Today in sports history – 8 April

As sport grinds to a halt all over the world due to the coronavirus pandemic, we’ve decided to have a daily look back at those “simpler” times, when there was triumph, drama and disappointment on various fields and arenas.

This is today in sport history…

1916

(Original Caption) Bob Burman, driving Blitzen Benz, car.

In Corona (no, we’re not making this up), California, Bob Burman tragically loses his life in an accident. The popular and accomplished racecar driver lived for speed, notably setting up the world records on track and dirt with a Blitzen Benz. He was also part of the group racers that participated in the inaugural Indianapolis 500.

His world record track time of  35.25 in 1911 earned him the title as “World’s Speed King”, which – rather extravagantly – included a $10 000 crown covered in jewels. But from 1912 onwards, Burman started to have some ominously bad luck in hindsight. Back again at Indianapolis, his car’s two rear tyres blew at the same moment, sending the car flinging and putting Burman in the hospital for a week.

Later that year, Burman attempted another dirt track record in San Diego, but his car burst into flames and he quickly yet cleverly drove into the ocean to extinguish the flames. In 1915, he participated in a race in Oklahoma City, where he drove with a broken goggle and a glass splinter  in his eye for more than half of the 200 mile event.

No-one though quite foresaw that Burman and his mechanic, Erick Schrader, along with four others, including a policeman, would be killed after he rolled his open Peugeot during a street race. Ironically, his death would prompt his great friends Harry Miller and Barney Oldfield to develop what is now known as the roll cage.

1989

Jim Abbott of the California Angels stands on the mound during the game against the Baltimore Orioles at Anaheim Stadium on June 2, 1996 in Anaheim, California. (Photo by Jed Jacobsohn/Getty Images)

Jim Abbott makes his Major League Baseball (MLB) debut for the California Angels. It’s a fairly unmemorable occasion that lasts just over four innings. However, what makes the then 21-year-old’s appearance so remarkable is that he made it into the big leagues without a right hand, a birth defect. It clearly didn’t hamper his athletic prowess at all.

Abbott was named the USA’s best amateur athlete in 1987 and won gold with the American baseball team at the 1988 Olympics, earning him a spot in the MLB draft. Abbott played a decade in the MLB, including the New York Yankees, and in 1993 memorably threw a no-hitter against the Cleveland Indians. To clarify: Abbott didn’t allow his opponents to make a single hit in the whole game.

Abbott did quite brilliantly to minimise his disability when it came to fielding. He would rest his mitt on his right forearm and then slip his left hand into it within a flash should he have been required to field the ball. He would then clamp the mitt again between his right forearm and chest to take out his left hand and retrieve the ball for throwing.

He even managed two hits as batter during his career and his Yankee teammate Mariano Rivera swears he saw Abbott once hit home runs with one hand during practice.

1989

Evette de Klerk (Armstrong), athletics, during a sports event in South Africa.
(Photo by Wessel Oosthuizen/Gallo Images)

Evette de Klerk, cruelly denied a rightful place on the world stage due to the Apartheid sporting boycott, breaks the South African 200m record with a time of 22.06 seconds in Polokwane. That mark still stands to this day. Agonisingly, her bare-footed effort is actually the fastest on the African continent over that distance, but can’t be classified as an African record.

De Klerk won the 100 and 200m national titles for ten consecutive years, but only competed internationally twice in 1993, winning bronze in the 200m at the African Championships and was a semifinalist in that year’s World Champs. She once received an offer to race for Great Britain, but declined.

2012

Louis Oosthuizen’s excellent week at Augusta is ruined by a sudden death playoff loss to Bubba Watson at the Masters. The farm boy from Mossel Bay had been neck-on-neck with the American and the result was in the balance right up to the end, when he narrowly missed a tricky par putt, allowing his opponent to make par.

For more sport your way, download The Citizen’s app for iOS and Android.