Handbook of Summer Athletic Sports

Handbook of Summer Athletic Sports

The success of Weston and OLear y in their long-distance walks in England surprised the Britons greatly. Up to the time of Westons appearance in that countr y, Englishmen had been accustomed to consider themselves the best walkers in the world; but the two Americans-the native and the naturalized-soon took the conceit out of them. The best English long-distance walkers were Peter Crossland and Henr y Vaughan, who had both done excellent work in matches of the kind then practiced in England. But the introduction of six-day contests, first started by Weston, put these professionals on unfamiliar ground, and they found that a man who could walk a hundred miles in one day was not able to cope with these American wonders, who could finish five hundred miles in six days. The Englishmen laid their defeat to the right cause-unfamiliar methods; and Sir John Astley, a rich sporting baronet, to put both parties on an equality, introduced the six-day ldquo;go-as you-pleaserdquo; match, soon to supersede all others. It was thought that runners would have the advantage over walkers in this match.