Thus I urge you to go onto your greatness if you believe it is in you.

Think deeply and separate what you wish from what you are prepared to do. – Percy Cerutty

The Original Gangsters Of Running (Volume 1)

• Jerry Jobski
• Benji Durden
• Jackie Hansen
• Joe Henderson
• Ken Martin
• Mark Covert
• Bill Rodgers
• Don Kardong
• Patti Catalano
• Dick Beardsley
• Ron Wayne
• Anne Audain
• Pat Porter
• Jack Leydig
• Phil Camp
• Herm Atkins
• Doris Brown Heritage
• Bobby Hodge
• Hal Higdon

Been asked by interviewers – and my publisher – why exactly I wrote When Running Was Young And So Were We. 

Okay, one interviewer.  This is what I told him.

Somehow, sometime, I must’ve thought, you know, there was a time when Americans were great, when Americans were fast, when Americans ruled the roads, when even normal people, even average athletes like me, ran fast.  Before the festivalization of running, before the East Africans, we were great.  There was a moment.

I love the East Africans, I love the festival, but I want today’s runners to know about the first running boom. I want today’s runners to know… it’s okay to go fast.  At least it’s okay to try.  We used to party – trust me – but we partied after the race, not during the race.

When I started running, I ordered years of bound back issues of Track & Field News.  Think I got a half-dozen years’ worth.  1965-1971.  Maybe seven years.  I’m no mathematician.  Black & white photos of men excited about breaking a half hour for a six-mile run.  Good times.  Wasn’t all Vietnam and protests.  I think of those athletes of the Sixties and Seventies and even the early Eighties as the Original Gangsters of Running.  They didn’t open the door so much as break the door down.

I cannot remember exactly what first drew my attention to Jerry Jobski.  Remember thinking he looked like a skull with a Mohawk.  Sunken cheeks.  Tough, relentless, not the most gifted runner, a journeyman of sorts.  You looked at Jim Ryun or Lindgren and never thought, I could do that.  Jerry Jobski made running look like, if you were just tough enough, you could make a mark.

He made a mark. That’s why I thought of him first.

Wonder myself why I thought of these people in this order and I will tell you the honest truth – this is just the way they came to mind.

It’s what the word ‘impressive’ means really.– JDW

Jerry Jobski

We was young and we was dumb, but we had heart. – Tupac Shakur

TOUGHEST OPPONENT AND WHY?

Gerry Lindgren……He had the ability to punish himself and punish his opponents in the process.  First time I raced against him was at the NCAA meet in Berkeley in 1968.  I did not have a lot of experience at racing longer distances at that time but I was to race both the 10k and the 5k in that meet.  It was the only time I got to race at the NCAAs because the WAC conference had gone against NCAA policy and allowed us to compete as freshmen.  As a result I lost my eligibility for the NCAA Championships for my Senior year.  The rule had even been changed before my Senior year but in all their combined wisdom the NCAA overlords did not allow it to be retroactive.

Anyhow, back to the question.  Lindgren was tough…he had the ability to hurt himself, hurt you and laugh…all at the same time.  I think I was about the only one who tried to stay with him early in the race and he made me pay for my foolishness.  He started surging the straights after about three miles and I started moving back one place at a time.  Lindgren won in 29:40 and I was 7th in 30:15.  

I just looked at my diary for that race and the entry that caught my eye:  “I didn’t feel very good after 4 miles…”  probably the understatement of the year.I did exact some revenge about a year later running the 6-mile at the National Track and Field Federation Meet (remember them?) in Kentucky.  I had spent a lot of time deciding what to do, when Lindgren started surging.  I decided the best thing was to answer with another surge.  When he would return to a normal pace after a surge, I would surge again and pass him.  I beat him for the first time that day and it was very satisfying, even if it was another year in the books.

https://www.jackdogwelch.com/?p=14418

MOST MEMORABLE RUN AND WHY?

During the winter of 1969 after winning a bronze medal in the steeplechase in Mexico City, George Young ran and won a two mile race at the Sunkist Meet indoors at the Sports Arena in Los Angeles.  Sports Illustrated did a feature article on the meet that focused on George.  He indicated that he was interested in running across the Grand Canyon.  They titled the article “Warmup for the Canyon Run.”  Later that spring George decided that he needed to take some time off from running and would probably end his racing career.  

However, early in 1970, he was working on his doctoral degree in Flagstaff, Arizona and decided to start training again.  Late October, I received a call asking if I would like to run across the Grand Canyon with George.  I declined.  Chuck LaBenz got involved and talked me into thinking it might be a good long training run.  Chuck also assured me that it would just be a friendly training run that happened to cross the Grand Canyon.  The night before we were supposed to do the run, I decided to go.  We drove to Flagstaff and spent the night….at 4 a.m.  George came to our motel and along with a couple of the runners from NAU (to drive the car back to Flagstaff) George, Chuck and I headed for the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.

Even though I had grown up in Arizona, I had never been to the Grand Canyon, had never looked over the edge until that November day in 1970.  I kept repeating to myself, ‘it’s just going to be a training run.’  After a bit of a problem contacting our coaches on the South Rim, we were using walkie-talkies provided by the Forest Service, we finally started together down the North Kaibab Trail.  I was enamored by the dramatic scenery and, as we approached the bottom, I tripped and fell while glancing at Roaring Springs.  Chuck stopped to get me back on my feet…..George kept running.  

George was the only one who had made some allowances and carried a water bottle.  This was in the days before the running boom and there weren’t any water bottles commercially available. None.  George had rigged a spray bottle with a towel looped around his neck.  Since I had a mouth full of trail dirt and was pretty cut up from the fall, I caught up with George and asked for a bit of his water.  He said no….”if you thought you needed water you should have carried some.”  I was pissed.  

George took off across the bottom of the Canyon and the race was on.  Chuck wasn’t in the kind of distance shape that George and I were in.  I figured I was in better shape than George since he hadn’t raced since indoors of 1969 and I had just finished racing a cross country season.  I caught George as we crossed the black bridge on the South Kaibab Trail and started up towards Yaki Point and the South Rim.  He asked if I needed water….I didn’t answer him, then I made an effort to power on up the trail.  I ran 3:08 minutes, George was 3:12 and Chuck was 3:42.  

Within a year or so of our effort, the Park Service started actively discouraging groups from running across the Canyon but it has become quite a popular thing to do with the long distance crowd.  Our times stood as fastest known times for many years but with the advent of ultra-running and different running strategies, they have been lowered considerably in the past few years.  I believe the fastest known time is now something like 2:53 and there has even been a South to North and back to the South crossing (known as rim to rim to rim) done in 5:55.

FAVORITE TRAINING TIP?

Learn to take some easy days.  I did not learn this lesson until I was running as a master many years after college.  We always thought we had to go out and hammer when we were doing endurance work.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT?

Getting injured and having to stop training in the fall of 1971.  So many things went right in 1971 and so many things went wrong.  I had raced well at the National AAU meet (PR for 6 miles in 27:58) and was selected as an alternate for the Russian/American meet….I didn’t get to run but figured that I had this long track racing stuff figured out.  I was in Berkeley over the 4th of July for the meet and went home with a promise that I would be on the team to go to Europe for the second group around the first week of August.  A younger brother was involved in an accident at my dad’s service station and died on the 28th of July.  I never went to Europe and stopped training for about 6 weeks.  

When I started training again, I was running hard and piling up mileage.  Ran a couple of cross-country races in October but woke up one morning with a case of tendinitis.  That was about the end of my racing career.  It took some time to get past the tendinitis and, with everything else going on in my life,  I just stopped training and racing.  I interviewed and got a job teaching in one of the junior high schools in Mesa, Arizona.  

Didn’t start training again until I moved to Lake Tahoe and Tom Von Ruden talked me into training for some masters racing.  When I look back now and realize I had just turned 27 in July of 1971, I feel I never raced or trained during what should have been the best years of my running career (late 20s and early 30s).

WHAT WOULD YOU DO DIFFERENTLY? 

I believe my favorite training tip encompasses what I would do differently.  I would not spend every training session trying for a new PR, or spend every week being certain I got over 100 miles.  We were pioneers on the distance scene.  There had been some success with Bob Schul, Billy Mills, Lindgren and, of course, Jim Ryun but it wasn’t until 1966 and on that the greater numbers started to train….we were all learning together and experimenting.  Coaches were just starting to learn about distance running training.

FAVORITE PHILOSOPHER?

The writer and novelist Kurt Vonnegut.  A man who spent time as a prisoner of war and witnessed the destruction of Dresden.  He has written many novels with a comedic approach but if you search behind the comedy you will find a brilliant essayist who taught a humanistic approach to the excesses of mankind.

FAVORITE COMEDIAN? 

I had the pleasure (actually sheer terror) of dealing blackjack to Robin Williams early in his career.  This was during the time he was establishing himself as a brilliant comedian with the television series “Mork and Mindy.”  As a stand-up comedian, I loved most of the routines that George Carlin performed….he was amazing. 

PERSONAL RECORDS?

I don’t have all of my training diaries….only kept 1968 and 1969….have a habit of cleaning house and throwing stuff out to my regret at some later time.  I did that when I got out of the army….had kept a diary for three years and burned it a couple of days after getting home from my tour.  Weird huh?

PR’s400……training 52.5 with a running start

800…..157.5 relay leg after running a open 6 mile earlier in a relay meet.

Mile….4:10.0 (Several times between 4:10 and 4:10.5) in my defense, I was always doubling when I ran the mile.  We raced far too many races and I was always saving for a two-mile while trying to secure team points in the mile.  Don’t think I ever ran a mile when I didn’t have to come back on a double.

2-mile…..8:46.5  1969

3-mile….13:30.0  1969

5,000….13:54 (?)..1970

6-mile….27:58   1971

Half Marathon…..64:45  1970

Marathon…..2:24:17 (Fiesta Bowl) although I ran a 2:26:45 at the Tucson Marathon on a course that was re-measured to be exactly a mile too long.  There was a construction project on one of the roads leading to the finish, so they just routed around it by going to another exit……didn’t move the start or finish.  I felt that would have been close to a 2:20——2:21 effort.

50K…..back-country trails in Northern California….3:14:20….as a Masters runner.

Here’s that George Young article mentioned earlier.   George Young, I saw him run on the track in Eugene, talk about your OGoRs!  Just ask Pre.

https://www.si.com/vault/1969/01/27/559070/warmup-for-the-canyon-run

And here’s more testimony from Mr. Jobski.

November 14, 2017

One Comment On “Original Gangsters Of Running (Jerry Jobski)”

Thanks Jack,

Enjoyed the article, I like your writing style. Volume 1 Number 1, I’m honored.

Joking aside, it works. The links are nice…kind of fleshes everything out.

When I think back on my running exploits I remember something that Ken Kesey wrote in a book about rodeo and the original Pendleton Round Up in 1911. I’ll paraphrase here since I don’t have the book at my fingertips. The name of the book is Last Go Round.

Maybe you always think of yourself as what you were in that short
high noon of fame, not what you are during all of the rest of the long
twilight and dark.

Running memories are filled with the highs and lows but I never regretted
being a runner and trying to compete. My mind seldom wanders back to the time that I spent working in the casino at Tahoe even though that was 26 years of my life. Also, I seldom reflect on the ten years that I spent as a school teacher and coach.

However, I do remember running and races and splits and times and distances. I will always think of myself as a runner first and foremost.

Thanks again for including me in this project. I look forward to reading other submissions.

Jerry Jobski

Benji Durden

An onion can make people cry, but there has never been a vegetable

invented to make them laugh.– Will Rogers

What would you get if you crossed Zonker Harris with a Rubik’s Cube?

Benji Durden. Multiple sweatsuits in the humid Southern summer.  Always thinking. Running the race of his life to make the Olympic team that didn’t go to the Olympics.  Stayed home. Slipping in the volcanic ash of Mt. St. Helen’s.  Standing tall for professionalism. For the Original Gangsters of Running, wasn’t what you did, it was who you are.

How’d you get started?

I wanted to be a competitive athlete. I tried baseball, but the ball speeding by my head (this was before helmets) made me uncomfortable. I didn’t like getting hit when I tried football.  I was an okay swimmer, but the early morning practice in a cold pool wasn’t that much fun. Finally, I went out for track and selected the pole vault.  I moved to running when I saw a kid break his arm and collarbone when his pole snapped. So, in 1965, I became a runner.

Biggest influence?

Jim Ryun inspired me in Junior High to be a miler.  I wasn’t that good at it.After the 1972 Olympics, I began to think about road racing because of Frank Shorter’s performance, but I didn’t try a marathon ’til 1974. Bill Bowerman’s hard/easy approach to training was the basis for my training over the years.

Toughest opponent and why?

Bill Rodgers was the toughest opponent for most of us in the late 70s and early 80s.  He took no prisoners. [‘Benji was a feisty racer,’ remembers Rodgers.]

Most memorable run and why?

The Olympic Marathon Trials in 1980, 5/24/80, would have to be the most memorable, though there are many candidates.
I was not favored to be a Top-10 finisher with a 2:13:47 PR from the Nike OTC Marathon 9/9/79. I had run three more marathons before the Trials; the New York Marathon 10/21/79 (5th in 2:13:49), the Honolulu Marathon 12/9/79 where I dropped out around 25 kilometers, due to a bad achilles, and the Boston Marathon 4/21/80 (6th 2:17:46).

I had raced eighteen (18) weekends in a row including the weekend after Boston. The weekend before the Trials, I had run fourteen (14) 8-minute runs over two days at five-minute pace on a treadmill under Dr. E.C. “Ned” Frederick’s watchful eye for a Nike study to determine if a new air shoe would be better than phylon for racing flats.  Most of the Nike top American marathoners were tested, as we were getting ready for the Trials to help us decide which shoes to wear (I was the only one who chose the phylon).

 I knew I was fit from all of the racing, but I was just hoping for a Top-10 finish. In both of my 2:13 races I had gone out too fast and faded at the end.  Boston was hot and I was conservative.  For the Trials I decided to be cautious.  At the mile I was last with a 5:00 split.  The field of over two-hundred (200) runners was going for it. Over the next five miles I gradually moved through the field, keeping my pace at 5:00.

Just before we started across the Peace Bridge into Canada I edged into the back of the lead pack. Around 15K as we came off the bridge I began to have a slight cramping in my left hamstring, but forced myself to relax (chanting under my breath “you’re okay, you’re alright, you are doing fine”). The cramp finally went away and things were calm with pretty even pacing in the pack of about nine guys for the next 15 kilometers. About then I began to realize that almost everyone I was running with had a faster 10K PR than me. After a brief moment of thought I surged from the 5:00 pace we were running to 4:45.

I almost got away with it. Around 22 miles Tony Sandoval caught me. I tried to hang on, but he shortly dropped me. With about a kilometer to go I heard loud breathing and began to worry that another runner or more was closing on me. We made a turn for the last 600-800 meter stretch to the finish and I risked glancing over my shoulder to see who was behind me. I could see someone a long ways back.

I then realized the breathing I was hearing was me. I began to have tunnel vision as I red-lined to the finished 2nd in 2:10:41, a 3:06 PR. Easily a top moment in a running career.

Favorite training tip?

Listen to your body and allow for recovery after each hard workout.

Biggest disappointment?

Blistering badly at the Boston Marathon in 1983 and limping to the finish over the last ten kilometers.This also resulted in a plantar fascia tear and was the beginning of the end of my elite running. 

What would you do differently today?

Wear a different pair of shoes at the 1983 Boston Marathon.Why so many races in ‘79-80?  Why?  Why?  Why?I ran a lot of races every year when I was in my prime (I think around 35 was my high end). Most served as training and, in some cases, income since this was the time of appearance fees, not prize money. About four to six times each year I would rest for a race. Usually this was for a marathon, but there were some races, like the Cascade Runoff and Peachtree, that I backed off for. Usually, I just ran my normal routine and raced tired for the training benefit.

Career-wise, what would you do differently?

I don’t think  I would have changed much of what I did back then since it worked for me. There were races where I would have used a different tactic, but I enjoyed my overall approach to training and racing. In today’s racing climate with the emphasis more on prize money and sponsorship for income, I might have a different approach, but I’m not sure.

Favorite philosopher?

Will Rogers.

Favorite comedian?

George Carlin. 

Personal Bests

4:13.2 Mile track 
14:10.8 5,000 track BC Relays 1981
28:36 10K Peachtree 1981
43:28 15K Falcon Run 1981
48:08 10M Bobby Crim 1981
1:03:10 Half Marathon Savannah 1982
 1:16:17 25K Youngstown 1980
 2:09:57 Marathon Boston 1983

George Carlin routine.  Prepare to be enlightened.

https://www.jackdogwelch.com/?p=18357

Jacqueline Hansen

What keeps you going isn’t some fine destination but just the road you’re on, and the fact that you know how to drive. You keep your eyes open, you see this damned-to-hell world you got born into, and you ask yourself, ‘What life can I live that will let me breathe in & out and love somebody or something and not run off screaming into the woods? ― Barbara Kingsolver, Animal Dreams.

Like to kid Bill Rodgers about how I outran him at the 1973 Boston Marathon.  One of those I-Trained-All-Winter-In-The-Snow-Now-It’s-83-Degrees marathons.  BR was still learning and overcooked it early.  I didn’t outrun Jacqueline Hansen, who finished looking like a flower.  A winning water lily, sure, drenched through with several layers of sweat.  Green wreath on her head, just learning myself, I thought that must be one tough lady.

Don’t kid JQ about how I outran her at the ’76 Avenue of The Giants.  I was setting a personal record and she was right there in front of me.  Right there.  Was wondering how I could possibly beat her when she darted off into the redwoods with a look of – lady-like, of course – ‘Oh, shit!’

True story.  Women didn’t always run long and females never ran on the road.  Just the way it was.

Remember thinking, this must’ve been 1974, if I was female, I’d be the thirteenth (13th) fastest woman in the world.

Jacqueline Hansen changed the way it was.

“There had always been a voice inside me wondering,” she has said, “how far I could run without stopping.”

Not saying Jacqueline Hansen is Wonder Woman.  But no one has ever seen the two together in the same room.

Why did you start running?  Running marathons?

When I was in high school, I loved sports as much as I loved reading books.  But I was terrible at sports, at least all the traditional sports. But when a Physical Education teacher offered the opportunity to run track, I leaped at the chance and discovered I loved to run.  We were limited in competition to 440-yards.  But it instilled a love of running in me.  I graduated to the 800-meter (or 880 yards) and eventually the mile.  A chance encounter with another woman runner (Judy Graham) brought me into her track club under her coach, the famous Hungarian Olympian Laszlo Tabori, the third man in the world to break the 4-minute barrier in the mile.

I was trained for the mile.

But I also had a teammate named Cheryl Bridges.  I watched Cheryl run a marathon, setting a world record, and the first sub-2:50 for women.  I took that as inspiration and ran my first marathon the following year on the same course.  Boston was my second marathon and launched a career.

I found my event.

Toughest opponent and why?

Christa Vahlensieck of West Germany.  She was always a formidable and yet friendly “rival” throughout my career.  We respected each other and we shared some historic milestones together.  She was a fierce competitor, and I’m not sure I ever won a head-to-head competition against her.  I did get to the first sub-2:40 marathon mark before Christa and I broke her world record.  Nonetheless, she eventually beat my mark, and I never did run faster.

Chantal Langlace of France, Christa and I shared marathon world records back and forth in the mid-1970s.  In 1974, when I PR’d at the first Women’s International Marathon in West Germany, I came in first American, but Christa was ahead of me. When I convinced the race committee of the historical Sao Silvestre New Year’s midnight run in Sao Paulo, Brazil, to host a women’s division for the first time in 1975, I helped build the women’s field by suggesting an invitation for Christa.  She came in first and I came in second.

The “Hour Run” was a favorite race of mine; and once I had the best American mark for women, but Christa broke through the 10-mile barrier, so I ran the race again (back-to-back weekends) and broke 10-miles, too . . . . but hers was yards farther than mine.  When I dropped out of the New York City Marathon, wearing bib #2, because my foot had a stress fracture which broke through on the bridge approaching Central Park . . . to my surprise, Christa was right there with me, dropping out with her own foot injury (and wearing #1).

Together, we sat at the finish line watching Grete winning her first-ever marathon while breaking Christa’s World Record.  I consoled her.

We were competitors, but first and foremost, we were friends who respected each other.
We certainly brought out the best in each other.

Biggest disappointment?

Dropping out of the NYC Marathon.  Why did I think running the 50-miler in the prior month was a good idea?  Why would I not think it would be a detriment to my training for the marathon?  Why did I think I was Wonder Woman?

A wise observer once said that “much of your greatness is based on your stubbornness.”     [That was me!  I said that. – JDW]

The day I asked Laszlo for permission to run my first marathon – yes, one had to have permission – he responded with, “You are the most stubborn runner I know. . . I think you’ll go far.”

Personally, I prefer “determined.”  Determined.

It’s true although –when I want something bad enough, it’s worth pursuing and I don’t quit.  Normally.  So, I suppose I thought it was possible to run a 50-miler and a marathon in consecutive months.  I certainly trained towards those goals.  It was pretty disappointing for me personally to hit the wall at mile 35 in the fifty, and even though I gained eleven (11) world records en route, and was the first female finisher, I did not get the 50-Mile WR because of slowing . . . but I finished with determination.

In hindsight, only now do I see that I did not allow enough recovery between the 50-Miler and NYC Marathon.  I gambled.  I lost.  I have said in my defense, if you’re going to chase records, you’ve got to be willing to push the limits a little bit.  I pushed the window.  NYC did not work out.

Most memorable run and why?

I would say that breaking 2:40 for a WR at the OTC Marathon in 1975 in Eugene was most memorable, for the obvious reasons but also because it was a rare “peak performance” with all the hallmarks from “sports psychology” before that was even a term.  The race was effortless and euphoric.  It was extremely evenly paced, at 6:02 per mile average, with the slowest at 6:08 and last 10K at 5:55 with negative splits.  It was at once a sense of no time passing, and yet a sense of being keenly aware of every mile mark, every water bottle taken, and every split time.

[Look at photos of that OTC race.  She is smiling – broadly – most of the last 10K. – JDW]

I honestly felt at crossing the finish line I could do it again on the spot.

It was the most incredible feeling of a perfect performance I would ever experience. 

Favorite training tip?

Consistency is the only key to success.  Trust your training, trust that the long slow endurance workouts combined with the faster speed workout days will all come together on race day. And don’t underestimate the need for rest days.  It’s all a balancing act, be consistent and trust the training.

What would you do differently today?

In hindsight, I now know the importance of balancing, finding consistency in training, and taking the rest days as seriously as the workout days.  Perhaps I would add a dash of cross-training in the mix.Favorite philosopher? Author and poet Barbara Kingsolver.Favorite comedian?John Cleese, of Monty Python.

PRs

Never quite sure about my mile/1500m time but I believe 4:48 mile / 4:28 1500m

Remember, I was a mediocre miler, but I did OK in my “age groups” — first significant title was an AIAW Collegiate National Title and my last competitive title was World Masters 1500m & 5,000m Champion.

Others which are a matter of record:

Marathon  –  2:38.19 WR (twice set WR mark)

15K  –  52:15

World best 6 mile  –  34:24 (on the track…..maybe they did not know where the 10K mark was??)

5K  – 15:40

Hour Run – 10 miles, 243 yards (AR)

50 Mile (track)  –  7:14:58 (including 11 WRs)

Eleven WRs?  Oh, there were 11 separate records set on one race en route to 50 miles. If you have my book, they’re in the appendix. It was on the track, so they’re official (i.e.,  every 5K).

I have her book.  Just holding it in your hands will make you a better person.

Got to thinking about the book’s message.  The woman is a pioneer and a freedom fighter.

Asked her a softball question, certain to get an answer the world can likely use.

What would you tell a girl today if she was thinking about setting fifteen (15) world records as a runner?

The short answer is:  Be willing to step out of your comfort zone.The longer answer involves making sacrifices, be dedicated and committed to training; don’t second guess your coach; buy into the program and hold up your share of responsibility: make decisions which contribute to – and don’t take away from – your training and racing.

Do what you’re told, do what you promise, and get comfortable with being uncomfortable.

All you got to do then is deliver.  On the day.Jacqueline Hansen delivered.

Here’s my actual notes from Jack D. Welch’s 1976 running diary.  No longer the 13th fastest woman in the world.

May 2.  Sunday.  (163/40)  0900.  63 Degrees.  AVENUE OF THE GIANTS MARATHON.  Finished 45th of 431 starters (408 finishers) in 2:49:23 (6:27.9 pace)  1st mile (uphill) – 6:17.5; 10 mi. 1:03:20 (6;20 pace); 20 mi. 2:07:30 (6:22.5 pace) PR.

Did not feel good for virtually the entire race.  Think I finally reached the point where my performance grossly [underlined] suffered from a lack of speedwork – couldn’t sustain a fast pace.

At 24 miles, had to head into the trees for a defecation, lost about a minute and 6-10 places.

I don’t mind losing the time, but I was really moving thru these guys when I had to pull over. This is another PR.

I distinctly remember complaining to Chuck Smead about the hill at the finish.“What hill?,” he said.

No mention whatsoever that Jackie Hansen, former WR holder and Boston winner, finished a couple minutes behind me.

Guessing she lost about a minute and six to ten places.

However, first woman again.  First woman.

Jacqueline Hansen spent most of her 70th birthday chatting with me about back in the day.  About being an OGoR.You kids should be tattooing her face on your calves.

Very generous with her time.  Anyway, after sincere goodbyes – she has to prepare to blow out many, many candles – something dawns on me.

The next day.  My wife suddenly appears.  A small woman, fiercely stubborn and stubbornly determined when she puts her mind to it, disappears immediately, just passing through.  But I saw a look on her face – reminded me of something I understand about the woman I live with – caused me to ask Jacqueline Hansen one final question.

You are, I asked, trying to be delicate, what Democrats would call ‘vertically-challenged’ and Republicans would call ‘fun-sized’, I don’t know, is ‘short”okay, my wife prefers ‘petite’ or better yet, just forget about it…

Hi,

Just now, I need to take the cat to the vet, so will give this more thought later.I will admit that in high school I was never chosen for team sports and wasn’t very good at them anyway.I dreaded PE.

Perhaps I just needed to find my sport, and an individual sport suited me.

Joe Henderson

Your toughness is made up of equal parts, persistence and experience. 

You don’t so much outrun your opponents as outlast and outsmart them

and the toughest opponent of all is the one inside your head. – Joe Henderson

When I asked Joe Henderson to be in the first handful of Original Gangsters Of Running, he said, “Happy and honored to be included. I’ll certainly “qualify” as the slowest and least decorated of these OGoR’s.”

I told him, “Your How They Train was inspirational and seminal.  Green & white.  Bob Deines.”

He said I was wrong.  “That would be Road Racers and Their Training.  Fred Wilt wrote How They Train in 1958, and it was my first big inspiration — as a runner first, but with a more lasting influence as a writer.  Wilt recommended keeping a running log, which I did immediately and which evolved into a writing journal that continues today.My first book was Long Slow Distance. Bob Deines was part of that one, as well as Road Racers & Their Training.

Of course, sure, that’s the book I meant.  Just because I forget your name, doesn’t mean you didn’t change my life.I looked up Joe’s first book on Amazon and saw a One Star review.

katdunn1.0 out of 5 starsHilarious

April 16, 2017Format: Kindle EditionThis book really shows its age. Written before the running boom, when a 2:50 marathon was a pedestrian amateur pace, a 3:44 marathon isn’t considered even running and you were dripping with fat if you weighed 180 at 6 feet tall. Oh, also, run 120 mile weeks and 35 mile long training runs for marathon prep. No mention of women either. Not really relevant any more, for better or worse. I say for the better.

That is the actual real true review, you can look it up yourself.  “Written before the running boom” should be a clue.  “No mention of women.” Yeah, ’cause there were none, lady.  And I’ll tell you why – Joe Henderson wrote the stories that we lit the match to.Somebody had to provide the powder to go boom.Just love how the reviewer doesn’t even recognize a seminal work about a sport that once preached excellence.  Hilarious.  Don’t get me started.  There was actually a controversy about whether eight minute per mile pace could be called ‘running.’  Jogging, maybe, most of us thought.  Especially anybody running thirty-five minute 10Ks in training.  I kept a running journal.  I was six-foot, three and felt bloated at one-seventy.  I maxed out at 117 miles in a week but it was at high altitude.  Busted my ass to break 2:50.  That’s what it means to be an OG.I reminded Joe, you bought my first piece of running writing.

You’ll have to refresh your readers on when-where-what this was, Joe said.  “I’m sure you weren’t paid what you deserved. I’ll belatedly and partly make up for that by buying you a meal sometime.”

So, it’s a date, I told him.

I still have the letter around here someplace.  Joe said it was the best thing he’d seen in a long time and had made a bad day much better.  Or words to the affect.  Effect.  Whatever.  Think we got $75, which I had to split with Dr. E.C. “Ned” Frederick, who basically did all the work.  Only seemed right.Told Joe, yours was the first name I thought of when we – Ned Frederick again – sold Running to Nike.

The history of your magazine is a story in itself, maybe a series. It’s for you to tell.

That’s what Joe Henderson said.  Wish I knew what happened.

That’s when it dawned on me, Joe Henderson and I, we have never run together.  We should go for a walk some day soon, I told him..

Here’s a typical response from a modest guy.  “I couldn’t have kept up with you in your glory years.  It’s all walking for me now, and I doubt my short legs could match your long strides.”

More modesty.

“My first timed mile came in May 1954, a week after Roger Bannister first broke 4:00. At half his age and size, and none of his training, I hoped to run twice his time — that is, sub-eight-minute mile. The time was 7:23, and it was another four years before I forgot how bad that felt, and raced my first official mile. It was a DNF, followed a week later by the first official finish — a 5:25. Improvement eventually stalled out, in 1964, at 4:18.”

The guy ran a 4:18 mile.  I couldn’t do that if I fell from a 5280-foot-high building.

Seems like Joe had told me about walking a marathon a few years back.  “I never purely walked a marathon, but the last two (and note here that the word is “last,” not “latest”; I doubt there will be another try) were mostly walked.  The first was Yakima River Canyon, the second in Newport, Oregon, at ages 70 and 71.  Both allowed early starts for the slow.  Both took between six and seven hours to finish.

“My longest walk-only event came this year, a half-marathon on my 75th birthday weekend.  Why walk, not run?  That’s a long story that has little to do with leg failure from long-term wear and tear. I’ll explain only if you ask specific questions about that.”

I told Joe the truth about myself.  Which I like to keep secret.    I stopped running for a decade.  Lifted weights, gained weight, blew out my guts & tweaked my back.  Lost fifty-five pounds.  Decided to renew my running, which you know I truly love.

Couldn’t do it.  Tried everything.  Hoka shoes.  Elliptigo.  Nothing worked.

The pain was too great.  Turns out I really am completely arthritic, and every stride was a hammer hit to my skeleton.

I became a walker because I realized walking was as fast as I could run. When did you know it was time to stop?

Joe said, “I never made an abrupt switch.  This happened gradually since the turn of the century (no, not the 1899 to 1900!).  First came walk breaks added to what were still mainly runs.  Then the walking amounts gradually increased until… five years ago it became mainly walking with short run breaks.  This year, I’ve almost entirely walked because I had little choice.“A medical condition supposedly unrelated to running made each running step intolerable.  It was a urinary blockage that finally required surgery.  Through it all, the walks were sanity-savers. They allowed normal mileage, just slower — but not dramatically so.  Running had slowed a lot and walking had sped up a bit over the years, until the paces were closing in on each other.”

How did you feel about it?“I’ve long since made my peace with this.  ‘Walk’ hasn’t been a four-letter word for a long time.  To use a modern buzzword, walking is sustainable in ways that running the old way would not have been.  I couldn’t have run more than a few steps in this year’s half-marathon, or more than 10 percent of the last marathon.It was right about here where I told Joe, Forgive me in advance if I ask you a question, which might seem, umm, stupid or stupid.  I have forgotten more than I ever knew.

Joe said, there are no stupid questions, only dumb answers. And the latter are mine to give.

“You didn’t ask about my first and fastest marathon.  Both came the same day, at Boston 1967, with the 2:49:48 that I never bettered.”

He offered to answer more questions, so I asked. Can training with a dog make you faster?

Our last dog was a Greyhound named Buzz.  This born sprinter never challenged me to a race but was content to WALK alongside me until he got bored with my pace and signaled he wanted to stop.  A slow mile was his limit.

Toughest opponent and why?

Myself, always.  I learned early that no one could beat me but ME.  A little voice inside always pleaded or demanded slower, shorter, stop, don’t start.

Most memorable run and why?

Let’s limit this to races.  My favorite memory from more than 700 of those is Boston 1967.  It was my first and would forever remain my fastest, more than a half-hour better than my training should have allowed.  This planned “one-and-done” led to a career in writing about road racing.

Favorite training tip?

Jack Foster (who ran a 2:11 marathon at 41): “I don’t think of running as ‘training.’  I just go out and run each day, and let the racing take care of itself.  It has to be a pleasure to go for a run, looked forward to while I’m at work.  Otherwise, no dice.”

Biggest disappointment?  Why?

Not being much of a team player in college. I rebelled against the coach’s training methods, and doing so separated myself from my teammates who could have been my best friends during those years and beyond.

What would you do differently today?

Little, if anything.  I’ve been blessed to go so many places in this sport and to do so many things, for so long.Favorite philosopher?  Why?

For runners, George Sheehan.  No contest.Do you have a particular Dr. Sheehan quote?

A favorite, among many: “For every runner who tours the world running marathons, there are thousands who run to hear the leaves and listen to the rain, and look to the day when it all is suddenly as easy as a bird in flight. For them this sport is not a test but a therapy, not a trial but a reward, not a question but an answer.”Any songs from your early running days?

I’d say Johnny Cash’s “I Walk the Line.” Though I was dozens of years from accepting walking as acceptable, the words rang true then and still do: “I keep a close watch on this heart of mine/I keep my eyes wide open all the time…”Favorite comedian?

In running, Don Kardong.  His writings consistently brought humor into a sport that often takes itself too seriously.  I miss reading him.Why don’t more Americans run better times today?

I don’t know. I was never a speedster, didn’t write for them and now don’t coach them.

My first editorial in a running magazine read: “Instead of 10,000 people sitting watching one runner break four minutes in the mile, I’d rather have 10,000 running eight-minute miles with no one watching.” Today, a single 8:00 mile is the stuff of dreams for me.

He’s like a guru really.  Which he will completely deny.https://www.jackdogwelch.com/?p=18733

Trevor Holliday 5.0 out of 5 starsLong Slow Distance is Smart Training!

September 26, 2012Format: Kindle Edition Verified PurchaseThis book is an early example of Joe Henderson’s natural, modest writing style. For over twenty years, I have been inspired by this advocate of long, easy runs. “Nature,” he writes, “in all her wisdom, has provided us distance runners with a means to compensate for the speed she denied us. That is endurance.”Henderson’s endurance as a writer, I believe, is equally impressive.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nqTQuSx7hbE

Is Ken Martin Too Young To Be An OGOR?

Original Gangster Of Running: a title awarded more for who you are than when you were running big time. 

But thinking 1966-1976 for our purposes here.

Think about it.  A walk-on runs a sub-four minute mile AND a sub-two-ten marathon.  An American, more than a few decades ago.

That’s some pioneer stuff right there.  Hadn’t seen Ken Martin for many, many years, many years.  Then maybe four years ago, he was winning some well-deserved award and I was there taking notes.  Beers may have been involved.

Big fan of Dick Harter and The Kamikaze Kids.  Running was the next sport after basketball.  Ninety-eight (98) pounds going into high school.

He’s from Coquille, Oregon.  Which is near Bandon.  Near Coos Bay.  Never ran all year round.  Only twenty (20) miles per week in those high school days.

His distance coach was a high jumper.  Never won a state championship at Coquille.  Near Bandon.  Near Coos Bay.  You’ve probably heard of Coos Bay.  He liked Eugene, the big city.  He shopped there, it’s different… hippies.  Met some kids at basketball camp.

Doesn’t think he ever went to a track meet at Historic Hayward Field.  May she rest in peace.

Al Tarpenning – interesting man – recruited Ken to Lane Community College. The Titans of LCC kicked some ass in the Seventies.

He didn’t know you can walk-on to the team at the University of Oregon.  As it was then known.

“A couple of weeks before going to Eugene as a frosh,” Ken recalls, “I started doing three five-mile runs daily.  Five miles, three times.  For a week or two.”

You can almost see the memory wash across his face.  “I mean, I had no idea.”

He made up his own workouts, stupid stuff.  16 x 200.  Next day 16 x 400.  On asphalt.  This from a guy who had once thought running twenty miles weekly was some serious training.

“My first year at Lane, I beat the Duck’s fifth runner,” Ken says.  “Think it was Art Boileau.”  Seen above chasing.

At the same time, South Eugene High School was a force.  “At Lane, we were basically doing the South Eugene High School training.”

“I could just barely hang on to their top guys,” he admits.  “Which impressed [Coach] Dellinger.”

Spent 78-79 at the U asking himself, where is it going to be the best for me as a runner?  Consider – 2:13 marathoners were a dime a dozen.  They were painting houses.  There was a couple-year plan for some guys.  A few made it.

Finished getting Ducked in 1980, that fall went to Athletics West, Nike’s local company team.

Nike was blossoming.  Got his first pair of Nikes from Geoff Hollister.  Track spikes, white with tan swoosh.

Eugene was the nirvana of the running world as far as Ken Martin is concerned.   “A magical time to be there,” Ken remembers.  “So many greats came through town.”

He left town.  Most everybody does.  “I wanted to get out of the rain.”

Toughest opponent and why?

1. Henry Marsh, although I’d be more inclined to use smartest rather than toughest.  Being a few years older than most of us at the time, Henry would let the more aggressive younger steeplechasers push the pace until he’d pick us off as we tired.  He was a very good hurdler and sprinter, regularly running down the leaders over the last 200 meters.

2. A chronic leg problem that limited my training.  I tried many different types of treatment to try and solve an issue that would develop in my right calf after races or after higher volumes of speed work, if done in spikes.  However, wearing racing flats kept the problem to a minimum, which influenced me to race more on the roads. Years after retiring from competitive running, I had an x-ray done and on it we noticed a bone problem at the head of my femur. We determined this was probably what was causing the calf problem by preventing my leg from properly rotating enough inward.

Most memorable run and why?

Junior year (1975) high school state track meet, 880.  Until then I was just another guy who had qualified from one of the district meets, nothing outstanding, no ‘big meet’ (invitationals) performances, more interested in basketball really.  If I remember correctly, I ran a PR [personal record] to win my semi-final and felt easy doing it.  

I then realized I was as good as some of the other guys from around the state whose names and times I’d been seeing in the newspaper’s box scores.  In the final I was last at the bell but came in second behind a guy going to Oregon, which was another PR for me (1:57.7) and about a 5 or 6 second improvement from before state.  After that race, I was a runner.

Favorite training tip and why?

Jack Daniels explaining to me how and why to do tempo runs.  I think those were responsible for my large improvement in the 10k and my marathon successes.

Maybe I would’ve tried those tempo runs if I knew how?

If I remember correctly, Jack said that at least 20 minutes at my 4mmol-lactate threshold pace would improve my ability to clear lactate, eventually allowing me to run at a faster pace  before reaching that threshold – I would then run faster before significantly fatiguing.  

After doing tempos for about 18 months I – relatively suddenly (~ six weeks) – started running them a lot faster (from low 5:00 mile pace to mid-4:40 pace).  At that time there wasn’t information about tempo runs longer than 20 minutes, so I always stopped after 20 minutes, except one time I did two 20-minute tempos, separated by two minutes. That session was in Albuquerque [5355 ft. elevation.] before my marathon PR at NYC (1989)

You lost me at millimoles.  Biggest disappointment?

Doping’s influence on sports.  Sadly, I no longer view track and field with the same passion that I used to.

What would you do differently today?  I mean, besides the Afro.

Be more patient.  I’d back off on the frequency and on some of the intensity I used to do.  I’d try adding more volume (if my calf would allow) at slightly lower intensities and on fewer days per week (2 rather than 3 high-intensity days/week).  I’d slow down on my easy days.  Plus, I’d add more agility and strengthening drills – the further away I got from basketball or steeplechase drills, the weaker I think my body became, which I think over-stresses the major running muscles.

Tell me about your sub-4, please, & your sub-2:10.  Any special manly self-confidence come from that range?

For me, my sub-4 minute mile was flat out speed the whole way. When it came down to last 100m sprint, I tied up, having no extra gear.  I lost over 2 seconds on the winner and finished 5th.  I was thrilled to break 4 but concerned that I couldn’t kick, knowing how important that was for winning races.  Go figure, I’m a sub-4 minute miler with no sprint.  Doesn’t seem to make sense, but I attribute it to, at that time, my lack of understanding effective speed training. Running sub-2:10 in the marathon was hard at the end, but not as bad as hitting the wall, which I had done once before while on 2:08 pace.  I felt great on 2:08 pace at ~ 20 miles in Chicago in 1985, then suddenly started breathing really hard and slowed nearly 1 minute per mile.  In NYC in 1989, we went out just as fast (~ 1:03:40) as 1985 Chicago (except for Steve Jones who was minutes ahead of the pack).   

However, in NYC I got fatigued but was able to hang on.  I was tired but didn’t hit the wall, which I think is different.  I did lose ~ 30 seconds on the mile entering Central Park, but I still had a kick left to hold off Bordin who was catching me near the finish line.  [Italian Gelindo Bordin is the only male to win both the Boston Marathon and an Olympic gold medal in the marathon. – ed.] 

I remember talking to an agent before that race who asked me what time I was expecting to run.  I said “sub-2:10”, then he laughed at me.  After the race, in his presence, his girlfriend was the first to effusively congratulate me!  That still feels good! It sounds good that there are only 20 of us who have done both sub-4 and sub-2:10, but that’s not counting the 1500m conversions, and there would be a lot of those.  Still, more people have climbed Mt. Everest than broken 4:00 for the mile.  Add a sub-2:10 marathon to that and, well, I’m not sure what to compare that too.  It sounds cool, so I’ll simply go with that. Accomplishing those two things doesn’t really hit me until I go watch a race and realize that some guy who looks to be running fast would be behind me.  I think the sub-1:50 800, sub-2:10 marathon crowd is more impressive. There are probably only a few of those guys. 

How did running prepare you for life’s hurdles. e.g., cancer? 

My first thoughts about this are fairly basic and go toward the discipline that training develops, plus the patience needed to see a plan through.  There were times when I trained alone, for weeks, in countries where I didn’t know the language.  I had to contend with boredom, locate resources (track, trails, transportation, physiotherapists, grocery, etc.), and simply take each day as it came.   

This is not unlike the extended time I spent on the hospital’s isolation ward during my stem cell transplantation.  There, I was often bored and had to organize myself, including training, in an unfamiliar setting.  I remember thinking, this is kind of like that time I was training in such and such place – develop a routine, find out what is available that I like to eat, find out what resources are available to me, get on a consistent sleep/wake schedule, find things to do in my free time, interact with the ‘locals’, and take precautions not to get sick.  The hospital’s isolation ward became another training environment where I fell back into a familiar disciplined routine, but for sure with different outcomes and expectations.  

I believe that cancer first showed signs in me as far back as the summer of 1991, which would mean that I set two personal best, 28:11 track 10k (September 1991, Memorial van Damme) and 13:34 track 5k (Prefontaine Memorial win in 1992) with cancer. However, my career at that point had become unpredictable, with periods of good training and progression interrupted by unexplained periods of poor performances that I couldn’t seem to rest my way out of. After tiring of the frustrating, unpredictable ups and downs, I ‘retired’ from competition in the fall of 1994.

Favorite philosopher?

Hmmm, I don’t read typical philosophy, I’m still trying to sort out my college ‘Free will and determinism’ class!Jesus of Nazareth; and, Proverbs writers, particularly King David.  Some Proverbs are applicable to internet trolls:  “Whoever corrects a mocker invites insult; whoever rebukes a wicked man incurs abuse.” Proverbs 9:7 (New International Version). 

(This in the middle of the night from Ken: I just woke up thinking, Hey, Solomon, King David’s son, wrote most of the Proverbs, not King David! Went to check, yep.  Oh my, some folks will have fun with that gaffe.
Must have been the recent sermon we had on David and Bathsheba that stuck in my head. Ought to use some of the Proverbial wisdom and proof read better and check sources!  Back to bed.

Favorite comedian?

I liked the quirky stuff Steven Wright and Gary Larson did.  I also have a friend who is a comedian and I used to attend a lot of his shows.  It was interesting seeing him work – writing, fine tuning jokes at open mic nights, switching up sets, using call-backs, etc.  I now appreciate the writers we never see but who write the good line(s) in a monologue, sketch, or show.  Today, I miss the Key & Peele show.  

Favorite song of the era?

Nothing immediately comes to mind.  I grew up cash poor in rural Oregon, which means I mostly heard AM top 40 pop.  I just remember some quote about track being a symphony while road racing was rock and roll.  

Not sure what ultra’s would be.

Ken Martin (9/10/58)

High School:

880 1:57.7 1975

mile 4:19.4 1976

2 mile 10:06 1976

College:

steeplechase 8:20.9 1980

5,000 13:37.1 1980

10,000 29:42 1978

Post-collegiate:

1500 3:42.2 1983

mile 3:57.86 1981

steeplechase 8:20.4 1984

10,000 28:11 1991

marathon 2:09:36 1989

Two time U.S. World Cross Country Team member1980 & 1992, Team silver medal 1980 in Paris, France (3rd US team runner placing 21st).

Two time Pittsburgh Marathon winner, 1985 & 1989

Two time Bobby Crim 10 miler winner, 1985 & 1989

Two-time USA Marathon Champion, 1984 & 1985 (Sacramento Marathon & Pittsburgh Marathon).

The Consistent OGOR (Mark Covert)

Success isn’t always about ‘greatness.’ It’s about consistency.

Consistent hard work gains success. Greatness will come. – Dwayne Johnson

Last year I took the day off. I purposely skipped a workout last January 2nd. Purposely missed a day right off the starting line, so I don’t spend the rest of the year maintaining a streak I know will not be in my own best interest. Sometimes you need a break.

Mark Covert didn’t take a day off for 16,436 consecutive days or 149,651 miles. (Not a misprint.)

YLet me say that again. Mark Covert didn’t take a day off for 16,436 consecutive days or 149,651 miles. (Not a misprint.)

I am streaking myself, going on two months now. This year I am not going to skip a day on purpose.

One thing I know every runner knows about Mark Covert. Okay, two things. He’s the determined type and he is inspiring.

Just thinking about it inspired me. True.

The man told this to John Ortega in the L.A, Times. Sept. 1991.  His streak had twenty-two (22) years or so yet to go.

“I just don’t get a lot of enjoyment from running 34 or 35 minutes for 10,000 meters,” Covert said. “If I could do speed work on a consistent basis, and run what I consider to be competitive times on the roads, I’d race more often. But every time I’ve tried to run speed for any period of time in the last couple of years I’ve broken down. I have a lot of problems with my feet.”

Covert, 40, was a national-class distance runner in the early 1970s, winning the NCAA Division II cross-country title for Cal State-Fullerton in 1970 and finishing sixth in the marathon in the 1972 Olympic Trials. He is in excellent physical condition for his age but he has raced seldom in the past four or five years.

Covert is also tired of being compared to the runner he once was, Ortega wrote.

“I ran (less than 33 minutes for a 10k) a couple of years ago and a woman came up to me after the race and said, ‘Didn’t you used to be Mark Covert?’ ” Covert said. “A lot of people just don’t understand that you get old. I have a family and a full-time job.

“I’ve run over 100,000 miles during my career. After you go that far in a car, you trade it in.”

Something else you might know or not, cool enough to be repeated. Mark Covert is the first runner to cross a finish line wearing a pair of Nike shoes.

Five runners wearing the Moon Shoe started the 1972 marathon trials. Of them, only Covert finished.

Mark got his shoes from the hands of Geoff Hollister who was Pre’s friend and I am suddenly thinking Six Degrees of Mark Covert.

Toughest opponent and why?

Rick Hitchcock, Bakersfield College. Rick and I were the top two runners in Cross-County and Track in the California Community Colleges for the school years of 68-69 & 69-70. During those two years Rick or I won every race but one that we were both entered in. We both won a state XC championship and a two-mile championship.

Rick beat me a lot more then I beat him, but there were only a couple of runaway races. Almost all the races were close at the final 400 or so. Over the two years, we would race 15 times with Rick winning a large majority of the races. But we split the championships at the end of each season.

Rick would go on to Kansas State where he would run the 1320 leg of the Distance Medley relay when Kansas would break the world record. We would only race a couple times after that, splitting our two races at the NCAA Div 1 XC meet.

Most memorable run and why?

By far the Yosemite Valley to Tuolumne Meadows run. When I got to Cal State Fullerton our summer training camp was in Yosemite Valley.

I think the first time we ran this was in 1973. Our run would start at the camp site and head out past Mirror Lake heading towards the Snow Creek trail. Once we got to that trail, the run would start for real. You make a sharp right turn onto the first switchback of over 100 [switchbacks]. In the next 2.6 miles you will climb 2700 feet to a foot bridge and then start another set of switchbacks that take you above treeline heading towards Olmsted Point that has an elevation of 8300 feet.

For the first time in the run you are back on the street headed towards Tuolumne Meadows. One more climb and then you drop down to the Meadows about 9 or 10 miles on the street.

Twenty-Three (23) miles, 5000+ feet of climbing. The first time I ran it, it took me 2 hr 53 min. Doug Schmink and Dave White were not far behind.

Awhile later, we were waiting for the others to finish, and for our ride back when a ranger came up to me and asked where we had run from. I told him the Valley floor. He asked how many days it had taken us. When I told him that it took us less than three hours, he said the fastest he had ever heard anyone had done previously was two days.

Everyone that took the run that year still talks about the run and how tough it was. It is something we will never forget.

What would you do differently if you could do it again? Why?

I would have done all my long runs with White and Schmink. They did those 20-22+ mile runs every week and I only ran them once in awhile. I didn’t like to go much more then 16-18 and I ran them hard. I could recover quickly from them and get onto the next workout. When I did the long runs, I would have to take some easy days to recover and I didn’t like to do that. For me the wheels would always come off between 18-21 miles, due to the lack of those long runs. I didn’t figure that out for a long time.

Favorite philosopher?

Laszlo Tabori. I say this as he would have a big influence on how I would coach for over 40 years. The things he taught me about hard work and what we can do in training, left a mark on me and would influence me in many parts of my day to day life.

Favorite Comedian?

George Carlin and Jerry Seinfeld

PRs

800 1:56

Mile 4:09

2 Mile 8:55

3 Mile 13:41

6 Mile 28:08

10 Mile 48:07

Half-marathon 1:04.26

Marathon 2:21:35

Major wins

California Community College State XC Championship 1968 – 2- mile Championship 1970

NCAA DIV 2 Cross-Country Champion 1970

Mark gave me the answer to a question I didn’t ask him. But now I am going to ask everybody. What was your best stretch of running?

“Maybe my best stretch of running was in the fall of 1970 when I won the Division II Cross-Country meet. A week later, I was 16th at the Division I meet and five days later was 13th at the AAU meet, running for the Pacific Coast Club. PCC would beat FL Track Club by 3 points. I was the 3rd man on the team.”

Savvy follow-up. Why did that happen then, do you think?

“Not really sure but there were a couple reasons I think.   First I was healthy for almost six months but for a week when I had a small hip problem.  Next having been a part of the Olympic training camp in Pullman, Washington, that summer really did a lot for me mentally. Being around so many of the guys I had seen in Track &Field News for so many years and training with them made me believe it was only a matter of time before I could become part of that group.  Last, I had a couple of really flat weeks leading into our conference meet which I lost. I knew that I was ready for a upswing in my running and I hit it just right.”

Mark Covert didn’t take a day off for 16,436 consecutive days or 149,651 miles. I find that inspiring. Truly do.

But that streak is not what makes him an Original Gangster Of Running. What makes Mark Covert an OGOR, he was tough in the woods, he was tough on the roads. Consistently.

Original Gangsters Of Running (Bill Rodgers)

I ran my first road race in Greenwich, Connecticut.  New England was a hotbed of roadracing in the early 1970s.  Even big races were small by today’s standard.  Guys like me could still get into the school gym in Hopkinton. We all grew bigger and went faster.  Few bigger and faster than Boston Billy.  I have been a fan for 45 years and a friend for almost that long.  That should tell you something about Mr. Rodgers.  Or not.  – JDW

1979 Boston Marathon. I Was There.

Toughest opponent and why? 

For me, I’d say my toughest competitor was Frank Shorter, who I raced a lot.  Frank had strong credentials in cross-country racing, and on the track from 2 miles to 10k, so he was a well-rounded distance runner who was tough to race.

 Most memorable run and why?

My most memorable race has to be a tie.  Between my 1975 World Cross-Country bronze medal for the USA and winning Boston a month later in 2:09:55.  Both races lifted my confidence so I felt I could race with any athlete at the longer distances, especially the marathon.

Favorite training tip?

I like to talk to new runners at race expos about avoiding injury.  If they can run on grass a fair amount, that will help them do exactly that.

Biggest disappointment?

My biggest disappointment is clearly my struggles with a nagging foot injury and subsequent poor race at the 1976 Olympic Marathon at Montreal.  Followed by the USA’s boycott of the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow.

What would you do differently today?

Today’s professional marathoners are paid well and in my time as a marathoner we struggled with making a living and often over-raced due to the stupid rules of the day.  See Amateurism..’) https://www.jackdogwelch.com/?p=19156

I’m sure I’d rest more if I were a professional today.  I would also try training at altitude.

Favorite comedian?

I enjoy Laurel and Hardy, but Robin Williams leads the way.

I’d like to ask you a few more questions, I told him. And he tells me, “but the trumpeter says beware of the media, Jack.”

Bill,
Here’s the issue.  I have been writing about you for 45 years and books have been written, books by you or about you.  Safe to say, in our world, the running world, you are famous. That being said, I want to celebrate the Original Gangsters of Running.  You definitely are an OGOR. So, I am looking for new stuff.

I have an Associated Press clipping from the Statesman-Journal (Salem, OR) dated Tuesday, April 17, 1979.  Front page of the sports section. Big headline: BILL RODGERS wins second straight Boston Marathon.  

Sidebar: Four locals finish race.  (From combined reports)  Boston.  Four Salem men finished the Boston Marathon held here on Monday.  Jim Hiebert led the Salem entrants with a time of 2:45:02.  Jim Frank trailed with 2:47:45.  Michael Smith and Jack Welch finished two seconds apart with 2:53:16 and 2:53:18.

No byline, but you are quoted as saying ” There’s only one thing missing; that’s a medal in the Olympics.”

You said that was your biggest disappointment (one of two) but why specifically was that important to you?
“{Rodgers} said the last 10 miles were bitterly painful.”  Was that the worst ten miles of your life?

Did you keep running during your battle with cancer?Conscientious objection, divorce, cancer, business reversals, whatever…throughout all that, you were a runner.  

Is that how you have managed your life?

Bill, I am open to other ideas.  You got something to get off your chest about the sport?  Just spitballin.’

Yesterday, I was watching the Tampa Bay Bucs lose another game and a half-naked man with a long sword walked through my yard.  Ah, Florida.
Stay warm.
Jack

[The following has been edited for, how shall I say this, clarity. A long answer in text from Billy is like a big block of Peter Pan on double espresso.]

Hijack – Cool you ran the ’78 Boston; not a bad time either. It was a good day to run, cool weather,etc.

I think like most Americans I learned of the Olympics from TV. I watched the ’64 Tokyo games as a junior in high school. It was my second year as a runner and in high school  (Newington CT) we did not run that far, compared to HS youth of today. After all, our longest track distance event was the two-mile.

In cross-country, we’d occasionally go further. Maybe 2.8 miles. So, it was astounding to see the Olympic 10,000 meters, won by Billy Mills and to see Abebe Bikila take the Olympic Marathon gold so easily. I wasn’t sure how far 10,000 meters was. And the idea of running 26.2 miles was not conceivable for me in high school.

But, in college (Wesleyan University) I met a runner named Amby Burfoot, and he was a marathoner! He looked like a white Bikila,and seemed to run as effortlessly as Bikila had winning the Olympic Marathon.

When he was a senior at Wesleyan – 1968 – Amby won Boston. I was a sophomore and trained with Amby as he aimed for the Boston win. I felt like I was running with Bikila. When I moved to Boston and actually saw the Boston marathon in 1971 and 72, it became real for me. The marathon was not on TV in the ’60s and ’70s.

After dropping out of my first marathon, I finished one – 1973 Bay State Marathon (2:28:12) his first Course Record (CR) – and began to think, I can do this. I wanted to go to the Olympics and happily made the USA Olympic Team. Second to the defending Olympic champion in the Trials by 7 seconds.

I always loved the lore of the Olympic Games. The goodwill spread by the athletes, the highest level of sports competition in the world…. To have a foot injury and run poorly [Montreal 1976] was very hard for me and, as I was cramping up from dehydration, the last ten (10) miles were really hard physically.

Still, I did finish. Maybe 1980, I thought. So far away, thought that, too. But then a fellow named Fred Lebow, the New York City Marathon race director, came to the Falmouth Road Race on Cape Cod to specifically invite Frank Shorter and me to race in the First Five (1st 5) Borough NYC Marathon.

Redemption was ahead. My four (4!) wins at the NYC marathon were my way of saying, “No, okay, I don’t have an Olympic medal, but I’ve got four (4!) of these.”

Yes, I ran through my radiation. I didn’t find radiation had much if any impact on my running. The surgery I had in January of ’08 did knock me out of running a few weeks.

Yes, you do feel like you are being a little bit hard headed by dueling with cancer by running…screw you, cancer!

I do think running was a sort of balm, a way to think as I run to deal with any sorts of troubles in life.

I think I’m at about 56 years as a runner,and I still like to race every year at my favorite races, Falmouth, the Bix 7-mile, the Boilermaker 15k, sometimes the Cherry Blossom 10-mile, the Thompson Island 4k Trail Run I do every September…

Bill

Competitive Record

1. 1973 Boston Marathon (Did not Finish) (DNF)
2. 1973 Bay State Marathon (2:28:12) 1st Course Record (CR)
3. 1974 Boston (2:19:34) 14th
4. 1974 New York City Marathon (NYC) (2:36:00) 5th
5. 1974 Philadelphia Marathon (2:21:57) 1st CR
6. 1975 Boston (2:09:55) 1st American Record (AR)
7. 1975 Enschede Marathon, Netherlands (DNF)
8. 1975 Fukuoka Marathon (2:11:26) 3rd
9. 1976 Olympic Trials (2:11:58) 2nd
10. 1976 Montreal Olympics (2:25:14) 40th
11. 1976 NYC (2:10:10) 1st CR
12. 1976 Sado Island, Japan (2:08:23) 1st CR (200 meters short)
13. 1976 Maryland (2:14:28) 1st CR
14. 1977 Kyoto, Japan (2:14:25) 1st
15. 1977 Boston (DNF)
16. 1977 Amsterdam, Netherlands (2:12:46) 1st CR
17. 1977 Waynesboro (2:25:12) 1st
18. 1977 NYC (2:11:28) 1st
19. 1977 Fukuoka (2:10:55) 1st
20. 1978 Boston (2:10:13) 1st
21. 1978 NYC (2:12:12) 1st
22. 1978 Fukuoka (2:12:53) 6th
23. 1979 Boston (2:09:27) 1st AR
24. 1979 Montreal (2:22:12) 15th
25. 1979 NYC (2:11:42) 1st
26. 1980 Boston (2:12:11) 1st
27. 1980 Toronto (2:14:47) 1st
28. 1980 NYC (2:13:20) 5th
29. 1981 Houston-Tennaco (2:12:10) 1st CR
30. 1981 Boston (2:10:34) 3rd
31. 1981 Atlantica-Boavista, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (2:14:13) 1st CR
32. 1981 Stockholm, Sweden (2:13:28) 1st
33. 1981 Bank One, Columbus, OH (2:17:34) 7th
34. 1982 Houston (2:14:51) 5th
35. 1982 Tokyo (2:24) 301st
36. 1982 Boston (2:12:38) 4th
37. 1982 Atlantica-Boavista, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (DNF)
38. 1982 Melbourne, Australia (2:11:08) 1st
39. 1983 Orange Bowl, FL (2:15:08) 1st
40. 1983 Boston (2:11:58) 10th
41. 1983 Beijing, China (DNF)
42. 1983 Chicago (2:21:40)
43. 1984 U.S. Olympic Trials (2:13:31) 8th
44. 1985 New Jersey Waterfront (2:14:46) 2nd
45. 1985 NYC (2:15:31) 4th
46. 1986 Boston (2:13:35) 4th
47. 1986 Chicago (2:15:31) 11th
48. 1987 Phoenix (DNF)
49. 1987 Boston (2:18:18) 15th
50. 1987 NYC (2:25:01) 54th
51. 1988 Phoenix (DNF)
52. 1988 Los Angeles ( 2:20:27) 2nd masters
53. 1988 Boston (2:18:17) 2nd masters
54. 1988 NYC (DNF)
55. 1989 Los Angeles (2:22:24)
56. 1990 Boston (2:20:46) 5th masters
57. 1992 Vietnam International 19th
58. 1996 Boston (2:53)
59. 1999 Boston (DNF)
60. 2009 Boston (4:06:49)

I took a look at that list and sent Mr. Rodgers one more note.

Let’s Talk About This.

That’s a lot of hard work, my friend. Much respect.
How do your legs feel?
JDW

My legs are fine, Jack.

I did race a lot of races and marathons. Partly I enjoyed travelling around the US and the World representing the United States. Partly I over-raced as I seemed to be able to recover okay.

And we “amateurs” were starting to be paid small fees for racing on the roads. Maybe $500 or $1000. I think I ran twelve (12) Bostons and no money was involved. Three Fukuoka marathons,same thing.

ARRA and the Cascade Run Off 15k in 81 finally broke the back of the Amateur Sport arrangement,and that not only allowed money for Professional runners,and other Olympic sport athletes, but I think it fueled interest by the media and shoe companies etc. in track and Field/Marathoning. that support played a role in building interest in the sport.

Now, if we can only find a way to deal with altitude-born vis a vis sea-level-born athlete’s racing abilities and blood doping.

Bill

Original Gangsters Of Running (Don Kardong)

“You entered a marathon with hills? You idiot.” – Dingy

OK, I think I have some time today to give this a shot.

Toughest opponent and why?

Obviously, it was Pre. I think I figured out at one point that I was 0 and 9 against him. Compare that to my 3 and 1 record against Viren. But to be honest, there were a lot of other guys who gave me a tough time. Dick Buerkle, for example. And my teammate, Herm Atkins. In the marathon, Shorter and Rodgers, although I beat both those guys at one time or another. Well maybe not Frank, at least in the marathon.

Most memorable run and why?

Most memorable race was the Olympic marathon, where I ran my PR and almost snagged a medal. I remember a lot about that race. My whole Olympic experience was a blast, and to top it off with a great performance made it especially memorable.

My 12:57.6 three-mile at Hayward Field was also pretty memorable. It was a 20-second PR for me, run in front of the greatest track crowd in America.

I’ve got to throw in my rim-to-rim-to-rim in the Grand Canyon. It wasn’t a race per se, but an incredible experience. Very, very difficult, but also fascinating, because the trail drops through multiple layers of geological history. If you let yourself, you can imagine running back through time. On the other hand, the Grand Canyon feels timeless, too, and the result is kind of a religious experience.

Favorite training tip?

Whatever doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. But you need recovery days, too.

Biggest disappointment?

Not being able to return to the Olympics. I’m not sure I would have made the 1980 team anyway, because I think overall we had more world-class marathoners in America then than we’ve ever had, before or since. But the boycott made it all a moot point. I would at least have liked to have a shot at it.

What would you do differently today?

People ask me if the training today is much different than it was for me, and near as I can tell it really isn’t. Distance training in the U.S. got dramatically harder in the 1960s and 1970s, but then it kind of leveled off.  You can only do so many miles, so much speed work, and so on.

I think the only thing I might do differently now is incorporate surges more deliberately. Anaerobic threshold runs are pretty effective without being destructive, and when I was doing longer intervals I generally did them as hard as I could. Might have been a mistake.

Favorite philosopher?

Zarathustra. If Zoroastrianism was good enough for Freddie Mercury, it’s good enough for me. [ Zoroastrians believe there is one universal, transcendent, supreme god, or the “Wise Lord”. – ed.]

Favorite comedian?

Bill Murray. I could watch “Ghostbusters” forever. In fact, I have. Just ask my family.

And a personally important song of the era?

“Not to Touch the Earth” by the Doors. It gets pretty strange at the end, but what’s not to love about the line “Not to touch the earth, not to see the sun, nothing left to do but run, run, run. Let’s run!”

---

Don,
Great pics.  Thanks.
Just got a photo of the lead pack at Montreal.  Bill’s right there up front with Frank, and Waldemar and Lasse. No sign of tall Kardong.
What was your tactic/strategy?
You obviously have come to peace with 4th place. Really? And have they sent you a replica bronze?
Jack

Jack–
In that start line photo I sent, I show up pretty clearly because I’m about 6 inches taller than everyone else.
My strategy was to go on auto-pilot for the first ten miles, then start picking off guys who went out faster than they should have, which was just about all of them. I’ve watched the Canadian TV video of the race, and I’m nowhere to be seen until I’m back on the track. Of course they were shooting the leaders, not the come-from-behinders.

I was clearly there for a medal. But I also couldn’t have run any faster, so where I finished was just fine. It was, after all, fourth in the world, and there are a lot of people in the world. But it still pisses me off that a country (East Germany) had a national cheating program for over a decade, and the IOC has done nothing about it.
You know what they say, life ain’t fair.
–Don

The Commies had the best doctors back in the day. Don Kardong deserved the bronze. No doubt about it whatsoever. Makes me crazy.

As is his style, he’s taking it better than I am. And the controversy will never die. Not as long as men run.

Original Gangsters Of Running (Patti Catalano Dillon)

Just in case you don’t know: she was the first American woman to run a marathon in less than two and a half hours, when she finished second to Grete Waitz, with a time of 2:29:33, in the 1980 New York City Marathon.

Okay, Jack, here you go. Pleased as peaches I made the cut. I love the gangster bit.

When did you start running and why?
I started running on March 28th, 1976.

Although initially I started running to lose weight, what I really wanted was some kind of fulfillment or purpose.

I started something called the BE NICE TO PATTI CAMPAIGN, which meant that I would go back to the happiest time in my life, which was when I was a kid, running and biking around Hough’s Neck.

On my way to work one day, I saw a book that caught my eye, called Aerobics by Dr. Ken Cooper. I bought it, skimmed it, and saw that “jogging” would burn the most calories. 

I followed Dr. Cooper’s advice and wore my most comfortable clothes, which happened to be Earth shoe knockoffs, daisy dukes, a neoprene belt, and three heavy sweatshirts. I went to Quincy Cemetery and “jogged” seven laps around the graveyard, which turned out to be seven miles.

I was so sore I couldn’t move the next day, and I couldn’t run for two weeks, but as soon as I had recovered I did it again. 

What was your best stretch of running?

April ’80 to April ’81.

How did you manage to get to that level and stay there for that long?

I had one thing on my mind – win Boston. Every workout, every sit-up, every push up, every step, I breathed to win. And it was the best fun I ever had.

Biggest disappointment and why? 

I was raging, I got fuckin’ second in Boston again.

Confess I thought her answer lacked clarity and so I asked Patti what year she was talking about. You could almost hear her brain shout silently, what year?!!! You have to ask, what year? WHAT YEAR?!!!

I got second three times straight.  1979, 1980, 1981.  The second time was maddening to me.  I didn’t know Jackie [Gareau] was ahead until 24 miles…..I ran out of room..and it was the [Winning Imposter] year anyway.
The ’81 race, I smashed into a horse’s hindquarters at Cleveland Circle. Allison [Roe] passed me. I finished second with a PR 2:27:52.

Toughest opponent and why?  My anxiety.  I had a panic attack during the Falmouth Road race in 1979.  Joanie [Benoit] passed me towards the finish though I finished ahead of Julie Brown.  

Most memorable run and why?   

I’ve had many.  The most memorable run I still marvel about.  I was training and couldn’t take the slant of the road, the uphills or the downhills or pavement.  I ended up running a three-hour run on a baseball field.  Spelled my name, wrote the alphabet, ran numbers, you name it, I ran.

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why?   

WIN BOSTON!  So I could stop correcting people when I’m introduced as a WINNER OF THE BOSTON MARATHON!

I’ll be honest. I kinda thought you’d won Boston once. Seems only right.

Special song of the era? 

Queen ” We are the Champions” 

What was your edge? 

I squared up on my opponents. An attitude of go ahead…beat me…I dare you.

Jack.. I went into a race believing I would win.  The only way I’d  lose, I thought was that you would have to take it from me.  And I wasn’t going to let that happen.  I was ready to spit blood. I may not win,  but I wasn’t going to get beat .

Favorite comedian?

Lucille Ball….I love her. I identified with her antics because she got into a mess seemingly innocently. And it was always righted in the end.

Favorite philosopher?  Quote? 

“Ability is of little account without opportunity.”  Showing up is the first step to winning.

Okay. Thank you, Jack. Thanks for the memories. Isn’t that a quote?

Thank you, Patti.  Cross at the light.

Hey, did you hear Tommy Leonard passed last night? 

Running community is getting dim.

Tommy was definitely an Original Gangster Of Running.

Dim now but once we shined.

And shine we did..huh? The best.  People have no idea.

I ran with Billy [Rodgers]…we won races together..he watched out for me.  When I was homeless,  he helped me .  When I got on my feet, he rented me a car for a month.

I did track workouts at BC [Boston College] with – now – the who’s who of distance running.  At the time it was all normal. Now I look back and ‘whoa.’

I remember you being a bit intense at times.

Ohhh, I was intense. LOL. Well, I was a student. so much to learn. Remember, I never even heard of the Boston marathon.  Then come to find out after I said I wanted to run it, it was 26.2 miles long.  I felt stupid,  thinking, what the heck did I get myself into?

The marathon, hills, intervals, track workouts,  What’s the difference between 10km and ten miles. Who knew? And why a 15k?

I was just a girl who lost fifty-two pounds (52 lbs.) and, a few months after she started running, ran and qualified for Boston, winning her first 26.2 mile race. A  2:53:40 in Newport, RI.

And then just got better and better. Faster and faster.

Addendum. That’s Latin for Patti didn’t expect to see that photo atop this piece.  She felt compelled to tell me about it.

Well, as we now know, I ran into the hindquarters of a mounted police horse.  Tom Derderian caught me and passed me along to Paul Oberowski, both GBTC runners.  I was badly bruised and hurt my shoulder, arm and ribs.  I didn’t fall down.. I had the wind knocked out of me.  By the time I gathered myself to breathe, Allison passed me and I had only one thought  after I shouted NOOOO!  in my head.. Close the gap!

After I crossed the finish line, I was disappointed but was ready up for another year of banging it out.  I was going to win this race come hell or high water, even if it killed me.

 I was met by my coach.  He was sorely disappointed I had finished second…again.  I tried to explain, I had smashed into a horse at Cleveland Circle.  There was only enough room for one runner to pass at a time..and BOOM…He shook his head and said to me, I DO NOT KNOW WHAT ELSE TO DO WITH YOU! 

Those words hit me at my core…my heart was pierced…I stumbled down to the Pru garage and sat on the lip of a platform of the nearest doorway.  Dave Cowens, center for the NBA Celtics, came down the the driveway about two minutes later and picked me up like a doll and told me I did great!  
I almost cried.

A short time later I walked out of the garage under the escort of two Boston policemen.  As we were crossing the street to get me out of the finish line area to the interview area, one cop said to the other,,,”stop those girls…get them back”.  I looked up to where he was gesturing to and I said…”no, no..I know them. They’re my sisters”. There they were climbing over the  fencing barriers and running up the chute. 

Now I hadn’t seen them for years.  My little sister was  now 12…when did she get so big.  I was surrounded by my three of my four sisters and they said almost in unison…WE LOVE YOU PATTI! Now I never, ever had that said to me by any member of my family EVER!  And after a marathon and the smashing into the horse my emotions were a tad wired tight. It was enough for me to cry…and cry I did.

The photographer snapped a picture.  It’s one of my favorite pictures because it captured the day. And its the only picture I have of my sisters.
My life changed because what I wanted wasn’t winning the Boston marathon..I was already the fastest in America. The second fastest in the world. What more could I possibly want.

I had been chasing love. And it came up right at me in the chute.

The Obstinate OGOR (Dick Beardsley)

obstinate – unreasonably determined to have one’s own way; not yielding to reason or plea; stubborn; dogged; mulish

Obstinate.  Lord knows, I mean that in a good way.  For example, he lives in The Snowmobile Capital Of The North.

He ice fishes.  For fun.When did you start running and why?  I started running when I was 17 and a junior in high school. I was such a shy kid growing up, especially around girls. I thought if I earned a high school letter jacket that it would help me get a girlfriend. I went out for the football team and within 30 minutes I got gang tackled,  After that happened, I thought there’s not a girl alive worth going through that, so I quit, walked off the field.  My entire football career lasted less than a hour! 

So, a week later, a friend suggested I go out for the XC team. I had no idea what it was but, when he said you won’t get tackled, I thought I’d give it a try.  So I went out.  I was terrible that first year but I fell in love with running! 

Toughest opponent and why? That’s a close one but I’d have to say Alberto Salazar but a very close second would be Bill Rodgers. When I raced against Alberto in the 1982 Boston Marathon, it was a very warm day and a loaded field. Once we broke away, it was just him and me.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FmzljrUrwKE 

At 17 miles I did everything I could to break him, through the hills and all the way to the finish.  A couple of times I thought I had him on the ropes but he was tough, physically and especially mentally. 

Most memorable run and why? Most people think it was the 1982 Boston Marathon, that’s a very close second but for me it was the 1981 Grandmas Marathon in Duluth MN. I was very fortunate to win that day in 2:09:36 but the reason it was so special, it was the first time my mom and dad saw me run a marathon. They were both at the finish and my dad – who you could have hit over the head with a two by four and he wouldn’t cry – was crying like a baby, he was so proud and happy. 

Biggest disappointment and why? 

It would have to be finishing 1.6 seconds behind Alberto in Boston. I remember looking up when I finished and the clock was still in the 2:08’s and half of me had never been so happy and the other half had never been so disappointed! I’m thinking, I just ran 2:08 but finished second – how can that be?! But when I went back over the race in my mind, I was smiling from ear to ear.  I knew I had given it my very, very best and that’s all anyone can hope for. 

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why? 

I don’t think I’d do anything different. I trained harder than I’d ever trained before. We had a brutal winter that year here in Minnesota and I remember one morning I got up to go run and the actual temperature was minus 60! -60 degrees.  That’s cold.  I got my workout in and I think that run that morning and the workout I did in a blizzard ten days before Boston, up and down Heartbreak Hill, helped me to stay mentally tough that day in Boston. 

Favorite philosopher?  Quote? 

I’m not up on any philosophers but someone that I quote sometimes is one of the greatest golfers, Ben Hogan. He’d won numerous major golf championships and then got in a terrible car accident. He almost died and, though he survived, doctors said he’d probably never walk again. Not only did he walk again but he went on to win a few more majors. His quote was IF IT IS TO BE, IT IS UP TO ME. 

Major wins? I was fortunate to win the inaugural London Marathon in 1981. (2:11:48)  Inge Simonsen of Norway also won.  We actually tied and became great friends over all those years!

 I won Grandmas in 1981 and 1982.  My 2:09:36 in 1981 stood for 33 years until a Kenyan athlete broke it.  [Dominic Ondoro – 2:09:06.] 

Dick wrote Staying The Course: A Runner’s Toughest Race.  Here’s the description on Amazon: 

For a moment Dick Beardsley became the most famous runner in the world by losing a race. In the 1982 Boston Marathon, Beardsley, foiled by a motorcycle that cut him off, finished two seconds behind Alberto Salazar in one of the most memorable contests in marathon history. Staying the Course recounts that race and the difficult years that followed, including his recovery from a near-fatal farm accident, his subsequent addiction to painkillers, and a public arrest for forging prescriptions. His story of overcoming obstacles speaks to anyone who loves competition, who has survived catastrophe, or who has pursued a seemingly impossible goal. 

Anything you left out of your book?  

My book came out in 2002 and much has happened since then. The biggest thing though is I lost my son Andy on October 4, 2015. He was a Iraq war veteran and suffered from PTSD when he returned. He died of suicide at the age of 31. 

And because you are you, I am curious about your toughness.Farming, ice fishing, drug addiction, injury, etc.Seems like marathoning doesn’t begin to tell the story.

You’re right.  Marathoning is a small part of the story but a big one. I sure wasn’t anywhere close to being the most talented runner but growing up milking cows, running a trap line, starting my own fishing guide business at the age of twelve (12), hard work and having lots of faith has never been a problem for me. In fact I enjoy that and still do! I think all of those things definitely helped me with my running and dealing with other difficulties in my life in a positive way. I still run every day and love it as much as ever but I’m slower than molasses in January, but that doesn’t bother me a bit!  

What was your edge?

I think being mentally tough helped a lot. Living in Minnesota where the winters are long and sometimes brutal was a benefit to toughen you up. Having a love for the outdoors and being in it all of my life has showed me to appreciate everything in my life and to never take anything for granted.

I got hooked up with the New Balance shoe company in 1979 when I was a average runner at best, someone besides me believed in what I was doing and that was huge.

Then in the summer of 1980 I got together with Coach Bill Squires who at the time was the Team New Balance coach. He took me under his wing and he lifted my running to a place I’d only dreamed about!

What was your best stretch of running? 

I would say from 1980 thru 1982. After Boston in ‘82 I started having left Achilles problems and ended up having two major surgeries, the first in August of ‘83 and then again in February of ‘84. That kept me from trying to make the ‘84 Olympic Marathon Team, which was very disappointing! A year and a half after my last surgery, I was able to start training again but was never able to get back to that real high level.  

And why do you think you did what you did then? 

From when I started running in 1973 until after Boston in ‘82 I never had a injury.  I had a long string of years with lots of miles that made me very strong.   

PERSONAL RECORDS?

Mile – 4:19

10k – 29:12 (road)

15k – 44:10

10 Mile – 48:20

20k – 1:00:10

Half Marathon – 1:02:56

Marathon – 2:08:53

Have to think that’s the slowest mile PR of any 2:08 marathoner in the history of the known world. I have to think that.

But enough about running. I saw you have a new project, a bed & breakfast. Is that why you get up at 3:45 a.m. and is it rude to inquire about possible masochistic tendencies?

Our B&B is really mostly my wife Jill’s thing. I make sure the grass is mowed and the walks and driveway are cleared of snow, do repairs, and help out other ways if needed. I sure don’t need anything else to keep me busy!

Whether you’re longing for a relaxing stay overlooking Lake Bemidji, a romantic get-away, a fantastic day of fishing, or a pleasant stop while traveling for business, enjoy the quiet ambiance of Lake Bemidji Bed & Breakfast. Just 200 feet from the west shore of Lake Bemidji, you’ll awaken in one of our richly appointed guest rooms to a breathtaking view of the morning sun rising over the lake.

Special song of the era?

“Are the good times really over” by Merle Haggard.

Favorite comedian? Ron White.

I am thinking Inspirational Fishing Guide Dick Beardsley should consider a Guru Package. Stay at his house, go running together, fishing and daily bull sessions around the fire. Which better be hot. Because my idea of ice fishing is pulling the last olive out of the bottom of the glass. – JDW

Dick Beardsley
Motivational/Inspirational Speaker

Fishing GuideInnkeeper
Co-Author, Staying the Course, A Runner’s Toughest Race

Original Gangsters Of Running (Ron Wayne)

I raced Ron Wayne at least once. I was in sight of the finish line when he won.  I was right there.

Unfortunately, I had another six-mile lap to go. He beat me by only ninety-two (92) places.

Sounds a lot closer than ten kilometers.

When did you start running and why?

When I was a junior at Brockton High School, I joined the cross country team to help with my fitness for the upcoming basketball season. In addition, the coach, Harry Allen, was also the Assistant Varsity Basketball Coach and I thought that if I could show him I had a strong work ethic, it might help my chances of making the varsity squad.

Two and a half months after running my first ever workout, I placed 19th in the Massachusetts Class A State Cross Country Meet. Now I had a decision to make: Do I play basketball or keep running? I joined the indoor track team.

Toughest opponent and why?

Throughout the ‘70’s there certainly was a fraternity of tough competitors, but I would have to identify my toughest opponent as a school rivalry. I attended college at UMass Amherst which at that time was a member of the Yankee Conference.

Also, in that conference was UConn and one of their runners, who was a year ahead of me, was John Vitale. We raced against each other in cross country, indoor track and outdoor track. Furthermore, during and after college we competed against each other on the roads throughout New England. This included many Boston Marathons and numerous other 26.2 mile events throughout the US. Over the years, we each had our share of victories and defeats against each other. One such victory was finishing less than a second ahead of Vitale to win the national marathon championship.

Most memorable run and why?

When one competes for 20 years, you develop a collection of fond memories. I will tell you my favorite one first, but also discuss a close second.

I was born in Boston and every Patriots Day my parents would take me to my grandparent’s house on Beacon Street, Brookline to watch the Boston Marathon. From the time I could read, I went out on the street with the Boston Globe in hand that listed all of the runner’s names (only 200-500 competitors in the race during the 50’s to mid-60’s). I would look up the street to see the runner’s numbers, so by the time they came by me, I would find their name in the newspaper and yell out their name with words of encouragement.

My dream was to play for the Red Sox (my Brockton North Little League All-Star Team was State and New England Champions), but who knew that I would end up becoming a marathon runner. In 1977, my best Boston finish was 4th place, top American. To accomplish this achievement in my home town and to have a police motorcycle escort me in to the finish line was extremely exciting.

Another memorable race was winning the New England High School Cross Country Championship that capped an undefeated fourteen (14) race season that included the Massachusetts State Class A Championship. What makes this a head-scratching senior high school season is that I had only been running for less than fifteen (15) months.

Biggest disappointment and why?

After competing in the May 1976 Bay To Breakers Race in San Francisco, I came down with bronchial pneumonia, causing me to miss the Olympic Marathon Trials in Eugene, Oregon later that month. I attended graduate school at the University of Oregon from 1972-1974, so I was very familiar with the Trials Marathon race course, as it had been part of my training loops for several years. These Trials would have been my best chance to make the Olympic Team.

Later that year, in December 1976, I placed second in the Honolulu Marathon beating Olympians, Don Kardong, Jeff Galloway, Kenny Moore, Tony Sandoval, Jack Foster and 1976 Boston Marathon winner, Jack Fultz. So I guess that was my Olympics.

What would you do differently if you could do it again? Why?

After college, I was self-coached and other than the majority of my Sunday 20-25 mile runs and speed workouts on the track, I trained by myself. I was very confident with my high mileage training regimen, but one tactic that was missing was tempo runs, something that is very popular today. I believe I would have benefited greatly from tempo training.

Also, what if I had joined a training group/club, such as Greater Boston, that had athletes better than me? I believe I would have improved significantly.

Also, perhaps I raced too many marathons every year. In 1974, I was the first person in the world to run four (4) sub-2:20’s in the same calendar year. In 1977, I was the first person in the world to run five (5) sub-2:20’s. Today, most top runners only race a spring and a fall marathon. Maybe fewer marathon races would have produced faster times.

• 

What was your ‘best stretch of running’? Why do you think you hit that level at that time?

Research has shown the average lifespan of an elite marathon runner is about ten years. Over my nine-year career of racing marathons, I had several successful stretches, but my best was from December 1976 through October 1977. During that time period, I placed second in Honolulu and ran five (5) sub-2:20 marathons in 1977 that included, third at Trails End, fourth at Boston, sixth at Amsterdam, fourth at Nike OTC and fourteenth at New York.

In 1977, I was ranked sixth best marathon runner and ninth best road runner in the United States by Track and Field News. [The Bible Of The Sport! – ed.] Due to pneumonia, I missed about four months of training during the summer and early fall of 1976, which, although very frustrating, forced me to rest. I believe the rest followed by consistent training, staying healthy and injury-free, as well as luck, all contributed to my best stretch of running.

[Interesting sidebar: https://www.jackdogwelch.com/?p=14421]

What was your edge?

Eating a loaf of toast a day and consistently running 140-150 mile weeks.

Favorite philosopher? Quote?

My favorite slogan came from a Nike advertisement that read, “There is no finish line” which concluded with the tagline, “Beating the competition is relatively easy, but beating yourself is a never-ending commitment.”

Special song of the era?

In December 1965, before leaving for my first ever high school indoor track meet, I stretched out on the couch in the family room and listened to the Beatle’s album, Rubber Soul that had just been released. I won the mile that day, my first-ever high school win. As a relaxation and visualization exercise, for the rest of my high school career, I listened to that album prior to all of my indoor and outdoor track meets. Some of my favorite cuts were Nowhere Man, Drive My Car, Michele, Girl, In My Life and Run For Your Life.

Favorite Comedian?

Definitely Jerry Seinfeld. One of my favorite episodes is the “Hot Tub.” Jean-Paul, an Olympic marathon runner from Trinidad and Tobago, famous for over-sleeping and missing the Olympics. Jean-Paul is in town to run the New York Marathon. The night before the race, J.P. stays with Jerry. Meanwhile, neighbor Kramer overheats a new indoor hot tub pump and blows out the electricity in the building, causing Jerry’s alarm clock to fail, Jean-Paul doesn’t get his wake up call. Nonetheless, Jerry still gets J.P. to the race start.

Near the race finish, Jerry, Kramer and Elaine see Jean-Paul leading the race and cheer him on. Kramer, who had fallen asleep in the hot tub – still freezing from the hot tun incident, is drinking scalding hot coffee. Thinking it’s water, Jean-Paul grabs the drink from Kramer.

You can just imagine. Right there, so close to victory, Jean Paul is forced to drop out of the race.

I guess you had to be there.

And Ron Wayne was. Usually in the lead pack.

The Loaf Of Toast OGOR.

I included the following list of personal bests, because if you can’t believe the Association Of Road Racing Statisticians, whom can you trust?

Type	Distance	Time
RD	10 km	31:51	Boston MA/USA	19 Apr 1981
RD	15 km	48:33	Portland OR/USA	25 Jun 1978
RD	10 mi	53:49	Quincy MA/USA	10 Jun 1972
RD	20 km	1:03:37	West Roxbury MA	26 Oct 1975
RD	1/2 Mar	1:13:47	Perry FL/USA	26 Oct 1974
RD	25 km	1:18:54	San Francisco CA/USA	15 Sep 1974
RD	Mar	2:15:04	Eugene OR/USA	11 Sep 1977

A number of the times listed as personal bests are not accurate.  I attached a 10K race result that shows I ran 28:50. The half marathon time listed was a training run.  There were very few half marathon races in the 1970’s.  The two I raced, Bakersfield (probably ’78 or ’79) and San Luis Obispo (’80 I think) I won both and the times were 1:05  something.  I will try to find the actual times. 

I think the only accurate personal best time you listed is the marathon.

The only PR that really matters.

The Uncommon Gangster (Anne Audain)

“The key to success is consistency in training and a determination to give it your very best effort every time.”

When did you start running and why?

I was adopted at birth and was born with bone deformities of both feet which grew as I grew. They caused me great pain and I did not have a normal gait as I adjusted my stride to avoid the pain. I could not wear normal shoes but, thankfully, New Zealand’s climate is mild so I could go barefoot a lot. Surgeons decided to wait until I was a teenager and my bones stronger to perform reconstructive surgery.

When I was thirteen, they performed the surgery with no promises to my parents except they hoped to relieve the pain so that I would walk better.  When it came time to leave the hospital, they did not give me crutches or a wheelchair. Their idea to help me get the “heel-toe” motion was to give me leather boots with a wooden rocker. When I walked, the rocker forced me to use the front of my feet which I hadn’t used before.

This also was very painful but a great plan because once the plaster casts came off and I went through extensive rehab I discovered it was easier to run than walk. One year later I asked my parents if I could join the Otahuhu Athletic club ( a suburb of my hometown of Auckland New Zealand) . All my school mates and neighbourhood friends were members. Sports in NZ are administered in the club setting. As this was 1970, girls could only run as far as the 800m. This was the longest distance for women in the Olympics.

I discovered I loved to run and had success very quickly. I qualified for the inaugural Women’s Olympic 1500m in 1972  at age 16 and finished 9^th in 1973 World Cross country Champs Senior race at age 17!

Toughest opponent?

Myself and The Clock.  I was known as a “front runner”!  I never ran tactically. I preferred to lead and run hard. Part of this decision was due to my feet. They did not handle the “stop-start” of a uneven pace. I taught myself the rhythm of the pace I needed to run for a certain time and distance and raced that way.

I also wanted to know I completed each race knowing I had given myself every opportunity to win and left everything out there on the course.

Most memorable race?            

1982 Commonwealth Games Gold Medal in 3000m.  Brisbane, Australia. 
We had an amazing history on the male side with multiple Olympic medalists and World Record Holders, many my teammates and contemporaries. But until then, New Zealand had never had a female gold medalist on the track. I was the first.

I was also the first woman pro. I had been racing the roads in the USA for 18 months including winning the first openly professional road race (Cascade RunOff) in Portland, Oregon, in June, 1981. That resulted in an international ban for track racing.  Road race directors in USA ignored the ban but New Zealand athletic officials didn’t.

In March 1982, a special race was set up for me to make a record attempt. I broke the 5000m World Record in Auckland but it was not acknowledged due to me being banned.

I arrived back in the USA soon after and went back to the roads. I went on a great winning streak, also breaking many course records.

Around July my coach New Zealander John Davies ( Olympic 1500m bronze 1964) started to encourage me to race in the Commonwealth Games in October.  I told him I didn’t want to run track anymore and, besides, I was still banned from track racing internationally.

He told me he was sure the ban would be lifted in time and kept at me, saying I needed to do it for my family, my country, myself, as he really believed I could win Gold!  I relented, saying as long as I could continue to race the roads and he could fit the track training into the program, I would do it.

I flew to Australia with two weeks to go before the Games’ opening ceremonies and still a banned athlete. With one week to go, with me already in the Games Village, the ban was lifted and I was presented with my World Record plaque.

Race day was very windy and I was only ranked 9^th in the field. As noted, I liked to lead and was ready to do so. It was a very windy day and John came out to the warmup track and made me promise I wouldn’t lead! He was nervous for me and was also going to be commentating for NZ TV. He had also told folks he believed I could win Gold. Pressure!

In the 3000 meters you start on the 200 meter bend. You draw cards for the spot on the line and I drew Number 1! It’s a dangerous position as everyone outside of you will take off fast to get the inside lane. I needed to start fast to avoid getting boxed in.  I found myself in the lead and thought of my promise to John not to lead.

I hesitated, hoping someone would go past me but my reputation as a front runner was established and no one would take the lead. At that moment I decided this was my chance to dictate the pace and go for the Gold. I led the entire race, setting a new Commonwealth Record, a personal best by 13 seconds and – to this day – still New Zealand’s only female track Gold Medalist.

Biggest disappointment?

I wouldn’t use the word “ disappointment”!  Any sporting career has its ups and downs.  Frustration maybe? I have often wondered how I would have performed earlier if I had been coached by John Davies from the beginning. (My first coach was Gordon Pirie, British Silver in 1956) . I certainly had success under him but no consistency. For other reasons he also caused me to quit the sport in 1980. 

I joined John at the end of 1980 and never looked back. Also, the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles where the inaugural women’s marathon was added but not the 5000m and 10000m, where I would have had a better chance. I did run the marathon but didn’t finish. I was too inexperienced as I had only run two marathons prior. Again, that’s life!  I think I had some good innings.

What would I do differently?

Nothing really. This is the path I was given and again I think I did OK!

Quote? 

My dad, when I first began to have success:

” Don’t get too big for your boots as there is always someone working harder!

“You are only as good as the next race you run!

“Be humble in winning and defeat. “

Song ?          

Bryan Adams “ The Summer of 69!”    This was the time I had my feet fixed, summertime in New Zealand. I remember being so mad I couldn’t go to the beach like we always did. January is the time all NZ is on vacation. And I had to be in hospital and plaster casts!

Favourite  Comedian? 

Too many!   Johnny Carson, John Stewart, Colbert. We need them daily to stay sane!

Best racing results stretch? 

Unbeaten from September 1981 to March 1983. Twenty-one (21!) wins; all course records.  All credit to John Davies and his consistent training program.

What was your edge?

Being a Front Runner.  I have had my competitors say, they always knew they were in for a hard race if I turned up to compete. Here again, I credit John Davies for training me to have the confidence to lead and run hard and fast.

Then there’s this tale on Amazon.

Born in New Zealand with badly deformed feet, Anne Audain was adopted as an infant by a kindly, hard-working couple–a printer and his wife–who nurtured her and taught her that being adopted meant she was special because she had been selected over all the other available babies.

But she was a tiny child, shy and bookish, and with her awkward, stumbling gait, she became a special target for teasing by her classmates. Finally, when she was 13, the doctors felt her bones were strong enough to sustain an operation, and her condition was surgically corrected. Liberated from much of the pain and awkwardness for the first time, she discovered athletics at a local club and literally in a matter of months had become a nationally known runner in New Zealand.

She went on to run in the Olympics, win a Commonwealth Games gold medal, set a world track record, and to move to the United States where she became the first female professional runner, a Nike sponsored athlete, and the most successful woman road runner of all time, winning most of the major U.S. road races she entered from 1981 to 1991. Now a naturalized citizen, she is a successful motivational speaker and businesswoman, and is the founder of the Idaho Women’s Fitness Celebration, one of the largest women’s sporting events in the world.

The biography of Anne Audain is a fascinating, inspiring story for all readers but especially for women, young people, and athletes

Inspiring story also for old men.

Enough said.

Okay, one more thing.
One OGOR says the ARRS PRs for him are all wrong. To be honest, I can’t even keep track of my own records. So all respect due to statisticians everywhere. 

I asked Anne if the PRs those geeky statisticians credit her with are accurate. (Wouldn’t really know, but I think that’s called ‘journalistic integrity.’) She sent me the following:

So I sent Ms. Anne Audain a note.

Note said,

“I don’t mean to be rude, but I looked at that and thought –

“Boy, you’re some hot shit, aren’t you? “

Just telling the truth.

Sorry, my bad. But I am gobsmacked by the woman. Total gangster. I mean, really. Did you see those feet? Did you know girls weren’t supposed to run back then?

Really. Did you look at those times? Did you look at that record?

I did.

The Muddiest OGOR (Pat Porter)

A number of the Original Gangsters passed before I could celebrate them. Steve Hoag. Tom Fleming. Pat Porter is gone, but I managed to have a conversation with him on the record. The Panther gets his club patch posthumously.

If I find many more forgotten pieces, I may actually have enough for a sequel to the award-winning, critically acclaimed When Running Was Young and So Were We.  Which nobody bought.  Book would’ve been better with this conversation, first published in Track & Field News May 1986. – JDW

(Actually, I found that photo online, but am guessing Ms. Jennings won’t mind.)

Tall, angular, lanky, lean, long-legged Pat Porter has his head screwed on so tight, you can almost hear the squeak.  His is a personality of production, not prattle.  He doesn’t back up his words with deeds – he lets his actions speak for themselves.

Porter’s performances have been screamers, roaring with a determination born of thousands of miles in the oxygen-scarce atmosphere of Alamosa, Colorado.  A town of eight- to ten-thousand people (‘if you count all the surrounding farms”).  Alamosa is the site of Porter’s alma mater, Adams State, and his coach, Dr. Joe Vigil.  It is a great town in which to grow up; a good place to be grown up.

Much of Pat Porter’s growth is ascribed, by Porter himself, to Vigil.  In a marvelous love-love relationship, Vigil credits his young charge with being “an extremely hard worker.”  It’s the partnership union that works.

Porter seems to be involved in many partnerships.  There’s his relationship with his home, his coach and his school – he still lives near campus and trains with the ASC track team.  Porter is more than pleased with his partnership with Athletics West, the Nike-sponsored track squad which provides Porter with the wherewithal to chase some of those goals which weren’t even dreams for a high school boy who was not even offered an athletic scholarship.  Porter’s best partnership seems to be the one we all have, to varying degrees, and with different levels of success; his best partnership just might be the one he has with himself.

JDW:  Funny, you don’t look African.

Porter (chuckles): Well, after running the race I did at Worlds, I don’t feel very African.  I am not very happy.  In fact, I’m rather disappointed.

JDW:  Disappointed?  Come on, sixth in the world ain’t bad.  And let’s face it.  Those guys who beat you are something special.

Porter:  Sure, they are special.  What I’m disappointed about is not where I placed, but how and why I finished where I did.  I didn’t run my own race; I didn’t go out when I should have.  I ran with inhibitions.  You can’t win running someone else’s race.  The Africans bleed like everybody else; they put their pants on like everybody else.  They’re just guys… very talented, but just guys.

JDW:  You’re no slouch yourself.

Porter:  Thanks.

JDW:  Let’s change the subject before this starts sounding like Johnny Carson interviewing Fernando lamas.  What’s it like not to work for a living?

Porter:  I don’t know.  It’s a lot of work – hard work.

JDW:  What’s hard work?

Porter:  I do a lot of miles.  Lots of aerobic work.  Mountain training.

JDW:  Can you be more specific?

Porter:  Sure.  No secrets here.  When I’m racing, I’ll do 80-90 miles a week, fairly intense.  Normal training mileage is 100.  When I’m building my base, I’ll run around 120, but not much quality.  At 120, I start to squeak a little bit.

JDW:  Is that the most you’ve done?

Porter:  No.  I had a really poor season last year.  Coming back from a broken foot, I needed the base work.  So I did 130 miles for five weeks.  I was just putting in the time, and my joints really started making a racket.

JDW:  I’m still waiting to hear the secret.

Porter:  My long runs are 20 miles or two hours, whichever comes first.  Pablo Vigil took me on my first 20-miler; I’d go two hours and not a second longer.  I’d plan the route so we’d be near my house when the time was up.

The “secret” is just hard work.  That’s the secret with most things.  I remember when I first started running 100 miles, I thought I would die.  When I cut back from 120-130, a 100 seems now like a holiday.  It’s a lot of hard work and determination.

JDW:  Have you always wanted to run?

Porter:  Oh, no.  Like most kids, I think I wanted to play the big-time team sports, but that never worked out.  I do remember my first hero was Jim Ryun.  And that was before I started running.  I must have been eight or nine.  Ryun was so good and he seemed always to be in the newspapers, winning races and setting records.  And he was more than an athlete – he was a good Christian, a good person.

JDW:  I’ve heard you didn’t exactly throw yourself at the sport.

Porter:  My sophomore year in high school I went out for track.  I figured I’d be a hurdler or something, but when we had tryouts, I was just so petrified.  I hung out at the back of the crowd, hoping I wouldn’t get noticed.  The coach would call out an event and some guys would head out onto the track.  Finally, there was one event left – the mile – and four guys.

JDW: How’d you do?

Porter:  Well, this isn’t one of those wonderful stories where the kid shows up in cutoffs and becomes the star.  Let’s just say, I finished in the top four in my first race.

JDW:  How did you get so good after starting so poorly?

I don’t really think I’ve done anything outstanding yet.  If I was truly talented, I’d be winning more, setting records.

JDW:  Your collegiate career didn’t start any better than your prep one, did it?

Porter:  It was different in that by college, at least I was trying.  I transferred to Adams State in my soph year and walked on.  I can still remember my first long-term run.  It was an “Indian run,” one where each runner takes turns in the lead every few minutes.  It was six miles and I think I made it to the front twice.  When we got finished, I knew the coach would give me a ride back to school – of course, he didn’t.  By the time I got back, I was exhausted and everybody was either done showering or already gone to dinner.

I’ll never forget that day.  I was the last man on the team.

JDW:  Pat, my editors sent a few questions, so I’d better ask at least some of them.  Is it true you wear underwear with the days of the week embroidered on it?  Oops, sorry, wrong interview.

Here it is: why is Pat Porter such a tough cross country runner?

Porter:  Because he wants to be.

JDW:  Their questions are designed to bring out illustrative responses.  Let’s try another.  What is it about running that brings out the best in you?

Porter:  That’s a toughie.  Do you think it does?  Hmmmm.  It does drive my desire to excel.  It may bring out the worst in me, actually.  I get awfully hard to get along with; feisty, even nasty.

JDW:  That sounds selfish.

Porter:  It is selfish.  This is a selfish sport, and that’s the nature of the beast.

JDW:  Can you estimate the effect of Joe Vigil on your career and your life?

Porter:  Coach has had a tremendous effect.  I was a typical high school kid and Coach gave me direction.  School is absolutely the first priority.  Coach taught me about life by stressing so much more than just running.  He teaches you to apply the discipline of running to the rest of your life.

JDW:  Vigil has said, you’re a runner for all seasons, but isn’t cross country your favorite?

Porter:  It’s just fun.  Track is necessary.  Cross country is marginally my favorite, but right now I’m tired of it.  October through March is a lot of cross country.  Right now, I’m looking forward to track.  But cross country – well, the leaves are changing, the weather is brisk…. I love it.

JDW:  How important has it been for you to live and train at altitude for all of your career?

Porter:  It’s pretty important.  Just knowing me and coach Vigil, I could run well anywhere, but I’m glad I’m at altitude.  It makes running everywhere else feel easier.  That’s the bottom line.  I run a two-mile time trial at 8:30 up there  and it’s real tough.  It can’t be physically good for your body, but altitude is stress and one gets stronger by adapting to stress.

JDW:  Has it been tougher for you to get to the top or to stay there?  Or is each its own challenge?

Porter:  Each is different.  Neither is easy.  I guess it’s a little tougher to stay on top.  When you’re coming up, it’s tough learning how to train.  At the top, you have to learn how to race, learn the tactics that will help you win.  Being on top is harder because there’s no margin for error.  If you’re trying to stay on top and you’re not fit, you’re in big trouble.

JDW:  In a different vein, you must be pretty well known in Alamosa.  What’s it like to be 26 years old and the most famous guy in town?

Porter:  I’ve never thought of myself as famous because it’s been such a gradual process.  Yeah, everybody seems to know what’s going on and that’s strange because I’ve never told anyone about myself.

Alamosa is pretty slow, but I like it.  You can really get into your own life.  Everybody seems to know me, but that’s okay.  When I made the Olympic Team, there were congratulatory signs up all over.  I do get a lot of recognition, but my success gives Alamosa a lot of that same notoriety.

JDW:  Any idea how much longer you will compete?

Porter:  My plan is to be very much like Carlos Lopes.  Look at his record: 1972 through ’84.  Three world titles.  27:17 on the track.  A 10K silver medal in ’76, marathon gold in ’84.

I’m not the best in the world now, but I might be the best some day – if I keep working.  I mean, I’m not thinking about the marathon at all.  But if I did run one, I know I would run very well.

I keep thinking that in 1996, I’ll be 37 years old.  The bottom line is mental; it’s just how badly you want it.  Of course, you have to avoid injury.  You have to be lucky.  But I don’t doubt that the fitter you are, the luckier you’ll be.

Epilogue.  To the best of my knowledge, Pat Porter never raced a serious marathon.

This from Wikipedia.  “On July 26, 2012, at approximately 8:30 a.m., Porter was killed in an airplane crash along with his 15-year-old son Connor and his son’s friend, 14-year-old Connor Mantsch.  Porter, an avid pilot, hit a boundary fence at the south end of the Sedona Airport runway just outside Sedona, Arizona, then went down a steep mesa and burst into flames upon impact at the bottom of the hill. He was 53 years old.”

Original Gangsters Of Running (Jack Leydig)

Many years ago, I was in a bit of trouble, so I made a rare call to the Anonymous OGOR and asked if I could stay for a few weeks. Maybe twelve.  Hadn’t heard from me in years.

Conversation went something like this. “It’s me. Jack. The Running magazine guy.” “Oh, Jack. Hi.” Told him I’d stay out of his way. And he said okay.

I get to the place – big and empty – and make myself at home. He gets back a fortnight later from a trip, takes one look at me and says, “I gotta be the only guy in the world with two friends named Jack who operate running magazines.”

I’ll be honest, he looked a little disappointed. True story. – JDW

When did you start running and why?

I started running in the fall of 1960 at Hillsdale High in San Mateo.  My driver education instructor, Connie “Conan” Smith, was also the cross-country and track coach.  He was only at Hillsdale for three years but created two national record holding teams in that short time period!  He said I looked like I could be a good distance runner and said I should come out for cross-country and track.  I ran in only my junior and senior years.

In the fall of 1961 our cross-country team ran 49:04 for the Track & Field News five-person two-mile team competition (we actually broke the old record twice).  In the spring of 1962, we set a U.S. 4 x 1-mile relay record at 17:49.9 on a dirt track with no competition to speak of.  I was a part of both teams and ran 4:21.5 for the mile that year.  Those two records still stand at Hillsdale, over 55 years later!

Toughest opponent and why?

Not sure I ever thought about my toughest opponent.  I simply tried to do the very best I could, so I was my own toughest opponent, always trying to be better.  I never got to the levels I thought I was capable of reaching (sub-2:20 marathon, etc.).

Most memorable run and why?

Qualifying for the 1972 Olympic Trials Marathon by running 2:25:15 at Boston (finishing 22nd) in fairly warm weather.  That is my P.R.  Sub-2:30 was the qualifying standard that year.  I also ran a 1:39 for 30K on the roads earlier that year. 

Biggest disappointment and why?

Not being able to qualify for the 1976 Olympic Trials Marathon (2:23 was the standard that year).

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why?

I probably needed more speed work (really!) and should have taken more time recovering from very hard training stretches.

I probably overdid my training.

What was your highest weekly mileage?

I’d have to go back to my training logs to find that, but probably 105-110 miles.  In my best days I always tried for 90-100 mile weeks when I had the time (and energy).  

What was your ‘best stretch of running’?  
And so why do you think you hit that level at that time?

I think my best stretch of running was in 1972 when I was awarded NorCal Roadrunner Of The Year for my overall performances.  I was not working that year and was aiming to just qualify for the Olympic Trials marathon.

What was your edge?

Having so many friends that were supportive of my running, especially those on the West Valley Track Club, where I was president for about 15 years.  

Favorite philosopher?  Quote?

None comes to mind.

I think that was Sartre, ‘none comes to mind.’

Special song of the era?

“You Can’t Always Get What You Want!” – Rolling Stones.

Favorite comedian?

Can’t think of one… I probably needed several at many times!!!

And because you’re you…

Why “Bonus Jack?”
Don Kardong & Duncan Macdonald thought [nothing can go wrong. – ed.] that would be a suitable moniker.  Don went on to finish 4th in the 1976 Olympic Games Marathon by only a few seconds [& a bunch of PEDs – ed.], and Duncan broke the U.S. record in the 5,000 meters (13:19).  Don originated the Lilac Bloomsday Run in Spokane and has been the continuing meet director.  

Please tell me something about the genesis of NorCalRR?

NorCal Running Review started out in the first year or so as a West Valley Track Club publication, primarily about the club.  After a few years, Paul Reese, a great masters runner in the 60’s and 70’s, thought it should be renamed because it started to cover the entire spectrum of distance running, track & field, and race walking throughout the area.  

I was the originator and editor until I no longer had the time to continue it in early 1981.  It was supported by the WVTC and members of the athletics community throughout the 1970’s.  

NorCal Running Review was scanned in 2013-14 by LA84 and all issues can be viewed online (thanks to the support of Jacqueline Hansen).

https://digital.la84.org/digital/collection/p17103coll2/search/searchterm/NorCal%20Running%20Review

Check it out. You’ll be amazed.

Jack Leydig did a helluva lot for the sport. Many important contributions. Look him up at http://www.woohoo.org/runsf/stars.htm

I am attaching a page from the Sep. 1980 Track & Field News which had the summary of the Moscow Olympics, which I attended.  Unfortunately, most of the T&FN staff were not issued travel visas by the Soviet government (it figures!).  However, Tom Jordan, the long-time Prefontaine Classic director, went and was my room mate.  See the lower right portion of the page.  I brought the primary T&FN timing equipment (an 8-Lane Chronomix timer) which we operated from up in the stands…not perfect, but not bad.  If we hadn’t had an Intourist guide with us it would have probably been impossible to get it into the stadium…you know, lots of batteries and wires when you opened it up (a bomb no doubt!).  Memories!

Commander Gangster (Phil Camp)

When I started running, I was a twenty-five-year-old married veteran. There was one running magazine, which didn’t seem to come often enough. Black and white photographs. Remember I looked at a pic of Phil Camp on the move, six-one, one-fiddy-five, looking like a big-footed mustachioed crane who got startled from behind and I thought, he’s just like me. Except, except I never got fast and couldn’t rock the headband. – JDW

Ok, Jack, hope this is of interest. No head bands or mustaches these days, but I still have my hair!! Running is far more of a social get-together today. I’m not too keen on racing.

When did you start running and why?

My first two years of high school, I didn’t even know there was a cross-country team! I was a puny kid who had to be heads-up on the beach, so some muscle-bound guy wouldn’t kick sand in my face! In the early ’60’s, the JFK Fitness program was being implemented and our PE class was required to do an “endurance” run every Friday.  I was way ahead each week and held the record for my period, so my name appeared on a chalk board in the entrance to the locker room.

The course was 3/4 of a mile around the athletic fields and the track, I was running it around 4:00 minutes. The coach wanted me to come out for track, but my back got screwed up and I could barely walk for a few months. Finally came out for XC in the Fall of ’63.

Yeah, I remember that JFK Fitness Program. Your coach asked you to go out for track, while my coach made me run with the slow girls.

Toughest opponent and why?

Hard to say, a tie between Frank Shorter and Bill Rodgers. I was never really that competitive with Frank and was actually sad when I passed him in the ’80 Trials. He was injured and at that point was just running to finish. I had more of a friendship with Bill. As most people know, he’s a great guy and loves to talk!

I was warming up before the ’82 Seoul International Marathon when I realized there would be no safe place to leave my warm ups. All of the sudden a bus rolled up and a group of elite runners including Bill stepped out! I waved and Bill called out, “Phil, come with me!” We rode a short distance to a school gym, where everyone was assigned a locker for their clothes and we could warm up on a track. The bus took us back to the starting line and we stepped in front of a massive group just before the gun went off. Bill was only pacing his girlfriend at the time and wished me well, I was probably the first uninvited runner in 10th place in a 2:19.

Most memorable run and why? 

The ’79 Marine Marathon was the amazing for me. To win a race put on by our Marine Corps was such an honor for a Navy Lieutenant! I was watching The Today Show (may have been Good Morning America) the next morning and they showed a video clip of the finish and mentioned my name. I was blown away.

Later the Navy sent a Public Affairs Officer and an enlisted photographer, Steve Harris out to Whiting Field where I was assigned as a Flight Instructor. They shot video of me running, taxiing out to fly and actually put the photographer in the front seat of my T-28 for some airborne footage. I did a barrel roll and some aileron rolls with Steve twisting around in the front seat shooting my picture throughout the maneuvers. Steve turned around and finally said, “I think I’ve got enough, Lieutenant!” He was ready to puke!

The Navy Newsreel video was shown throughout the Fleet and a photo of my finish appeared on the inside cover of the Navy’s All Hands magazine. My CO proudly taped a copy of the picture to the door of his office! Later, a “Face in the crowd” award from Sports Illustrated was presented to me by the local Mayor of nearby Milton, FL.

I had a Letter To The Editor in SI once. About the swimsuit issue.

Biggest disappointment and why? 

Missing the Boston Marathon in ’79. I had trained very hard and was really ready for a fast time when I suffered a calf strain some weeks before. Of course, a close friend of mine was able to go and established a PR that he never bested! I finally got to run Boston in ’80 but it was too hot for me and I only ran a 2:21 for 29th.

The 1979 Boston Marathon was a record breaker, there is little doubt.  Fourteen men broke 2:15 (ten had done so in ’78).  Fifty-four went below 2:20, surpassing 1978’s record of 32. Fifty-seven Americans reached the Olympic Trials qualifying standard of 2:21:54 – Frank Shorter, who placed 79th, missed the mark by just two seconds. The once formidable 2:30 barrier was breached by 286 athletes.

The women shattered some marks themselves. For starters, 520 females had qualified for the race by having run sub-3:30.  Here, fifteen bested 2:50′ and 2:55:23 was worth no better than 25th.  Benoit’s record was more than 35 minutes faster than Nina Kuscik’s winning time in 1972.

So, yeah, it was a bit of a flyer, but maybe everybody just got better that year.

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why? 

I would probably have skipped Boston in ’80 and perhaps been stronger for the Olympic Trials, which were a little less than four weeks later. I also regret not running more track meets earlier on and lowering those PR’s.

I always look back and wish I could have done better.

Favorite philosopher?

I really don’t have a favorite philosopher.  I’ve tried to live by a philosophy about doing things today, so that in the future, I won’t have regrets when I look back on my past and say, “I should have tried to do this or that.”

Quote?

“This to shall pass.”

Special song of the era?

“Goodbye, Yellow Brick Road.” I was also a big Cat Steven fan!

Favorite comedian?

Rodney Dangerfield. We were both late bloomers!

Personal records?

880 – 1:57.

Mile – 4:07.6.

2-mile – 8:54.

3-mile – 13:39.

5000m – 14:16.

6 mile – 28:47.

10,000m – 29:57.

1 hour run – 12 miles, 69 yards.

Marathon – 2:13:46.

What was your ‘best stretch of running’?  

1973 to 1980 for the Marathon.

And so why do you think you hit that level at that time?

I think I had finally matured as a runner and gained enough experience to race smarter. Once I got my flight deck running behind me, I became more consistent with my training! I actually had a good stretch running my last three sub-2:20 marathons in ’82, starting with the Manila race against Cierpinski, then winning a race in Taiwan in 2:18 and finishing with the 10th up at Seoul, all in two months.

Unfortunately, as the rainy season was finishing in the Philippines, I made a bad decision to race again in Manila in the heat and high humidity of the dry season. It was a “local” marathon to mark Ferdinand Marcos’s birthday. I had a ten-minute lead with about two blocks to go when I collapsed with heat exhaustion. A close friend of mine, JAG Lieutenant John Rolph came to my aid and called for a medevac flight from Subic Bay. I was so thankful and proud to pin a Navy Commendation Medal on the man who saved my life. How many people get to do that? 

Two blocks to go? That is so gangster. Did John Rolph get the medal for saving you?

Yes, I was taken to a small local clinic in a coma. When my wife arrived, they sent her to a local drug store to buy IV fluids, so they could start treatment. Ultimately, John found me, chased away some local photographers and sent people to bring back ice. He then called our Base in Subic Bay to inform them of my condition and a medevac helicopter was dispatched to the US Embassy to take me to Clark AB. My Squadron Skipper heard about my fate and raced to Clark AB from Subic Bay in record time. He was in the ER when I regained consciousness.

What was your edge?

Everyone used to tell me my long stride was an advantage but hauling around a pair of size 13’s was never an easy task, and now size 14’s at age 71!!!

Because you’re you...Tell me about running in the military, Commander?

I really enjoyed my years in the Navy; I would have stayed beyond my 22 years if I could have. As a Student Naval Aviator, I actually got connected to my current wife when I checked with the Base Recreational Services office to apply for the Inter-Service Track Meet.  When I returned my application, the receptionist handed me a picture of her little sister with a phone number! I finally called her after I returned from the meet. We dated for just over six months and when I finished training, Judy pinned my wings on. I asked her to marry me before I left Pensacola, but it was not meant to be. In 2017, forty-five years later, Judy and I were finally married.

Phil, I am gonna get hate mail from a bunch of old ladies, if we leave a forty-five-year gap in your love life.

I always felt that Judy was the love of my life and I asked her to marry me before I left Pensacola. Years later she would tell me that she was too immature to make the right decision. I think it had a lot to do with her religion. After I left, she started dating another flight student who was baptized in her church. They were married several months later into a loveless unhappy marriage that ended in a divorce seven years later!

By the time I went on my first cruise, I had pretty much given up on dating in the United States. It wasn’t like Tom Cruise in “Top Gun!” I met a beautiful girl in the Philippines, married her and immigrated her to the US. I adopted two Filipino boys, her son and an orphan nephew, but we never had children of our own. Over the years life got more and more stressful with my first wife. I reconnected with Judy and finally divorced my first wife in 2016. Judy and I got married soon after and are very happy together.

I told somebody, the third marriage is the best. My current wife said, then I can hardly wait for my next one.

Running with a Navy shirt always gave me that extra ounce of pride and drew cheers from the sidelines, “Go Navy!” The Navy would fund me to the Inter-Service meets and other National Championship meets. I still had to do my job and compete for promotions by accepting assignments to “enhance” my career, my training runs were done on my own time, usually before or after a long day, especially during my time as a flight instructor.

I trained in a lot of interesting places, considering my eleven years outside the Continental US. While assigned in the Philippines, I was able to compete against Waldemar Cierpinski in the ’82 Manila Marathon. President Ferdinand Marcos wanted to pit Cierpinski against an American Champion, and Bill Rodgers got the invite! Bill told me later there was a bit of a disconnect with the Manila folks because he was already committed to run Tokyo. Bill came to town and made a few appearances with Waldemar and then left for Japan,

I became the uninvited American contender to take on the East German star. Cierpinski and I met running along Manila Bay several weeks ahead of the race. His coach invited me to do a training run the next morning and I gladly accepted. Cierpinski didn’t speak much English but was very pleasant throughout, so we were not strangers during the race.

Running at the head of the pack was nerve racking, motorcycles with sirens and a convertible with Kathy Switzer and a local sportscaster! I stayed with Waldemar for 10k and then backed off to remain in a comfortable second place. He ended up running a 2:14 with me next at 2:19.

Why the headband?  And don’t tell me sweat.  That was a very specific look.

In the early years the headband was to keep the long hair out of my eyes! The latter part of the Vietnam War, Admiral Zumwalt softened a lot of grooming regulations. Longer hair, mustaches and beards were allowed in an effort to enhance the morale of a large number of draftees on active duty. As a young single Naval Officer it was difficult to even get a date with a girl outside of the Officer’s Club. Long hair and bushy mustaches helped us close the gap when competing with the civilian “hip” guys for the affections of the local women! After Zumwalt retired, the draftees were rapidly departing and the regulars tightened up. Beards finally left the scene around ’84.

What was your highest mileage?  Why?

Seventy to 80 miles a week on average. I would do two or three 100-mile weeks in preparation for an upcoming marathon.

I’m surprised in these days of social media how the achievement of total lifetime miles are recognized. When I went out for XC in ’63, no one told me to log those miles. Don’t get me wrong, I’m impressed by how old running pals kept track, especially Mark Covert’s book, Never Missed. I trained to race when I had time to train, wherever I was in the world.

I think I told Amby Burfoot that we have a given number of miles to run and it’s up to us as to how quickly we use them up. Twenty-five, thirty, or fifty-plus years, who knows? These days, running is my daily stress test,

I have two coronary artery stents and got a pacemaker three years ago for Bradycardia, an abnormally low heart rate.. I wear a heart monitor when I run and when I ride my bike! I’m currently healing a strained calf but hope to get back to my 15 – 20 miles weeks very soon. I also ride a road bike to augment my fitness.

Just before I injured my leg, my cardiologist made some adjustments to my pacemaker to the algorithm that controls the rate of how quickly the heart rate increases to a given value. Still a work in progress!

Still a work in progress. Just like me.

I salute you, sir.

Original Gangsters Of Running (Herm Atkins)

For forty years, Herm Atkins has held the distinction of being the fastest native-born black American at the marathon distance. 2:11:52.

But that’s not why he is an Original Gangster. We were at Bloomsday, visiting our friend OG Don Kardong. The field was scary loaded. I asked Herm how he felt he’d do. Have to paraphrase ’cause I am old now, but he said something like – without hesitation – well, Jack, I’m gonna win.

Must admit I expressed surprise. Say what you will, but I was something of an astute observer of the sport. After all, these guys had been beating me like a two-assed mule for years. Have you seen the entry list? I asked him.

He didn’t miss a beat. “If you don’t think you are good enough to win, why bother showing up?”

Herm Atkins always showed up. And I always admired that about him.

When did you start running and why?

I tried out for football in 10^th grade in Seattle as a 113-pound running back, and I didn’t last very long. I was then directed into running by the high school gym teacher where I discovered I had some talent, and I blossomed into a very good distance runner in my senior year. I enjoyed it, and it gave me a great deal of confidence.

Toughest opponent and why?

As I got into elite running, all the opponents were tough. I found that the late Steve Prefontaine was the most intimidating. But I sought out the competition because I knew it would bring out the best in me.

Most memorable run and why?

I think the most memorable race was when I won the state cross-country championships race in high school and continued to improve. I say that because it opened the door for me to continue my education after high school and improve my running skills at the collegiate level.

Biggest disappointment and why?

Missing the 1980 Olympic Marathon trials due to a stress fracture. I had trained very hard and prepared for that race and I was looking forward to winning a position on the marathon team. The stress fracture was due to increasing my training to 140 miles a week. As I look back on it, my best performances were when I maintained 75 quality miles a week.

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why?

After college I basically coached myself. I think if I had to do it again I would get input from someone else who could evaluate my progress. I also probably would have started running marathons at a lot younger age. My first marathon was at age 27. I think I would also have remained a track athlete. After the 1976 trials, I dropped track & field and got into road racing.

What was your highest weekly mileage?  Why? 

In early 1980 I got up to 140 miles a week, thinking it would improve my performance.  I was wrong. I ended up with a stress fracture and missed the marathon trials later that year.

What about the occasion(s) when you had to run down a perp??  

On one that was a shoplift, I ran after the guy. I got up behind him and said, “You want to keep running? I could do this all day.”  He just stopped. The goal was not to catch the bad guy too soon.  Let him or her tire out, so you would not have to fight them. Most bad guys are not in great shape. A short run would take the fight right out of them.

Favorite philosopher?  Quote?

If we go by quotes, I guess I would say President Teddy Roosevelt.

“Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure … than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.”

You can probably guess who holds the Everett, Washington, Police Department’s record for the 1.5 mile fitness test. 7:07. The fastest native-born black American cop. What about the occasion(s) when you may have had to run down a perp??

On one that was a shoplift, I ran after the guy. I got up behind him and said, “You want to keep running? I could do this all day.”  He just stopped. The goal was not to catch the bad guy too soon.  Let him or her tire out, so you would not have to fight them. Most bad guys are not in great shape, so a short run would take the fight out of them.

Special song of the era?

“On the Road Again” by Willie Nelson.

Favorite comedian?

Redd Foxx.

What was your ‘best stretch of running’?

I think between 1975 to 1979. In 1979 I placed 2^nd in San Blas Half Marathon behind Miruts Yifter of Ethiopia. I later ran Boston and placed 9^th, and I ran a very good marathon at Nike OTC at 2:11:52.

And so why do you think you hit that level at that time?

I was training with a group of guys at University of Washington who complimented each other.

Of course, just living in the northwest where many great distance runners come from … Gerry Lindgren, Steve Prefontaine, Doris Brown Heritage, Don Kardong … to name a few.

Original Gangsters Of Running all.

2019 National Black Distance Running Hall Of Fame Honoree

Herman Atkins (Everett, WA)

• Placed 5^th at Nike/Oregon Track Club Marathon in a time of 2:11:52 on September 9, 1979. The fastest marathon by a native-born Black American.
• One mile best of 4:04.
• my PR for a 2-mile was 8:40 and a 400-meter best of 49 seconds.
• 1973 – 5,000 meters 13:43.
• 1977 – First marathon 2:18.
• 1977 – Second place Honolulu Marathon 2:20:54.
• 1979 – Ninth place Boston Marathon 2:14:27.
• 1980 – Nike/OTC Marathon 2:15:09.
• 1981 – Houston Marathon 2:17:22.
• 1984 – Men’s Olympic Marathon Trials 2:19;45.
• 1993 – Led Snohomish Track Club to a National Masters Cross-Country 10K Championship. Herm clocked 32:28.

Personal Bests

Type	Distance	Time	Flags	Site	Date	Actions
RD	10 km	29:29.8	Everett WA/USA	23 Sep 1979
RD	15 km	45:40	Portland OR/USA	24 Jun 1979
RD	20 km	1:06:19	Snohomish WA/USA	19 Mar 1972
RD	Half Mara	1:05:51	Coamo PUR	04 Feb 1979
RD	Marathon	2:11:52	Eugene OR/USA	09 Sep 1979

Original Gangsters Of Running (Doris Brown Heritage)

I can’t run. I walk as hard as I can and imagine I am running. Like an intramural mindmeld. Sometimes I imagine I’m running trails with giants.

One day recently, I asked myself, clipping along at an imaginary sub-six minute pace, what if you could take a run with Doris Brown Heritage or Steven Roland Prefontaine, what questions would you ask?

Don’t really have a question for Pre except, won’t you please call Uber next time? But there is no next time, is there? Hate that a lot.

Imagined we were both dead, because that’s what virtual running is like. At least for me. Floating along at a pace I could hardly accomplish in real life a half century ago. Your experience may vary.

Pre does most of the talking, He’s something of a chatterbox.

One morning – the new puppy trying my patience – I decided to run with somebody I didn’t know, had never met and admired since the very beginning. Doris Brown Heritage. Talk about your joyful warrior.

And the first thing she says to me is, “I’m not dead.”

So I made a call. And she made a call. And pretty soon, I get a call and it’s her. DBH. 
I imagine her smiling. She’s feeling less than spiffy. I still imagine her smiling.

It seems you know the climate of our sport when Jacqueline Hansen and I were lively athletes and I could speak openly about that time.  It was a good time but also difficult. I am still a little unsettled  from it.… in some respects.

Something caught in my throat. She is after all the woman who is said to have said, “When you put yourself on the line in a race and expose yourself to the unknown, you learn things about yourself that are very exciting.”

Running is a road to self-awareness and reliance – you can push yourself to extremes and learn the harsh reality of your physical and mental limitations or coast quietly down a solitary path watching the earth spin beneath your feet. – DBH.

Thank you for inviting me into your “Original Gangsters of Running” It is an honor. Here are my “off the top” responses to your questions.

When did you start running and why?

From childhood, I have always run…started when I commenced walking at about one year of age. The neighbors suggested to my mom that she put me on a leash! Through the years I just loved to run everywhere I went. When other kids rode their horses and bikes, I ran along.

While in High School I had a summer job on a playground. I was young enough to enter a Park Department meet with the kids in Tacoma, WA. The events were 50- and 75-yard sprints and also the Long Jump. That was my first competition. There were no longer races. I really loved the long jump. An elderly man who was at that event saw the need for girls to have a team, I was ready! My folks weren’t…plenty of work at home on the farm. But soon after they did let me join.

My first meet was in Vancouver, B.C. I did the long jump and 440. Our team didn’t have workouts given us but we met on Sundays after church and I did whatever events they did…a few starts, jumps and a 440 after they were done. At home I daily charged down the road 440 yards, rested a bit, and hammered back home, feeling sick with bad cramps. I didn’t know why until after visiting our doctor and learning about warming up and cooling down. That is about what I did until going to the 1960 Olympic Trials and going to the USA Team Training Camp and learning about intervals and more from Junar Bellew and Ed Temple, the coaches.

Toughest opponent and why?

Probably me! I loved to run and actually was training in a way. I ran everywhere on our beach, in our woods, lots of miles. But in those days that was not “training”. But I had success early on and so felt a lot of pressure to keep doing well for those who believed in me and to be a “good example” for the rest.

As an individual opponent? A Russian athlete or three. Lyudmila Bragina was one who always caught me at the finish line. Not surprising as the 800m was the longest Olympic race then for women, and I was enjoying my “natural ability” as an endurance individual and didn’t have the fast twitch muscles or specific training to be quick. And I used no drugs.

Most memorable run and why?

The first World Cross-Country Championships for women took place in Barry, Wales, in 1967. I went with my coach Dr. Ken Foreman and I unexpectedly won! With all those famous male athletes so excited for me and welcoming to us female athletes! The future looked great for a USA Team the following year in Blackburn, England, and we won, travelling again at our own expense.

“Traveling again at our own expense.” Ah, yes, the good old days.

Also, the first indoor track mile in Vancouver B.C. My coach Dr. Foreman was also there and a couple of Falcon Track Club teammates. Again, an unexpected win for me and a new World Record. I became the first woman in the world to break the five-minute mile barrier for women on an indoor track. I loved the high banked tight turns! Again, it seemed it would lead to increased opportunities for U.S. women.

Biggest disappointments and why?

1960. I didn’t make the Olympic Team trip to Rome, as none of us met the qualifying standard. Only one athlete got to go and I was runner-up. Out of luck by 1/100th of a second. 00.01.

1964. I had a broken foot and could not race well.

1968. I finally qualified and actually had the fastest time going in, but was impeded by another athlete on the final turn, lost my rhythm and again felt disappointed but challenged for 1972.

1972. Finally, a 1500 Olympic opportunity for women. But on the way to the starting line from the practice track under the stadium when we were marching in for our race, I stepped on a small section of curbing that was loose and did not see as I was walking behind another athlete,and tore my perennial tendon and broke five bones in my foot. They taped me up and numbed my foot but I could not run.

These were the BIG OBVIOUS disappointments. Others that hurt Badly in other ways had to do with our Federation’s unfair treatment of athletes, especially female athletes and more so distance runners.

What would you do differently if you could do it again? Why?

I can’t answer this quickly right now (relates to the above comment) I prefer to look back on a wonderful “Journey”, even though the precise goals were not often achieved. The real stuff of the journey was beyond expectation. Friendships, travel, a vocation and avocation, satisfactions like knowing the rewards of tough and enduring efforts. Realizing results, both in running and gains for those who would come after me. Of late I have also continued to be humbled by what has come my way as a result of vision, effort and maybe just stubborn striving alongside others, for what athletes (especially women athletes) should have coming to them.

I stayed positive through many untimely injuries, injustices, whatever. I stuck to being a good role model, trying to see what was of service to others, hoping my running, coaching and speaking would open up opportunities to impact local, national and international athletic organizations.

More to the question of “do differently?” Should I have been more aggressive, more outspoken, more of a troublemaker for the Federation? Fortunately, in our pack of individuals who put the causes ahead of our personal desires and plans, others were more adept at other aspects of accomplishing what needed to happen. I don’t feel I did less than my part. My coach Dr. Ken Foreman and I always tried to be honest, fair. Probably quite naïve, too. We always fulfilled our Seattle Pacific University responsibilities and squeezed in many “causes” that kept us from personal gains. Which I don’t regret.

I do feel Coach Foreman sacrificed too heavily, but that was the case for the few who will get their reward in heaven.

What was your “best stretch” of running?

1966 to 1972. Cross-country was “my thing.” DBH won the world cross country championships from 1967 to 1972 — the first five years in which this international competition took place.

That’s when our efforts for endurance competitions were commencing on the track. Races were getting longer and I seemed more able to meet the challenges as a female runner, teacher and coach. Honestly, I feel God inspired me to rise to the continuous challenges.

That’s when I finally qualified – or was noticed – to be selected to the U.S.A. teams and my competitive efforts allowed me to have a voice in our sport. It lead to my election to some committees. I could represent not only active athletes in track and X-C, but also several other sports organizations. I coached men and women when they were NAIA, NCAA and, a short time, the women’s AIAW organization, as well as being active the PNWAC.

My edge?

My love of running and all it brings is my lifestyle. I just want more of it, so I hang on for what will come next.

Stubbornness – Never Give Up. Accepting the challenge against the odds. And being dedicated, disciplined, and worked toward being my best self by honoring God and by serving others.

Favorite philosopher?

What quickly comes to mind while on this subject of running is George Sheehan. My coach Dr. Ken Foreman was equally a philosopher and had a philosophy I live by and is a part of his legacy.

The short version is the acronym: REACH.

R – Risk. E – Expect. A – Act. C – Choose. H – Hustle.

Also, the Bible philosophers who wrote Psalms, Proverbs and James. These men really said it all. King David was the best of examples of what men (and women) can live by.

Special song of the era?

Can’t think of one now. Wagner’s “Ride of the Valkyries.” Maybe not of this era but it never gets old for me. The theme from “Chariots of Fire” maybe.

Favorite comedian?

Bill Cosby. He was a friend of athletes at the time.

Found that response, ummm, surprising. Impolitic, in fact. Had to ask her if she had a second favorite. No joke.

I have to ask for more about your Bill Cosby answer to favorite comedian. Given that he’s in prison for numerous sexual assaults… Do you want to explain further why you name him as your favorite? Would another comic also be a good answer? I sincerely truly want to make certain you are okay with the Cosby answer.

Bill Cosby WAS my favorite comedian and I don’t have a new one that comes to mind.  I knew him as he spent time with us at Indoor and Outdoor track meets.  He had a fine family TV show. His humor was healthy and he had tapes (in the old days) about his past time as a student athlete I enjoyed.

“I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.” Bill Cosby said that back in the day.

And Doris Brown Heritage is still full of life. I imagine I will imagine running again with her real soon.

The USATF Hall Of Fame.

A pioneer in women’s distance running, Doris Brown Heritage won the world cross country championships from 1967 to 1972 — the first five years in which this international competition took place. Undeterred by the obstacles women faced in the sport during those years, she had already developed her versatility as a runner. After being barred from even using the school track while she was in Peninsula High School, she joined a local running club and set a national record in the 440-yard dash. She next trained for the 800 meters — the longest event then on the Olympic program for women — and finished third at the 1960 Trials. 

Unfortunately, her time didn’t qualify her for the Rome Olympics. That year, she entered Seattle Pacific College and began running with the men’s team. A broken foot kept her off the 1964 Olympic team, but she pressed ahead. In 1966, she became the first women to run a sub-5 minute mile indoors, clocking 4:52. By the following year, she began her string of five world cross country championships. In 1968, she finished fifth in the 800 meters at the Mexico City Olympics. She set world records at 3000m and two miles during 1971, and that year, took a silver medal in the 800m at the Pan American Games.

In all, she represented the U.S. on nine world cross country teams and won 14 national titles. An outstanding distance running coach at Seattle Pacific University, she was named an assistant coach for the U.S. women’s team at the 1984 Olympics and 1987 Outdoor World Championships. She is also the first female member of the Cross Country and Road Running Committee of the IAAF, the world’s governing body for the sport. In addition, Heritage is a member of the Distance Running Hall of Fame and the National Track Coaches Hall of Fame.

Records Held
World Record: 3,000 m – 9:26.90 (July 7, 1971)
World Record: 2 mi. – 10:07 (July 7, 1971)

Events
800 m – 2:02.20
1,500 m – 4:14.40
3,000 m – 9:46.90
2 mi. – 10:07 

Championships
1968 Olympics: 800 m (5th)
1968 & 1971 Pan Am Games: 800 m (2nd)

https://www.runnersworld.com/news/a20850905/50-years-ago-doris-brown-put-u-s-womens-distance-running-on-the-map/ hMarch 21, 2019JDWRunning Free

Original Gangsters Of Running (Bob Hodge)

“Always good to count your blessings.” – B.H.

When did you start running and why?

I was a Frosh in high school Phys. Ed. The teacher suggested I try out for cross country when he saw my speed on the base paths in our pick-up baseball games. Of course, I had no idea what XC was but after my first race – the frosh/soph division of the CMI Invite at famed Franklin Park course – I was hooked.

Toughest opponent and why?

That is a tough one ‘cause on any given day, it is just that guy you happen to be up against and then it mostly came down to you. How well prepared I was and how badly did I want to conquer.

My own teammates on GBTC (Greater Boston Track Club) Rodgers, Meyer, Dillon, Salazar, Mahoney, Fleming, Thomas, Roche. As much as we worked together to succeed, we also were competitive with each other. But not in workouts; generally only in important races.

Most memorable run and why?

Beppu Marathon in Japan in 1982, a race I won by seven seconds. I am one of only a few Americans to win a “major” marathon in Japan, along with Shorter and Rodgers. The marathon is a big deal in Japan and it was an unforgettable experience.

Biggest disappointment and why?

1980 Olympic Boycott. In 1978, when I decided to dedicate myself to athletics for some period of time. I was thinking almost more about the 1984 Games because I thought it might take that long to develop. That all changed when I finished third at Boston in 1979 in my second marathon and ran 16 minutes faster than my personal best. I ran 2:12:30 and was ranked 7th in the country by the Bible of the Sport (Track & Field News) and after that I wanted to do everything I possibly could to make that ’80 Team.

I was in Florida winter/spring ’79, when I first heard about the boycott and that really burst my naive bubble. I did not run the Trials because I did not want to be complicit.

What would you do differently if you could do it again? Why?

Well, I made plenty of mistakes and generally learned from them, so then I was growing in athletics. Even though we had a great coach in Bill Squires, we still were mostly individuals on our own. We raced a lot, which generally fit well into my training, was fun and I came home with a check or a blender or something like that.

Sometimes you need to say, whoa! and step back, be more analytical, but I was flying by the seat of my pants. I was whimsical and, if something felt right, I did it. But I can’t really say I would change anything. I was blessed.

Running is so different today when Galen Rupp runs maybe six races a year and spends the rest of the time in the lab with Alberto. It may have garnered him Olympic medals but would it hurt to compete in some races across America? Not barnstorming like his coach did or Bill Rodgers, but enough to let America see its best athletes in action on the road race carnival circuit.

I think it would help a helluva a lot if Galen took a shot at Falmouth and Peachtree and Bay-To-Breakers and Beach-To-Beacon or wherever.

Favorite philosopher? Quote?

Uncle Walt Whitman.

Do poets count? [Poets always count. – ed.]

“Though much is taken, much abides; and though

We are not now that strength which in old days

Moved earth and heaven, that which we are, we are;

One equal temper of heroic hearts,

Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will

To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.” – Tennyson

“I tramp the perpetual journey

My signs are a rain-proof coat, good shoes, and a staff cut from the woods,

No friend of mine takes his ease in my chair,

I have no chair, no philosophy,

I lead no man to a dinner-table, library, exchange,

But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll,

My left hand hooking you round the waist,

My right hand pointing to landscapes of continents and the public road.

Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you,

You must travel it for yourself.” – Whitman

Special song of the era?

So many….. “Tuff Enuff.” Fabulous Thunderbirds.

Favorite comedian?

Bill Murray. “Whatever you do, always give 100%. Unless you’re donating blood.”

What was your ‘best stretch of running’? And so why do you think you hit that level at that time?

1978-1988 all had their ups and downs. I ran my marathon PR 2:10:59 in the spring of 1980, then I had the most serious injury of my career in the fall of ’80.

I hung in and had very good years in ’82, when I won Beppu and finished 5th at Fukuoka in 2:11:52. I also ran well on the track, finishing 5th at Nationals in 28:44 for the 10K and competing in the USA vs. USSR Meet. In ’84, I ran 28:24, placing 5th at Penn Relays.

I was running very well in ’84, preparing for the Marathon Trial, end of May, but I may have peaked too soon. Or the allergies I was having problems with at the time led to more fatigue. I finished 17th at the Trial in 2:18. Very disappointing. In ’87, I made my first World Cross team and in ’88, I finished 7th in the marathon trial.

Consistency was the key to everything. Definitely could have benefited from good, accessible, physical therapy and health care for treatment and recovery from injuries and illnesses.

What was your edge?

Generally just believing in myself. Not getting down in the dumps too much over a bad performance or too high over a good one.

Most mileage in a week? Why did you do that?

146. I think just to find my red line. Average for me was about 100 a week.

Personal Bests

Type	Distance	Time	Flags	Site	Date	Actions
RD	5 km	14:27		n/a USA	25 Jun 1989
RD	10 km	29:00		Purchase NY/USA	23 Sep 1978
RD	15 km	44:19		Minneapolis MN/USA	16 Sep 1978
RD	10 mi	48:02		Washington DC/USA	30 Mar 1980
RD	20 km	1:00:44		Holliston MA/USA	04 Mar 1979
RD	Half Mara	1:04:06		New Bedford MA/USA	20 Mar 1988
RD	25 km	1:21:35		Gloucester MA/USA	02 Sep 1991
RD	30 km	1:35:59		Ome JPN	17 Feb 1980
RD	Marathon	2:10:59		Eugene OR/USA	07 Sep 1980
OT	3 km	8:13.9		Dedham MA/USA	25 Jun 1988
OT	5 km	14:02.4		Dedham MA/USA	11 Jun 1988
OT	10 km	28:24.6		Philadelphia PA/USA	26 Apr 1984
IT	5 km	14:06.41		Dartmouth NH/USA	10 Jan 1987

Https://Tonireavis.Com/2015/12/31/Forty-Years-Ago-On-New-Years-Day/

Performances

Date	Finish	Time	Flags	Type	Distance	Site	Race	Prize money	Actions
27 May 2006	25?	32:36		XC	6.9 km	Princeton MA/USA	Wachusett Mountain
30 Sep 2000	9	1:01:03		RD	10 mi	Harvard MA/USA	Apple Harvest
15 Nov 1998	13	27:31		XC	7.935 km	Boston MA/USA	USATF New England Crosscountry Masters Champs
25 Oct 1998	85	27:40		XC	8 km	Boston MA/USA	Boston Mayor’s Cup Crosscountry
20 Jun 1998	12	1:09:54	a	RD	12.3 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Road Race
24 May 1998	7	27:01		XC	6.9 km	Princeton MA/USA	Wachusett Mountain
21 Jun 1997	22	1:14:08	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Road Race
15 Jun 1996	14	1:10:17	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Road Race	$150
07 Sep 1992	1	1:26:04		RD	25 km	Gloucester MA/USA	Around Cape Ann
24 May 1992	1	2:22:11		RD	Marathon	Burlington VT/USA	Vermont City
14 Dec 1991	1	2:22:46		RD	Marathon	Huntsville AL/USA	Rocket City	$1,500
30 Nov 1991	73	31:15		XC	10 km	Boston MA/USA	US Crosscountry Championships
10 Nov 1991	3	24:14		RD	5 mi	n/a MA/USA	Alamo Alumni Run
02 Sep 1991	2	1:21:35		RD	25 km	Gloucester MA/USA	Around Cape Ann
15 Jun 1991	3	1:05:32	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Road Race
06 Oct 1990	12	14:51		RD	5 km	Nashville TN/USA	Music City Championship
11 Aug 1990	23	30:48		RD	10 km	Asbury Park NJ/USA	Asbury Park Classic
16 Jun 1990	10	1:07:35	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Hill Climb
12 Nov 1989	12	2:16:51		RD	Marathon	Columbus OH/USA	Columbus	$800
15 Oct 1989	3	30:26		RD	10 km	Worcester MA/USA	Worcester
24 Sep 1989	3	46:08		RD	15 km	Wilton NH/USA	Wilton Road Race	$250
26 Aug 1989	6	29:46		RD	10 km	Exeter NH/USA	Blue Cross/Blue Shield Kiwanis Charity Classic
20 Aug 1989	25	33:56	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
29 Jul 1989	22	34:13		RD	11.27 km	Davenport IA/USA	Bix
25 Jun 1989	3	14:27		RD	5 km	n/a USA	NEAC Road Championships
24 Jun 1989	2	1:03:01	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington Road Race	$300
25 Jun 1988	7	8:13.9		OT	3 km	Dedham MA/USA	Metrowest Twilight Meeting
17 Jun 1988	14	14:28.15		OT	5 km	Tampa FL/USA	TAC Mobil Championships
11 Jun 1988	19	14:02.4		OT	5 km	Dedham MA/USA	NEAC All-Comers
28 May 1988	8	1:04:45		RD	20 km	Wheeling WV/USA	Elby’s Distance Classic	$400
24 Apr 1988	7	2:16:56		RD	Marathon	Jersey City NJ/USA	US Men’s Olympic Trials	$6,000
09 Apr 1988	7	44:59		RL	15 km	New York NY/USA	Asics Cup America’s Ekiden- Leg 5	$3,600
20 Mar 1988	8	1:04:06		RD	Half Mara	New Bedford MA/USA	New Bedford	$450
06 Dec 1987	8	2:21:25	a	RD	Marathon	Sacramento CA/USA	California International	$250
26 Nov 1987	1	23:50		RD	5 mi	Boston MA/USA	Jordan Marsh	$1,000
04 Oct 1987	3	23:21		RD	5 mi	Lowell MA/USA	Jim Witt 5 Star
27 Sep 1987	1	46:07		RD	15 km	Wilton NH/USA	Wilton	$1,000
26 Jun 1987	9	28:56.95		OT	10 km	San Jose CA/USA	USA Mobil Outdoor Championships
20 Jun 1987	1	1:01:14	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mt Washington	$350
25 May 1987	24	30:52		RD	10 km	Boulder CO/USA	Bolder Boulder	$244
24 Apr 1987	3	28:29.8		OT	10 km	Philadelphia PA/USA	Penn Relays- Olympic Development
29 Mar 1987	34	32:47		XC	9.5 km	San Vittore Olona ITA	Cinque Mulini
22 Mar 1987	198	40:13		XC	12 km	Warsaw POL	IAAF World Crosscountry Championships
14 Feb 1987	6	37:37		XC	12 km	Dallas TX/USA	US Crosscountry Trials	$1,000
10 Jan 1987	2	14:06.41		IT	5 km	Dartmouth NH/USA	Dartmouth Relays
09 Nov 1986	18	24:13		RD	5 mi	Salem NH/USA	Screen Road Race
12 Oct 1986	9	2:15:56		RD	Marathon	Saint Paul MN/USA	Twin Cities	$2,200
14 Sep 1986	20	1:04:59		RD	Half Mara	Philadelphia PA/USA	Philadelphia Distance Run
05 Sep 1986	6	28:53.87		OT	10 km	Brussels BEL	Ivo vanDamme Memorial Meeting
17 Aug 1986	16	33:32	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Puma Falmouth Road Race	$450
21 Apr 1986	6	2:14:50	a	RD	Marathon	Boston MA/USA	Boston	$8,500
06 Apr 1986	15	48:15		RD	10 mi	Washington DC/USA	Nike Cherry Blossom
16 Mar 1986	6	1:04:46		RD	Half Mara	New Bedford MA/USA	New Bedford
01 Feb 1986	3	2:15:57		RD	Marathon	Auckland NZL	Wang New Zealand
30 Nov 1985	27	32:14		XC	10 km	Raleigh NC/USA	TAC Crosscountry Championships
06 Oct 1985	8	38:18		RD	12.87 km	Boston MA/USA	Freedom Trail
14 Jul 1985	3	1:03:15		RD	20 km	Ames IA/USA	Midnight Madness
22 Jun 1985	1	1:01:32	a	RD	12.2 km	Gorham NH/USA	Mount Washington Road Race
25 May 1985	10	1:03:40		RD	20 km	Wheeling WV/USA	Elby’s Distance Race
25 Apr 1985	5	29:01.9		OT	10 km	Philadelphia PA/USA	Penn Relays
01 Dec 1984	1	29:50		RD	10 km	San Diego CA/USA	American Trails
04 Nov 1984	5	2:27:03		RD	Marathon	Newport RI/USA	Ocean State
07 Oct 1984	4	23:01		RD	5 mi	Salem NH/USA	Salem Screen Printers
30 Sep 1984	5	37:52		RD	12.87 km	Boston MA/USA	Freedom Trail
03 Sep 1984	5	1:01:19		RD	20 km	New Haven CT/USA	New Haven Road Race
26 Aug 1984	27	34:06	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
19 Aug 1984	5	23:06		RD	5 mi	Agawam MA/USA	Riverside Twilight
08 Jun 1984	DNF	DNF		OT	10 km	San Jose CA/USA	TAC Championships
26 May 1984	17	2:18:10	a	RD	Marathon	Buffalo NY/USA	US Olympic Trials
13 May 1984	4	48:36		RD	10 mi	Worcester MA/USA	Charlie’s Surplus
26 Apr 1984	5	28:24.6		OT	10 km	Philadelphia PA/USA	Penn Relays- Open
17 Mar 1984	8	28:53.7		OT	10 km	Eugene OR/USA	Oregon Invitational
26 Feb 1984	1	48:57		RD	10 mi	Amherst MA/USA	RRCA Championships
19 Feb 1984	17	36:48		XC	12 km	East Rutherford NJ/USA	US Crosscountry Trials
15 Jan 1984	22	2:17:33		RD	Marathon	Houston TX/USA	Houston
26 Nov 1983	55	31:01		XC	10 km	State College PA/USA	TAC Crosscountry Championships
20 Nov 1983	3	23:52		RD	5 mi	Fitchburg MA/USA	Slattery’s Turkey Trot
12 Nov 1983	1	1:08:41		RD	Half Mara	Lowell MA/USA	Lowell Elks
06 Nov 1983	9	29:56	a	RD	10 km	Boston MA/USA	Purity Supreme Heartbreak Hill
16 Oct 1983	40	2:25:27		RD	Marathon	Chicago IL/USA	America’s
18 Sep 1983	4	30:59		RD	10 km	Warwick RI/USA	Warwick
05 Sep 1983	4	1:01:44		RD	20 km	New Haven CT/USA	New Haven
21 Aug 1983	10	33:12	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
07 Aug 1983	5	23:11		RD	5 mi	Agawam MA/USA	Riverside Park Twilight
23 Jul 1983	4	36:04		RD	12 km	Itasca IL/USA	Crain’s Challenge
18 Apr 1983	95	2:21:01	a	RD	Marathon	Boston MA/USA	Boston
27 Feb 1983	8	1:34:58	x	RD	30 km	Nagoya JPN	Chunichi Speed
05 Dec 1982	5	2:11:53		RD	Marathon	Fukuoka JPN	Fukuoka
28 Nov 1982	9	29:26		XC	10 km	East Brunswick NJ/USA	TAC Crosscountry Championships
13 Nov 1982	1	1:08:16		RD	Half Mara	Lowell MA/USA	Lowell Elks
31 Oct 1982	3	29:05		RD	10 km	Bangor ME/USA	Benjamin’s
09 Oct 1982	9	45:31		RD	15 km	El Paso TX/USA	Crimestoppers
06 Sep 1982	7	1:00:27	x	RD	20 km	New Haven CT/USA	New Haven Road Race
15 Aug 1982	9	33:13	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
08 Aug 1982	2	22:47		RD	5 mi	Agawam MA/USA	Riverside Twilight
20 Jun 1982	5	28:44.3		OT	10 km	Knoxville TN/USA	TAC Championships
23 May 1982	4	46:01		RD	15 km	Fayetteville NY/USA	Dynamis
09 May 1982	2	49:33		RD	10 mi	Worcester MA/USA	Charlie’s Surplus
02 May 1982	5	49:53		RD	10 mi	Lawrence MA/USA	Eagle Tribune
04 Apr 1982	3	29:30		RD	10 km	Boston MA/USA	Boston Milk Run
14 Mar 1982	5	48:23		RD	10 mi	Cherry Hill NJ/USA	Nike New Jersey
07 Feb 1982	1	2:15:43		RD	Marathon	Beppu JPN	Beppu-Oita
25 Oct 1981	24	2:15:33.1	a x	RD	Marathon	New York NY/USA	New York City
10 Oct 1981	1	57:10	x	RD	20 km	The Woodlands TX/USA	TAC Championships
07 Sep 1981	4	1:00:39	x	RD	20 km	New Haven CT/USA	New Haven
16 Aug 1981	18	33:51	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
21 Jun 1981	DNF	DNF		OT	10 km	Sacramento CA/USA	TAC/Mobil Championships
03 May 1981	5	36:36		RD	12.35 km	Spokane WA/USA	Lilac Bloomsday
14 Mar 1981	9	45:25		RD	15 km	Jacksonville FL/USA	River Run
05 Oct 1980	4	37:54		RD	12.875 km	Boston MA/USA	Freedom Trail
07 Sep 1980	2	2:10:59		RD	Marathon	Eugene OR/USA	Nike-OTC
23 Aug 1980	1	1:02:35		RD	20 km	Concord NH/USA	TAC Championships
17 Aug 1980	4	32:39	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
20 Jul 1980	8	1:11:10		RD	Half Mara	Orleans MA/USA	Natural Light Orleans
15 Jun 1980	1	1:04:29	a	RD	12.875 km	Gorham NH/USA	Mount Washington
08 Jun 1980	1	34:40		RD	11.265 km	Litchfield CT/USA	Litchfield Hills
18 May 1980	3	36:29	a	RD	12 km	San Francisco CA/USA	Bay to Breakers
21 Apr 1980	DNF	DNF	a	RD	Marathon	Boston MA/USA	Boston
30 Mar 1980	6	48:02		RD	10 mi	Washington DC/USA	Cherry Blossom
15 Mar 1980	1	44:54		RD	15 km	Jacksonville FL/USA	River Run
17 Feb 1980	11	1:35:59		RD	30 km	Ome JPN	Ome-Hochi
01 Jan 1980	3	44:00.2		OT	15 km	Palo Alto CA/USA	Runner’s World Invitational
24 Nov 1979	3	30:52		XC	10 km	Raleigh NC/USA	AAU Championships
29 Sep 1979	15	29:37		RD	10 km	Purchase NY/USA	Diet Pepsi
16 Sep 1979	6	37:51		RD	12.875 km	Boston MA/USA	Hood Freedom Trail Run
01 Sep 1979	1	29:11		RD	10 km	Kingfield ME/USA	Kingfield
07 Jul 1979	1=	24:31		RD	5 mi	North Falmouth MA/USA	North Falmouth
17 Jun 1979	1	1:02:08	a	RD	12.23 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mount Washington Road Race
10 Jun 1979	2	35:42		RD	11.265 km	Litchfield CT/USA	Litchfield
20 May 1979	1	36:50		RD	12 km	San Francisco CA/USA	Bay to Breakers
16 Apr 1979	3	2:12:31	a	RD	Marathon	Boston MA/USA	Boston
01 Apr 1979	4	1:02:54		RD	20 km	Atlanta GA/USA	Nike US Club Road Racing Championships
04 Mar 1979	2	1:00:44		RD	20 km	Holliston MA/USA	AAU Championships
25 Nov 1978	14	30:25		XC	10 km	Seattle WA/USA	AAU Men’s Crosscountry Championships
01 Oct 1978	5	38:21		RD	12.875 km	Boston MA/USA	Labatt’s Freedom Trail
23 Sep 1978	4	29:00		RD	10 km	Purchase NY/USA	Run America Run
16 Sep 1978	3	44:19		RD	15 km	Minneapolis MN/USA	Nike Challenge
20 Aug 1978	8	33:12	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
13 Aug 1978	2	37:16		RD	12.4 km	Chelmsford MA/USA	Chelmsford
05 Aug 1978	2	30:39		RD	10 km	Duxbury MA/USA	Gurnet Classic Beach Run
04 Jul 1978	12	30:11	a	RD	10 km	Atlanta GA/USA	Peachtree
18 Jun 1978	1	1:04:13	a	RD	12.2 km	Gorham NH/USA	Mount Washington Road Race
19 Jun 1977	1	1:04:44	a	RD	12.2 km	Gorham NH/USA	Mount Washington
18 Apr 1977	46	2:28:45	a	RD	Marathon	Boston MA/USA	Boston
15 Aug 1976	7	34:32	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
19 Jun 1976	1	1:05:31	a	RD	11.2 km	Gorham NH/USA	Mount Washington
28 Mar 1976	7	1:34:03	a x	RD	30 km	Albany NY/USA	Bankathon
26 Oct 1975	6	1:02:56		RD	20 km	West Roxbury MA/USA	National AAU Championships
17 Aug 1975	5	35:51	a	RD	11.265 km	Falmouth MA/USA	Falmouth Road Race
16 Jun 1974	14	1:15:42		RD	12.2 km	Pinkham Notch NH/USA	Mount Washington
22 Nov 1973	6	23:17		RD	7.64 km	Manchester CT/USA	Manchester Road Race

Original Gangsters Of Running (Hal Higdon)

“There is no such thing as an average runner. We are all above average.”

Nearly a half century ago, I read Hal Higdon’s On The Run From Dogs and People. Had already decided I wanted to be a fast runner and a published writer and here was proof it could be done. Never got fast and I am not willing to say Hal Higdon got me started – he didn’t – but he certainly suggested distance running could be a good place to spend the rest of my life. Writing, too. – JDW

Sports Illustrated August 09, 1971

A LONG-DISTANCE RUNNER IS SAVED FROM LONELINESS BY DOGS, COPS AND WISE GUYS

 BY ROBERT CANTWELL

Half of Hal Higdon’s On the Run from Dogs and People (Regnery, $5.95) is made up of explanations and anecdotes intended to show the non-runner how interesting long-distance running really is. You stride along the street in shorts and T shirt in the early morning or late evening, trying to get in shape for the next race. Strangers shout encouraging remarks such as “Late for work again?” or “Where did you leave your pants?” Sometimes a police car pulls up ahead and officers emerge, saying, “Stop where you are!” Runners have been mistaken for heavyweight contenders doing their roadwork, and for the Nude Burglar, who terrified the town of Evanston, Ill. because he stripped off his clothes and laughed hideously as he looted houses.

It is unwise to train by running past prison farms or mental hospitals. Country roads are better, though a distance runner in Florida was once pursued by turkey gobblers. Horses seem to be indifferent to the sight of a man running along a road. Dogs, however, are prone to dart from porches, yards and hedges, snarling and growling.

Higdon himself was once chewed by a sneaky German shepherd that came up on him from behind and did not even bark. And yet, he says wonderingly, the dogs along the route of the Boston Marathon do not do anything when as many as 1,300 runners stream past. They sit on the porches and watch, mesmerized.

The latter half of On the Run is a mildly facetious account of Higdon’s own distance career. He tells how he began in childhood winning a money prize in a sack race (which he fears made him technically a professional ever since), took up track in high school and in his junior year at Carleton College won the mile and the 880 in the Midwest Conference championships. Since the entry fee in the 1952 NCAA championships at Berkeley, Calif. was only $2, it was a simple matter to persuade the track coach to enter a Carleton College contingent, especially since the contingent had to get to California from Minnesota on its own. The Carleton broad jumper “had the most impressive credentials of all: a 1940 Mercury coupe.” Of his own start in big-time competition, Higdon says, “I sprinted right into last place at the start and held my position to the finish.” The experience taught him that “everybody loves a loser.”

Now 40 years old, Higdon has competed in 40 marathons, including nine at Boston. He first ran there in 1959, when he sat down on the curb after 18 miles and was unable to get up. In 1962 he finished 26th, with a time of 2 hours 46 minutes. In 1963 he knocked 10 minutes off that to finish 13th. And then in 1964 he had his finest hour—or finest 2 hours 21 minutes 55 seconds to be exact. He set out amid snow flurries with 300 contenders, the largest field ever up to that time. After 20 miles he was second to Aurele Vandendriessche, the eventual winner. Even with only a mile to go he had hopes of finishing fourth, but the last half mile “seemed longer than the entire distance.”

He finished fifth, posting the 10th fastest time in the 67 previous years of the Boston Marathon and was the first American among the finishers. “I crossed the line and stopped, my head hung low, my arms resting on my knees. ‘Do you want a blanket?’ a voice said. I shook my head. I was crying at that point. I had wanted to win.” That was the high point. Since then, he confesses, he has kept on running, but it has all been downhill.

When did you start running and why? 

I went out for track my sophomore year in high school, because I was switching schools at the end of the year and I wanted to win a letter. I sometimes say that I went out for track to impress my girlfriend, but that probably is a myth.

Toughest opponent and why? 

Burt Budd of St. Thomas College in St. Paul. He ruled the roost in the Twin Cities. Sixth in the Nationals. My first several years at Carleton College, I was lucky to stay on the same side of the track, but toward the end of my college career, I had begun to beat him.

Most memorable run and why? 

The 3000 meter steeplechase at the World Masters Championships in Toronto in 1975. The finals included a runner from New Zealand who held the M40 world record and a runner from Australia, the previous record holder. There were six lead changes (my friends claimed) and I won in 9:18.6, which after 40+ years is still the American record, oldest one on the books.

Biggest disappointment and why? 

I never made the Olympic Team, although I ran eight times in the Trials, track and marathon. Three top-10 finishes including a 5^th place where I was up with the leaders with 600 meters to go, but I couldn’t match their kicks. I had the ability, but something always seemed to go wrong.

What would you do differently if you could do it again?  Why? 

I would start to run in 6^th grade and use the training knowledge acquired during my previous lifetime to properly prepare.

Favorite philosopher?  Quote? 

I’m not sure the words come from a philosopher, but I like the Irish mantra: “May the winds be always be at your back.” Over a long running career, they have been at my back more often than not.

Special song of the era? 

Gustav Mahler’s 1^st Symphony, the last great work of the 19^th century or first great work of the 20^th century. Take your choice.

Favorite comedian? 

Dick Gregory. After leaving college, Greg ran briefly for the University of Chicago Track Club, and I got to know him before he was funny.

What was your ‘best stretch of running’?  

1963-1965

And so why do you think you hit that level at that time? 

After a slow start because I didn’t take track seriously in high school and went to a small school where training was no big deal, I finally a decade later figured out the training with the help of Fred Wilt, who coached me at that time.

Most weekly mileage?  Why?  Were you happy with the results? 

100-110 miles, but maintaining that level of training became problematic without getting injured or overtrained. 60-70 miles a week was more reasonable, but you don’t win Olympic medals at that level.

What was your edge? 

During an era when everybody was an amateur runner, I was willing to run in the morning and run in the evening and fit a 9-5 job (and family obligations) in between.

Seems only right to conclude this rough first draft of Original Gangsters Of Running (Vol. 1) with the photograph of a studly old runner-writer. Still slim with the leonine receding hairline and sexily-shaped skull.

OGORs are all studly, even the ladies. Like shield-maidens on The Vikings.

Our out-and-back courses were uphill both ways. Into constant headwinds.

Movement makes you who you are.

Thanks to all the OGs for their example, leadership and inspiration.