Twenty years have passed since Evan King went within a whisker of winning the world famous Stawell Gift.
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For the now Ballarat 47-year-old though, he can still remember the moment like it was yesterday.
King, running off 6.25m, came up a heartbreaking 0.01 seconds short of catching Daniel Millard (10.75m), who clocked 11.98 seconds to claim the 1997 final.
Originally from the small Southern Mallee town of Beulah, King was unsure on the line whether he had done enough to realise a long-time ambition.
Up to that moment he had not contemplated anything else other than winning.
His mentor Lenny Templar had him trained to the minute.
“I didn’t think I could lose. We’d done everything we needed to do.”
As well as collecting the coveted Stawell Gift sash, he stood to win a sizeable financial windfall after backing himself.
It is no surprise that at the time defeat was shattering.
Templar told King that the only way to deal with it was to get back training and two days later this is exactly what he did.
King said defeat had not been easy to take then and admits that even now it remains a “what if” moment in his life.
While he missed out on the big prize, the handicappers did not miss out on making it much tougher for King on the back quick times – pulling him back three metres.
Consequently, while he managed to continue to have success in the immediate following years, making another Stawell Gift final proved beyond him for sometime.
King had to wait until 2004 before doing that again.
It did not finish there though. He made the most of the limit mark of 10m to reach another two finals in 2006 and 2007, and in doing so joined American Greg Saddler contesting four Stawell Gift finals – more than anyone else.
King has not always found it easy to talk about that Easter Monday, even though he has great pride in what he was able to achieve in getting so close in that year and his many achievements in professional running.
He has also had great satisfaction seeing many fellow Ballarat athletes enjoy success in the Stawell Gift and Women’s Gift to continue a great running heritage in the city.
“There’s no question Ballarat remains one of the strongest pro running centres.”
King will be back at Stawell this weekend competing again in the veterans’ 100m and 300m, and open 400m.
For the Gift though, he will be an onlooker and on Monday undoubtedly thinking back 20 years to what might have been.
