I was able to accomplish and
achieve the sort of consistency and longevity that I did
based on a singular focus of, how do I get the absolute
best out of myself from a performance standpoint? (LEGENDS LIVE ON) He was the youngest
of five children and his mum was a teacher and the other four kids
all have got college degrees and it was a very bright,
well-educated, highly motivated,
high-achieving family. High school
I was a 100, 200m sprinter. Throughout my four years
of my college career I was primarily 200,
and so for the first six years of my professional career, the 200 was the race
that I was more focused on. And when I had to pick one
I would run that one and win it and then have to
sit in the stands and watch someone else
win the other one and feeling like
I could win that, and I didn't like that feeling. Inside Michael Johnson
there was a lot more going on that he wouldn't really
let us see. (OLYMPIC GAMES BARCELONA 1992) It was my first Olympics. I was ranked number one in the
world for the past two years, hadn't lost a race. I was the defending
world champion from 1991 so I was in fantastic shape
that year. I got food poisoning
just before the Games, just sort of wrecked all of
my preparation and condition. Michael Johnson in lane two, Frank Fredericks right next
to him in lane three. Coming down to the top
of the stretch and Adeniken of Nigeria
has a short lead. Now Michael Johnson is really
having to work to get there, as Frank Fredericks wins,
and Johnson, Johnson may not have made
the final four. I wasn't able to advance - the biggest disappointment
of my life. Frank Fredericks of Bolivia
was the winner of that second semifinal heat
of the 200m. That inability to run
that final in 1992 definitely bothered him and was one of the things that
spurred him onward. OK, so what could I have done
to prevent that? Well, I could have had
my royal food taster, you know, taste all of my food
and then wait 24 hours to see if they still look healthy
or not, and then I'll decide to eat it, you know,
and that's just not practical. I had been named as
one of the members of our 4x400m relay team. And I remember we won it
and we got our gold medal and it was just not a good
experience for me at all. I wasn't there to win a gold
medal as a member of a relay. I didn't win the medal
that I wanted. Start to question, am I really
as good as I thought I was? "Didn't get it this year,
we'll try again next year." There is no next year
at the Olympics. I don't think I was poisoned
or sabotaged, but I've never thought
about that. Maybe - you never know. I mean, I was beating up
on people pretty bad and maybe they didn't want me
to win. But they weren't able to
keep me down for long, if that was the case. (OLYMPIC GAMES ATLANTA 1996) Michael Johnson with his first
steps toward track immortality. We knew the situation. The situation was Michael was
as close to unbeatable as unbeatable can be. Michael Johnson is off and
he's cruising for the finish. Michael Johnson
coming home all by himself. Michael Johnson
is halfway to history. So there was a group of us really fighting for
the other two medals. When I say I came second
to Michael Johnson, it's OK. So I'm very fortunate to have been part of
Michael's history. He changed the 400m event,
no doubt about it, because he was the first
pure sprinter who took on the 400 properly. He made us all realise,
this is a sprint, you've got to have speed
to run the really fast times. I remember standing
behind the rostrum and I remember just being aware that Michael
wasn't in the moment. I remember turning to Michael
and saying, "Are you all right?"
and he said, "Yeah, yeah." I said, "This is it,
this is why we do this. "Don't forget to savour
this moment." And there's this wonderful
shot of Michael, I think it's the only time
he ever cried on a rostrum. He blames me for that because he said I snapped him
out of... He was already
thinking about the 200m. (ATLANTA 1996 200M FINAL) Flashbulbs flashing,
Ato Boldon away well, so is Frank Fredericks,
and here comes Michael Johnson. I thought it was going to take breaking the world record
in order to win. Michael Johnson,
running for the line and into Olympic history. I wrote at the time, "He turned the inevitable
into the incredible." Everybody knew he was
going to win but nobody thought he was
going to run 19.32. I was really focused on
just trying to make history and be the best that there's
ever been in those two events. As these young kids
come onto the stage, could we give them a good ol'
Aussie g'day and welcome? Stadium Australia in Sydney, Michael Johnson in another
attempt to make history. He would become the first man to win back-to-back
Olympic 400m gold medals. 400m final is under way. I wanted to end my career
on a good note. Wanted to end my career as a
champion, as Olympic champion. Michael Johnson wins another and once again cements his
place as an all-time great. Michael Johnson,
the first to repeat as Olympic 400m champion. In track and field in general I think Michael Johnson
was a name that everyone knew. I appreciate
what he's done for us and the example
he set out for us and the records that he did
put out there for us, it really motivated myself. There's probably nothing that
you're ever going to be able to do in your life
that's going to top that, so I'm going to have to prepare
myself for another career. We're focused on
helping athletes be the best athletes
that they can. Michael always gave you the
impression that he was going to be the mechanical engineer
with the pocket liner and the pens in his pocket. He never sleeps. When he does sleep
he's dreaming about, "What am I going to do
to be better tomorrow?" and so what that does is it almost forces him to
look around at everything, evaluate how it is today
and look around for opportunities to improve on
what's going on today, and that drives a lot
of people crazy. It's much harder for a track
and field star in America to be really well known
and to really leave their mark, and I think Michael
has done that, not just because
of what he did on the track, but what he's done
off the track as well. Hi, I'm Michael Johnson. We're here in Dallas, Texas,
at Michael Johnson Performance and we're working
with the young leaders, doing a little bit of
basketball here, a little team-building. Really cool exercise
so we can get to learn how to communicate better
with one another. My foundation is really focused on helping find young people
around the world who are really interested
in helping their communities and helping other young people who have overcome significant
challenges just as they have. This year we had our first
class of 15 young leaders. Whether it be lack of education
in their community, or poverty in their community
or war, what we're trying to do
with this programme is to find those young people who have overcome those
challenges through sport and who have shown
a real passion for being a leader
in their community and changing their community and helping other young people
overcome just as they have. Just like Drica here in Rio.
It was soccer, or football, that helped her overcome
the poverty and the situation
that she was in and she decided, "I'm going to
use the same thing. "I know that kids in
my community love football "so I'm going to help them
through using football." I learnt different things
from different cultures because there were young people
from several countries. I learnt things like
how to look after my health and the children's health
and how to stay in good shape. I also learnt the Haka! These young people have gotten
themselves to the starting line and then decided instead of
just going ahead myself, I'm going to help others
get here, too, and so they inspire me, and that's what makes me
feel so good about what we're able to do
with these young leaders. Michael Johnson. I have great memories
of my career, but I'm happy with
what I'm doing now. As long as I'm close to
athletes every day, I love what I do now. I still wake up the same way
I did when I was competing, wake up every day driven,
ready to go, you know, conquer something. (LEGENDS LIVE ON)
