters and finishing second. Ovett had to settle for the bronze medal.
If I ever met David Coleman, I would like to ask, where did “Those blue eyes like chips of ice” come from. It’s a lovely metaphor: did he just think it up on the spur of the moment?
I often wonder what if Steve had stayed focused for the 1500 instead of nursing a hangover ---- in the end I am glad we got this 800 out of him --- olympic champion end of
Imagine going into this race not only had overt not lost over40 odd race's he was equaling COES 1500 WORLD RECORD ,WHILST WAVING TO THE CROWD ooooooh yeah,,,, his mum and Dad was in the stadium so ,,,this TITAN has just equalled sebs 1500(3:32'09) cruising into the finishing line loosing tenths of a second and looking like he could have run two seconds faster,,, not only is COE rightly Royally shitting himself in awe of this monster who he'd been in awe of from the time ovettwas16 he ran 3:59'9 mile !!!!!!!! And he was English schools 400 champion!!!!!! Overt had the fantastic experience of already going to the Olympics in 1976 MONTREAL,,,COE WITH ALL THE EXPECTATIONS WRAPPED AROUND HIS NECK DESTROYED HIS MORALE AND OVETT NO PRESSURE, RUNS 50'6 2nd lap after 40 years almost-STILL THE FASTEST IN ANY MAJOR!!!!!!! NOT ONLY THAT BUT COE HAD A SLIPPED DISC WHICH HE LET NOBODY KNOW ABOUT SO PAINFUL AND ONE LEG WAS SLIGHTLY LONGER THAN THE OTHER seb was not flowing like the year before when he established himself with 3 worlds records in 41 days!!!!!!!!!!! WHAT A WEIGHT TO CARRY ON THOSE FRAIL SKINNY SHOULDERS!!!!! SEB MIGHT HAVE LOOKED FRAIL BUT HE WAS ALSO A TITAN AS HE PROVED BY DOING WHAT NOT ONE SOUL IN THE WORLD COULD DO,,,,AND WHAT HAPPENED JUST AFTER THE MOSCOW HORROR???? OVETT NOT ONLY ANNIHILATED COES 1500M WORLD RECORD BUT DRAGGED THE OTHER TWO GERMANS UNDER SEBS TIME AS WELL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It took COE until 1986 to beat ovetts time,,, TWICE OLYMPIC CHAMPION and COE had to Wait until 1986 to finally beat ovetts time no thanks to James Robinson,,, the other James (MAYS) was the MASTER PACEMAKER,,, AND TOM BYERS WHO ONCE WON ,,,BEAT OVETT WHILST PEACEMAKING,,, REMEMBE???1981 OSLO YEAH???
He obviously didn't have a good semifinal, and so started the final in lane 8, which is bad and couldn't have filled him with confidence. That's not a lane from which champions emerge.
Fighting his way out of those positions must have cost Ovett energy and rhythm. On the other hand, sometimes adversity gives one strength. ("That which doesn't kill you makes you stronger"). There's a comment below that says Coe's tactics weren't as bad as history judged them - I agree with that also. The "what-ifs" in this race stretch away to the end of time.
Fair play to Ovett, he got this one right and benefited from Coe getting it horribly wrong. I'm glad he managed 1 Olympic Gold. If Coe had taken the lead at the bell no-one would have passed him, but that's racing for you. He stayed out wide and was left with too much to do down the final straight. Respect for staying on to win the silver though so 2 Golds and 2 Silvers overall in the Olympics wasn't too bad was it?
He should have gotten in the lane 1 going down backstrech. He is running in lane 3 the last 200. That is like a extra 8 meters. Those 2 and Cram ? Who else? Had great races for 5 years or so. Fun to watch.
I've often thought that Coe was so obsessed with Ovett in this race that he took his lead from the terrible positions Ovett found himself in for most of this race. Ovett was boxed in and yet, somehow, Coe - despite being clear of trouble - found himself at the back with just 300-350 metres to go. Both were classes above the rest of the field, but were clearly leery of one another. Ovett got "bottled up," says Coleman, and Coe "lost his way."
YEAH??? OVETT WOULD DEFINITELY BE DISQUALIFIED TODAY FOR THOSE ELBOWING TACTICS AND AS FOR ,,,,WHAT A FUKKIN DISASTER !!!!!! TOTAL FUKKIN DISASTER,,,, SUPER HUMAN EFFORT AT THE FINISH,,,,AND TO BEAT OVETT A FEW DAYS LATER SHOW'S HOW MUCH THIS RACE TOOK THE ZAP FROM STEVE,,,,THAT AND STRAUBS RUN FROM 700 METRES OUT AT 1:46 PACE !!!!!!!!!!!! 54 THIRD LAP,,,52, 2 LAST LAP !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 12,1 LAST 💯 METRES STILL THE FASTEST LAST 💯 METRES OF ALL TIME AFTER SUCH A FANTASTIC THIRD LAP FOLLOWED BY A 40 SECOND 300 METRES,,,then BAM 12,1 LAST 💯 METRES !!!!!!!!! THE RACE OF A LIFE TIME !!!!!!!!!!!
@@jeremyhomewood9573 At the time it was considered there was no way Ovett could win this race, fast or slow, as Coe held all the cards. Even though Ovett was physical, Coe laboured at the back at his own fault for too long. Ovett had set two world records before the games, so perhaps the zap had gone out his legs by the time of the 1500m. He even set another WR after the games (and squeezed two 5000m races in the space of four days, a 1st and 2nd). A monumental effort for a newly crowned 800m champ. That's why, as far as I recall, he was the named IAAF athlete of 1980. Something that is forgotten now. Though I can see why.
@@martynhanson How do Coe end up in lane 8--that's the question. He obviously had a poor semifinal run--but you rarely see a world-record holder and race favorite starting in the far outside lane, which is not a good place to be. I'm sure he'd not started in the lane in a race in ages, and he never looked comfortable in this race.
@@richardernsberger5692 Not sure why Coe did end up in lane 8. As you say he never looked comfortable at this snails pace race and i think the event got to him - Moorcroft had a similar race at 5000m euro in 82. He said he just never got going and that was a slow race too. To do with seeding things happened like that in those days. If you recall 1970 world cup. The holders and previous twice winners were drawn in the same group. No way would that happen today.
Ovett already knew how to run and race. Fuck me as a Coe fan I was gutted. Ovett just beat up the field. And then a few days later I was all smiles. Coe learned quickly how to race (running was never an issue) when 1500m came by.
A streetfighter's race! Coe was too used to staged record attempts and got mugged. He slipped up badly middle of first lap when he could have took off when Ovett was boxed in. Love this race cos I was an Ovett fan but Coe was a phenomenon and went on to prove it in 1500m and with silver and gold in 1984. And don't forget the controversy about his selection in '84 when a lot of people wanted Peter (ugghh) Elliot to go instead!!
The British athletes were not competing under normal circumstances. Due to the boycott of the games by 66 countries, GB decided to send athletes under the Olympic flag and Olympic anthem, rather than represent their country officially.
I so wanted Ovett to win the 1500m as well after this. Unfortunately, not to be . People always referred to the way Steve was quick to acknowledge Seb after both races , but Coe behaved like a spoilt child after losing
@@Revolver1981 your right.. Spoilt little Cecils cant accept losing gracefully just like he couldn't. He behaved disgraceful on the medals rostrum. Really let himself down.
бритов не нужно было допускать до Олимпиады. У них не было официальной заявки национального олимпийского комитета. Пусть бы сидели дома и смотрели по телевизору, как Киров становится олимпийским чемпионом.
You can hear the dejection in Colemans voice that Sebastian Coe didn’t win, and even more so that Steve Ovett did. FF to the end of the 1500m final and Coleman is positively gushing about Coe. Can’t get enough of him.
He ran the shittiest race he’s ever run, from beginning to end. Everyone said it including his dad who was his coach and told him that he’d “ run like a c-t”
To me Coe was a failed 800m runner - 2 Olympic 800m failures, didn’t complete in the 800m world championships in 83, or 87. He only run once under 1:42 and once under 1:43. Under achieved at 800m despite an amazing talent and only man to sub 3:30 1500m and 1:42 800m
It drives me crazy watching athletes run the turns in the second and third lanes... you're better off settling in at the back and save it for a final kick.
Not everyone can run in the inside lane; if they did, it would be single file and you'd have guys 15 meters behind the leader. Running in the 2nd and 3rd lane has always been done and always will be done--it's not that much longer. It's being out farther than that for an extended period that's a problem.
