Whale of an Artist

TRACK & FIELD

Indoor track fans usually have to be satisfied with style and spirit instead of statistics. Performances rarely match those outdoors, partly because few trackmen are in top form during the winter, partly because some events are a whole lot harder indoors. The world record for the mile is 3 min. 51.3 sec. outdoors but 5.1 sec. slower indoors. The board tracks are slower and slipperier than outdoors and smaller, too, with eleven laps to the mile instead of four, 22 turns instead of eight. The indoor long-jump record is 27 ft., compared with 27 ft. 4 3/4 in. outdoors--because runways are shorter indoors and jumpers cannot work up as much speed for their takeoff.

Then there is the shotput. Texas A. & M.'s Randy Matson holds the outdoor world record with a heave of 70 ft. 7 1/4 in., but the best he has ever done indoors is 64 ft. 4 1/4 in. One reason, says Randy, is that the shots themselves are different: both weigh 16 lbs., but the outdoor shot is plain metal while the indoor shot is covered with plastic so that it won't ruin the wooden floors.

"The indoor shot slips off Randy's hand," explains Matson's coach, Charlie Thomas. "He can't control it, and he's afraid of it."

Real Challenger. No such fear, obviously, besets the University of Oregon's Neal Steinhauer, 22, who has generated the only real excitement so far this winter. When the season started, hardly anyone gave him a second thought, although he was the world's No. 2-ranked shotputter. Last month in San Francisco, Neal broke the indoor record with a toss of 66 ft. 6 3/4 in. --beating Matson in the process. And two weeks ago in Portland, Ore., Steinhauer uncorked six straight puts of over 65 ft.--the longest of which traveled 67 ft. 10 in.--and broke the record again.

Suddenly Randy Matson, the King of the Whales, had a real challenger and Neal Steinhauer was a celebrity. It didn't seem all that sudden to Steinhauer. The son of a sawmill superintendent in Eugene, Ore., he has been putting the shot since he was a junior in high school, stood 6 ft. 2 in. tall and weighed 150 lbs. He is now 6 ft. 5 in., weighs 265 lbs., boasts a 52-in. chest and 18 1/2-in. biceps. Wearing an old Oregon football jersey with No. 70 on the back, he works out with weights for three hours (he can lift 600 lbs.) on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays; on alternate days he spends two hours throwing the shot in the basement of the Oregon gym, bouncing the plastic ball off a wall 55 ft. away. "And I'm forever knocking out the light bulbs in the ceiling," says Neal, "but they keep replacing them, so I keep on throwing."

Now that he has the indoor record, Steinhauer has two goals left. First, to beat Matson's outdoor world record. Second, to paint landscapes. "Heck," he says. "I was an artist before I was a shotputter, and I'll be an artist after I'm a shotputter."

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