`PRE, PRE, PRE!' : PREFONTAINE WAS AHEAD OF HIS TIME.

Byline: Mark Whicker Orange County Register

Steve Prefontaine died in 1975. He should have been born then.

Had he not flipped his gold MG at age 24, Prefontaine might well have won the 5,000 meters at the Olympics of 1976. With the same dismissive wave he gave his pursuers, he would have made his fourth-place finish in '72 disappear.

But had he come a little later, to the '90s that were truly ready to market his glowering charisma, Prefontaine might be the world's most famous athlete today.

Certainly his arthritic sport would no longer be struggling to overtake bowling. Prefontaine, the first to wear the Nike emblem on a running shoe, was a commercial waiting to happen.

The regrets of his mistimed life hover over ``Prefontaine,'' the Hollywood Pictures film that premiered this week in Southern California.

But they don't muffle the lascivious joy of the great Oregon runner who made entire stadia yell ``Pre, Pre, Pre!''

``Prefontaine'' is the kind of precise, eloquent work you'd expect from director Steve James, one of the collaborators of the unparalleled documentary ``Hoop Dreams.''

But this film was not James' idea. Joe Roth, chairman of Walt Disney Studios, was a high school contemporary of Prefontaine's and remembers his times. The Hollywood Pictures team plunged into the project and finished it within 13 months - mindful that a rival group is also doing a Prefontaine movie, called ``Pre.'' That one won't be out until November. Pre would vote for this film - he always ran in front.

``I didn't know much about Steve,'' James said, ``but it didn't take long before I realized what a great figure he was. It wasn't like Michael Johnson winning medals in the Olympics. Steve had the arrogance and outspokenness to go along with his ability - and, at the end, he was politicized by the events of the day. How many of today's athletes would turn down $250,000 and continue living in a trailer park?''

Prefontaine made that decision after '72, when amateur track athletes were literally that. Turning pro would have made another Olympics impossible. But Prefontaine bucked the U.S. Amateur Athletic Union (called the ATU in the movie) when it refused to let him race in Europe.

He invited Finnish athletes - including Lasse Viren, gold medalist in the 5,000 and 10,000 in Munich - to Eugene, Ore., for a renegade meet. The ATU relented, and even though Viren didn't show up, Prefontaine's meet succeeded. He drove home that night, to his death.

``His car wasn't even out of second gear,'' James said, trying to deflect criticism that the movie glossed over Prefontaine's 0.16 blood-alcohol level, far above the legal limit. It would have compromised nothing to show the truth, to show Pre downing beer instead of soda. It's particularly odd because James never spares us Prefontaine's dark sides, the ways he invited disdain.

The funeral was held at Oregon's track stadium, and as the hearse rode around the track, Prefontaine's U.S. record time of 13:21.87 in the 5,000 ticked down on the scoreboard. He left behind both parents, a girlfriend and a community that honors him with a Prefontaine meet every summer.

Jared Leto, formerly on ABC's ``My So-Called Life,'' vividly duplicates Prefontaine. At a screening in Orlando, Fla., such friends as Jim Ryun and Frank Shorter were amazed at the resemblance, in both physique and hubris. Leto was running 60-second laps at the end of his training for ``Prefontaine.'' That was almost as tough as mastering Pre's mood swings.

However, the camera is kindest to R. Lee Ermey, the old Marine sergeant-turned-actor who plays Oregon coach Bill Bowerman. Ornery enough to dynamite his own mailbox to keep truckers from knocking it down, Bowerman was also tough enough to earn Prefontaine's trust.

He told Pre that he couldn't be a miler - his kick wasn't sufficient.

``Nobody cares about the 3-mile,'' Prefontaine snapped.

``Then make 'em care about it,'' Bowerman snapped back.

Bowerman, who probably deserves his own movie, will be remembered for another contribution. He used his wife's waffle iron to make running shoes designed to last only one race for Prefontaine. Near movie's end, Bowerman tells Pre that a former Ducks walk-on is selling these shoes and asks him to wear the new logo - a heavy, yellow swoosh.

``Nike, the goddess of victory,'' Bowerman rasped.

Prefontaine shook his head. ``Unnecessary wind resistance,'' he said, and threw the swoosh away. It's the film's only obvious laugh line, and let's hope it really happened.

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3 Photos

Photo: (1-2) Actor Jared Leto, left, plays Steve Prefontaine in a movie of the runner's life.

Associated Press

(3) VIREN