 Both incidentally lost their races that day - Bailey to Dennis Mitchell and Johnson to Frankie Fredericks.Over the coming months in the fall of 1996, several offers to stage the 150-metre event came in, the most serious of which were those by Newcastle, England-based company Nova International led by British former distance runner Brendan Foster and the one by an Ottawa-based entity named Magellan Entertainment Group, a small company that up to that point specialized in motivational seminars for corporations.Amid much media speculation, Magellan won the bid in mid November 1996, announcing a $500,000 appearance fee for each athlete with an additional $1 million promised for the race winner.