The dive deep down in the archive came up with this. Funny how slow these times seem now. Guess that’s why they call it progress. – JDW
October edition of the Bible of the Sport, Track & Field News.
Quax Flies To 2:10:47
Eugene, Oregon. September 7 – Is it possible to wing a 2:10 marathon? Those who saw Dick Quax coast through the Nike/Oregon Track Club event might be asking that question.
Quax, the former 5000 WR holder, stalked the leaders throughout the race, picked off Bobby Hodge at 36 kilometers and then coasted to victory in a New Zealand Record 2:10:47. That lowered his own 2:11:13 run here last year, the fastest marathon debut ever.
Hodge, who led most of the latter half of the race, finished strongly for a 2:10:59 PR, making him the No. 9 American of all-time. Californian Dave Smith surprised everyone, himself included, by placing 3rd in 2:11:09, also a PR.
The personal bests weren’t confined only to the men as another New Zealander, Lorraine Moller, took the women’s title in 2:31:40 as the first three women all ran under 2:35.
The race began at 8 a.m. on the first cool day Eugene had experienced in weeks. But overcast skies and 60-degree temperatures promised a scorching competition. The promise was fulfilled as Tom Fleming roared to an immediate lead which he held through 8 kilometers, when Kevin McCarey caught the leader. A few moments later, so did most everyone else.
McCarey now pushed the pace, but it was an even pace unlike the sometimes-suicidal early efforts at other major marathons. The leading group passed 10km in 31:57.
At 15km, McCarey still led but John Graham, a Scotsman with a punk hairdo, a gold ring in his left ear and exceptional potential, accompanied him. Hodge, Benji Durden and Mike Buhmann (in only his second marathon) were a half-stride behind. Quax was perhaps 15m back.
Just before the aid station at 20km, Quax swooped down on the leaders like some bird of prey (no, not a Kiwi), His move was so effortless he appeared to close the gap in about five strides. But he didn’t take the lead.
Hodge recognized his companion and began a long, controlled bid for victory. He passed 30km in 1:32:30, but 7 minutes later Quax reeled him in. Buhmann and Smith were now 70m back.
Quax ran as if in a track race; one moment on Hodge’s heels, the next at his shoulder. At 36 km, the New Zealander darted ahead effortlessly. The race was effectively over. Quax went on to enter Hayward Field all alone. He ran the homestretch virtually sideways as he waved with both hands to the cheering crowd.
Afterwards, the taciturn Quax stated the obvious: “I was conservative and ran rather curiously.” After Hodge and Smith in 2nd and 3rd came resurging Jon Anderson, winner of this race in ’72 and ’75. The 1972 Olympian showed he had completely recovered from surgery on both Achilles tendons as he cut his PR to 2:12:03.
Buhmann in 5th cut nearly 4 minutes off his best with his 2:12:38. Exactly a minute back in 6th came Canadian Art Boileau, like Buhmann in only his second marathon.
(Other notables mentioned in agate included Herm Atkins 9th in 2:15:09 and in 10th, Dick Beardsley at 2:15:11.)
There was another race going on among the women that made this “gathering of eagles” (as the race is styled) seem like a collection of Kiwis.
Moller, winner of the Avon “World Championship” race in London barely a month earlier, collared early leader Marja Wokke of Holland at 29km and went on to score her 2:31:40 triumph for a Commonwealth Record.
Wokke moved to 6th on the all-time list with her 2:32:29, while New Zealander Allison Roe moved to 8th all-time in history that three women ran under 2:35 in the same race. In 7th came California prep Heike Skaden, whose 2:43:00 is the second-fastest time in high school history.
JDW: I asked Bob to share some inside dirt on the 1980 Nike/OTC Marathon. This is what he told me.
Nike/OTC 1980
I received a letter of invite from Nike’s Nelson Farris in May or June and also had an invite to Montreal. Reebok wanted me to run NY but that race had not invited me and Reebok was not paying expenses for me when I traveled so it would have cost me.
Mostly, I felt wanted in Oregon and Eugene had some mystique for me still.
I read Geoff Hollister’s book Out of Nowhere: The Inside Story of How Nike Marketed the Culture of Running and he mentions how Bowerman told him he wanted to see a more diverse field at OTC, not just Nike runners.
Peter Thompson, the race director, says that they went down the performance list and invited the top runners but there wasn’t much incentive to race there if you were not with Nike.
Hollister says in his book that he showed Bowerman a letter he got from Bill Rodgers declining an invite. Why BR would even consider running there with no prize money then or would Nike ever match NY appearance fee? Laughable.
The Nike athletes all went to Sun River Resort for a week of R&R and brainwashing after the race. No non-Nike runners invited.
For my part, I got to run against a great group of guys, including Quax, and I finished as the 7th-best-ever performer for Americans.
Out on the race course Thompson led the race on a motorcycle. There were sparse crowds; having only run Boston in my previous attempts, this was like a time trial.
As I remember it, after 20 miles Quax started doing some surges and each time I let him pull ahead a bit before closing the gap.
Seemed to me, everyone was cheering on Dick, even Thompson, and that pissed me off. A Reebok runner win their race? Unthinkable! 😀
I bet Quax got an appearance fee or some other incentive to run as he was an Athletics West coach at the time.
Quax’s feet were a bloody mess at the finish and he told the photographers afterward, “No pictures of the feet🦶! “
My prize was a trip to Fukuoka, which I did not run because of injury. I asked if I could take the trip the following year and they said no.
So I got a belt buckle as my prize.
The next month I went to the New York City Marathon to work the shoe show and ran into Alberto in the hotel lobby with Vinnie Fleming. Vinnie said, “Hey, Alberto, what do you think about Hodgie running 2:10:59 in your back yard?”
Alberto immediately said “2:11.”
I got lots more on this. Some memories are hard to kill.
JDW: And in a draft of Bob’s forthcoming book, a likely bestseller, he describes the 1980 Nike/OTC race this way.
I went to the Nike OTC the first week of September, hoping for a PR and a win. I ran a personal best finishing second to another great New Zealander, Dick Quax. It was a much different experience from Boston, being run at 8:00 A.M. with very few spectators out on the course. The finish was in Hayward Field, which was cool.
I remember thinking, as I ran the last five miles with Quax, that I was doomed when he decided to go for it, but so far, I had pulled him back after each of his surges.
In the end he inched ahead and beat me by twelve seconds.
I spoke with a few media types at the finish. For some reason I was not happy about my race, I was pissed that I lost, and it is amusing to read the little rant that I wrote in my running diary back then, cussing out “Quaxy” as I called him and the Nike crew. (I represented upstart in the USA Reebok at the time.)
I walked back to my hotel and grabbed twenty dollars and then I walked to the liquor store and bought a case of beer and a few snacks.
Back at the hotel I filled the bathtub with water and ice and also the sink. I put the beer in and then I jumped into the tub for a while as well.
I got up and toweled off, climbed into bed and started watching the US Open Tennis. McEnroe v. Borg, one of the greatest matches ever played.
It was a very memorable summer all around. I had discovered a lot about myself; at least in my athletic abilities and that was always my quest.