Fast Times In Hotlanta Despite stifling weather, a firecracker field lit up the new Olympic track with seven 1996 world bests by Tim Layden For nearly three years Gwen Torrence has tried to ignore Atlanta's Olympic Stadium as it rose from a hole in the earth alongside I-75/85. She would drive by it on her frequent trips to and from the airport and avert her gaze as she passed. "I would try to avoid looking at it," she says, as if it were roadkill. A construction site grew into a skeleton, which grew into a coliseum in which Torrence hopes to win at least three gold medals at this summer's Games. And still she would not look. Hers is a survivalist approach. When you're in the vise of Olympic-year pressure, it's wise to keep the Games in the distance. Do not contest them every day. It is, among track and field athletes, a common approach. In advance of the Grand Prix meet that christened Olympic Stadium last Saturday, participants kept trying to discount the significance of a major meet in the new stadium less than a month before the U.S. trials, which will be held in the same place, and scarcely two months before the opening of the centennial Games. Don't mention the Olympics, please. "It'll be nice to see what the place is like, but I've got too much work to do to think as far ahead as the Games," said U.S. shot-putter John Godina, who won his event Saturday with a throw of 69'3 1/4". With the knowing calm that comes from 18 years of international experience and competing in three Games, Carl Lewis listened to his fellow athletes talk - and all but shook his head. "People can discount this meet all they want," he said last Friday. "I remember the first time I walked into the [Los Angeles] Coliseum before the Olympics in '84. It was a very special feeling. Everybody knows what the stadium means." Bubka had no trouble clearing 19'9" in the pole vault, but the 92° heat made him pop his lid photograph by John Biever But as the athletes hid behind their calendars, Saturday's meet spoke the truth, as seven 1996 world bests were established. Among them were the fastest outdoor mile time (3:50.86 by world-record holder Noureddine Morceli of Algeria) and highest pole vault (19'9" by world-record holder Sergey Bubka of Ukraine) turned in on American soil. There were three remarkable sprints - one that showcased greatness unfolding (Torrence's), another that celebrated rebirth (of Lewis and of U.S. men's sprinting) and a third that promised an intriguing rivalry (Michael Johnson versus Mike Marsh). All of Saturday's races were contested on a $6 million, Italian-made track that can be called fast with the same understatement that Bill Gates can be called affluent. The first of the sprints was the women's 100 meters, in which Torrence faced Gail Devers, gold medalist in the 100 at the 1992 Olympics and '93 world championships. There had been steady rumors in the week leading up to the race that Torrence would skip the 100 in favor of the 400 because she has long sought to challenge defending Olympic and world champion Marie-Jose Perec of France. "I wanted to run the 400," said Torrence, who will compete in the 100 and 200 at the trials. But there were equally persistent rumors that if Torrence had entered the 400, Perec would have withdrawn, a prospect that forced Torrence's hand and left her angry at the politics. "Nobody owns no race," she snapped. Au contraire. Torrence owned Saturday's 100, blasting off cleanly at the gun and winning in 10.85 seconds. Her time was just .03 slower than her personal best, set in '94, and breathtakingly fast for the third weekend in May. Devers struggled home sixth in 11.20 seconds, her customarily quick feet looking slow and heavy. Devers still plans to run the 100 and the 100 hurdles at the trials. "I'm sure she'll be ready when it counts," said Torrence. Not long ago it seemed that Lewis, Dennis Mitchell and the other once-dominant U.S. sprinters might never be an Olympic threat again. In 1995 no U.S. sprinter broke 10 seconds in the 100, and Jon Drummond's No. 4 world ranking was the lowest ever for the top American. "Everybody jumped on us about having one bad year, forgot about us," Mitchell said before the start of the outdoor season this spring. "I'm saying Americans are still the best sprinters in the world, don't count us out." Still, the addition of world champion Donovan Bailey to the 100 field on Thursday only seemed to ensure an embarrassment for U.S. sprinters. "Should be fun," was Lewis's coy assessment on Friday. It was more fun than anyone could have expected. Mitchell shot out of the blocks, ate up Drummond at 40 meters and tore home in 9.93 seconds, barely holding off the 34-year-old Lewis, who closed as if in his prime to finish in 9.94. Mitchell, always demonstrative, squatted and clapped his hands hard at the finish and then jogged a victory lap with Lewis. Because the wind was 2.1 meters per second (0.1 mps more than is acceptable), the times were ever-so-slightly wind-aided. Still, neither Lewis nor Mitchell had run faster since the epochal 1991 world championship 100 in Tokyo, in which Lewis set a since-broken world record of 9.86, Mitchell ran a 9.91 and four other runners also broke 10 seconds. With Bailey third in 9.97 and Drummond fourth in 9.98, last Saturday's race was the fastest since the one in Tokyo. It also represented a huge leap for Lewis, who had run a wind-aided 10.10 to win the Texas Relays on April 13 but was still not expected to make the U.S. team in the 100. Suddenly he became a gold medal contender. "Bottom line, he proved he's still good," said Drummond. The 30-year-old Mitchell's performance quieted doubts about him, too. Last year his best non-wind-aided time was only 10.12, but in September he split with coach John Smith and returned from Los Angeles to Gainesville, Fla., where he had trained during his most productive years. Bailey, meanwhile, took no pleasure in having broken 10 seconds in a losing effort. As Lewis bounded through a staging area at one corner of the stadium, Bailey brooded nearby, seething at having been invited to the meet so late, after he'd put in a hard week of training. "I only make mistakes one time," Bailey said. "This will not happen again. I'm going to light these guys up." Such talk is the sweet music of rivalry, the magic that track desperately needs. In the 100 there is now the promise of a nasty sub-10 fight at the U.S. trials for three Olympic spots and a riveting Games final among Bailey, Linford Christie of Great Britain, Bruny Surin of Canada, UCLA senior Ato Boldon of Trinidad, Frankie Fredericks of Namibia and whichever three Americans make the team. "Mind-boggling,'' said Mitchell. Meanwhile, Michael Johnson has been without rivals or peers. Since he embarked on his personal quest to become the first athlete to win gold medals in the 200 and 400 at the same Olympics, he has competed in a vacuum. Michael versus the schedule. Michael versus his training. Michael versus world records. He has won 52 consecutive 400s and 19 consecutive 200s. Now there is the previously unexamined possibility of defeat, which only heightens the appeal of his attempt. In Saturday's 200, Johnson caught Marsh, one of Lewis's Santa Monica Track Club teammates and - this has been largely forgotten - the defending Olympic 200-meter champion, only in the final 10 meters. Johnson won in a 1996 world best of 19.83 seconds to Marsh's eased-up 19.88. Marsh was unbowed by the loss, saying that a twinge in his right leg gave him pause as he came off the turn, with Johnson chasing him. "I don't believe anybody will catch me again if I come off the turn in front," Marsh said, failing to name the obvious name. There's also the prospect of challenge in the Olympic 400. On Saturday, Butch Reynolds won that event in the year's fastest time, 44.33 seconds. That was far off his 1988 world record of 43.29 and also far off Johnson's 43.39 at last year's world championships, but it was quick enough to suggest that in contrast to what has happened in their recent matchups, Johnson won't swallow up Reynolds in the third 100 meters when they meet next. Afterward Reynolds was talking, as was Morceli, of finding a place in the Southern heat to train for the Games. It was 92 degrees on Saturday, uncommon for May in Atlanta, but ordinary for July and August. "I will have to try to work out in a warm, humid place," said Morceli. The new stadium took some heat of its own. Upon viewing it last week, IAAF president Primo Nebiolo, who months ago had voiced concerns that it too resembled the ballpark that it will eventually become, said, "Now it will be a nice Olympic Stadium ... [but] it is still a little bit baseball stadium." He is right. There is a grassy triangle beyond the finish line, where home plate will someday sit. There is a concrete trench where the first base dugout will be. There is, in general, nothing particularly Olympian about the structure, except that the Olympics will take place there. But as Saturday's meet proved, that quality alone will make the stadium breathe.