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TRACK & FIELD

He smokes cigarettes, downs his full share of red wine, and readily admits that he often stuffs himself on sauerkraut. He plays soccer for kicks and seldom exerts himself in training. He has no coach. "My principle," explains French Distance Runner Michel Jazy, 29, "is to do nothing contrary to the body. An athlete in shape is like a pregnant woman. One may indulge one's tastes and be sure not to overdo."

Mais oui! Last week, before 3,000 wildly cheering countrymen at Rennes, he breezed through the mile in an astonishing 3 min. 53.6 sec., chopping a full .5 sec. from the world record set last year by New Zealand's Peter Snell. The week before, Jazy turned a 3-min. 55.5-sec. mile, the seventh fastest in history, and topped that by setting a new European record of 13 min. 34.4 sec. in the 5,000 meters, only 8.6 sec. off Australian Ron Clarke's world mark. Late last week, trying again to break Clarke's record, he missed by only 3.2 sec.

The curious thing is that Jazy runs best against nobody. Most runners find extra energy when a challenger pounds up alongside. Jazy freezes. He has won only a few major races against other stars, and finished a dismal fourth in the 5,000-meter run at the Tokyo Olympics. Few runners can match him when the pressure is off and he has some helpful "rabbits" to pace him.

At Rennes last week a French runner led him through a 57.3-sec. first quarter, a second rabbit helped him to a 1-min. 56.5-sec. half, a third man pushed him to 2 min. 57.2 sec. at the three-quarter mark. From there on, Jazy sprinted out ahead, finished with a dash that put him 45 yds. ahead. He then coolly noted that the footing on the track was poor be cause it had been chopped up by too many earlier races. "Without this," he said, "I could have done 3 min. 52 sec."

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