As I am watching the meet, I found myself thinking about Pre getting his Medicare card. Wondering how much better the world might be if he had made it this far. He was a distance runner. – JDW
Pre… an antecedent… to be in front of… to come before… superior.
What he really wanted to do was play football.
In 1964, Steven Roland Prefontaine, an eighth grade bench warmer, weighed one hundred pounds and stood five feet tall. Any bigger, he would have made a great middle linebacker. He had the heart of a giant.
“He was too small for football and he got tired of sitting on the bench all the time,” says his father Ray, a barrel-chested French Canadian woodworker. “He wanted to find something he could do, something he could enjoy.”
Determined to be a winner, Pre lost his first race.
He was motivated. As a sophomore, he didn’t get to the state meet. That district qualifier the only poor performance of his career.
“In high school, he was laying in the front room on the floor, and we were watching TV, and he said, “Mom, I am going to the Olympics,” recalls Elfreide, a petite German war bride and seamstress. “I said, ‘Steve, how can you?'” Focused.
He went undefeated the remainder of his high school years, running 8:41.5 for two miles, a national record which lasted over two decades. Pre competed internationally while still a boy, already faster than the legendary Zatopek. Gifted.
Hard working. He always had a job. “Steve worked three jobs so he could have a car,” Ray remembers. “We picked out a Ford Fairlane, with an engine smaller than he wanted. I told him, that car will stay parked in front of the house forever if your grades suffer.” Steve maintained his B average.
“He was not stubborn,” his mother says.
“He never caused us any trouble,” says his father.
He always had his goals set, written down and taped on his bureau in his tiny bedroom in a little blue house on Elrod Street.
“If you want to come to Oregon,” legendary Coach Bill Bowerman wrote in a note to the pride of the Marshfield Pirates, “there is no doubt in my mind you’ll be the greatest distance runner in the world.” Coachable.
Pre drove to college in a pastel blue ’56 Chevy, back end jacked up, mag wheels brightly gleaming, fluffy faux fur tastefully accenting the interior, dice dangling from the rear view mirror.
“What I want,” he admitted at an early age, “is to be Number One.” Driven.
Steve Prefontaine entered the University of Oregon in 1969 considering a career in insurance or interior decorating. He was quickly nicknamed “The Rube.” Eugene is something of a backwater burg even today, which gives you an idea what Pre was like coming out of Coos Bay, a seaport town of loggers and fishermen and housewives and shade-tree mechanics. He ended up majoring in Broadcast Communications.
Communicating came naturally to him. Pre wrote letters and talked on the phone simultaneously. He could curse a blue streak. Outspoken.
As a freshman, Pre won the NCAA cross-country championship. The following spring, a dozen stitches in his foot, he won the NCAA national 3-mile title. He captured both crowns every year of his collegiate career. Dominant.
Pre was always a celebrity. His first year at the University of Oregon, he appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated. The headline under Pre’s photo read “America’s distance prodigy.” Magnetic.
He had charisma, before he could spell it. He was more candid than tactful. Simple and true. Pre was as good as his word. Beneath his early cockiness and arrogance, there was a defensive streak, wide but shallow, which eventually faded away like a seasonal stream.
His sophomore year he would get up at six a.m. for a half-hour run before preparing his fraternity’s breakfast. Easy runs, he never went over a six-minute pace. He believed anything slower had no benefit.
Pre preferred city streets to country trails. The hubbub of commerce more interesting than a rural setting. He didn’t like to run beyond ten miles, twelve was about as far as he would go. He avoided hills when he could.
He had to be top dog even in workouts. Rare occasions when a talented teammate finished ahead of Pre were cause for reflection and revenge. He took names and kicked butt the next time.
Pre trained to race. He didn’t leave his race in a hard workout. He was persistent and he was patient. Most young runners want to be good too soon. Want to run all those miles so they can get there early. In the long run, that’s a mistake. Good things come slow. Particularly in distance running. Pre was only on the edge of where he was going to start running well.
– Bill Dellinger
He rarely lifted weights. His exceptional upper body strength was clearly the result of his father’s genes, although Pre included chin-ups in his daily routine. He was always doing sit-ups.
As a junior, Pre won the Pac-8 cross-country championship. Typically penurious, Oregon offered to send him to the NCAAs, but was unwilling to send the entire team, which had placed second in the league. Pre said he would not defend his national title unless the team went with him. The team went and, like its captain, won the championship. Loyal.
He hated the idea of being perceived as a super jock, everybody treating him like he was unapproachable. By now his nickname was “World,” as in world famous. He wasn’t famous to himself.
Pre did what he felt like doing. He seemed constantly in motion. Never satisfied. Yet always calm in the heat of battle. His flame burned brighter, but Pre was cool.
Warm. Never afraid to hug a friend or throw an arm over a buddy’s shoulder. Kind to old women and considerate with little children.
I was only 14 and Pre sort of adopted me as a project. He was concerned with the number of races I ran and the kind and amount of training I was doing. Too much at a young age, and I think he felt protective. Pre was afraid I’d fall into the burn-out syndrome. In some ways, Pre was just like all the rest of us, do as I say, not as I do. Pre was the kind of person, if you wanted to run competitively, he would do everything he could, and use everything he knew, to help you be as good as you could be.
– Mary Decker Slaney
Pre lived in a short single-wide at the River Bank Trailer Park along the Willamette. A railroad track bordered the property, so his home shook every two hours all day long. His scholarship paid $101 a month for room and board. For extra money, he delivered cars to dealers in California.
Meticulous. Pre ate quickly and he’d always wash the dishes first before leaving his house. A green salad eater, he watched his weight which could climb at times. He liked to put peanut butter on his pancakes. Liked pastries. Liked sugar. Liked bowls of ice cream before he’d go to bed. He was often in bed before 10 o’clock.
“I never saw him moody,” remembers his roommate Pat Tyson. “He was a real kind person.” Considerate.
Around town Pre wore blue jeans, t-shirts, momentos of track meets gone by, and suitably scuffed training shoes. Otherwise he dressed fashionably. He wore double-breasted suits and a tie on road trips. “He was a stud,” remembers one teammate. “The rest of us dressed the best we could, but you just looked at him and went, ‘Wow, he’s a good dresser.'” Style.
Pre had stinky feet. He didn’t wear sox when he ran, so he had to keep his shoes outside, particularly in the spring and summer, when they became especially rude.
Tremendously energetic. Never slowed down. Fast in everything he did. Impatient. Hyperactive. Involved. Pre lived more in twenty-five years than many men do in a normal lifetime.
He loved dogs. Lobo, a good-sized German Sheperd mongrel Steve rescued from the pound, was his best friend and a favorite training companion. Pre enjoyed gardening and carpentry, building things with his hands. He built a darkroom. Photography was his main hobby, taking pictures, mostly of nature.
Steve liked girls.
He loved beer.
He drove fast. He enjoyed driving with the top down, wind in his face, radio blasting. He enjoyed basic AM rock & roll. He never seemed to learn the lyrics, so he’d make up his own words to the songs, off-color and off-key. Elton John’s Rocket Man was a particular favorite.
Pre was, an understatement, highly competitive. “I love to compete against people,” Pre said, “and not just track & field, but almost anything.” He never ran a road race.
He never missed a meet or a workout in college due to illness. Rarely injured, he suffered periodically from sciatica, a painful inflammation of nerves in his back and down the back of his legs.
When I think of Pre, I think first about his consistency and his work ethic. Pre was all business. When it was time to train, he trained, when it was time to race, he raced. Pre didn’t make excuses. He was self-motivated and self-disciplined. He was always striving to get to that next level.
– Todd Williams
As Pre moved through his life, he had the impact of a large weather mass affecting the climate all around him. Myth now, fact then. Rain would fall all dreary day, drench gray the competition until he stepped onto Hayward Field, then blue skies opened and the sun would follow him like a spotlight as he warmed up. A performer.
Pre’s People, they called themselves, the fans who filled the stands at Hayward Field. The noise would start to build from the moment he stepped onto the track. “There he is!” And the clamor grew. “It’s Pre!” The sound would follow him. “Pre!”
The crowd loved him for his unbridled energy, his raw determination, his relentless desire. And he loved them back. You could see it in his eyes as he ran. Pre’s People could see it, too, so they cheered louder, and he ran faster, so they cheered louder still.
“Pre!” Still louder. “Pre!” Still faster. “Pre!” As the race went on, faster and faster, lap after lap, “Pre!,” louder and louder, “Pre!,” washing to and fro, his name would echo and ricochet from east to west and back again. “Pre! Pre!” Towards the finish, every man, woman and child on their feet propelling the hometown hero toward the finish and victory. “Pre!” The race over, he’d take a victory lap, nearly full speed. “Pre!” Waving at fans and friends.
“He said, if it wasn’t for them,” his father Ray recalls, “he couldn’t have done what he did.”
Pre seemed invincible at home. He competed thirty-six times at Hayward Field. Lost to three specialists at their best distances. Set two personal records and tied another in those defeats.
He was an icon and a iconoclast. Irreverent. Went looking for trouble, like a knight on a crusade. He was a pioneer in the battle for athlete’s rights. He was fighting – successfully – Ollan Cassell before many of today’s top competitors were born. Pre was the Anti-Nixon.
Pre was Nike’s original endorsement athlete, receiving $5,000 his first year under contract. The swooshes, handglued to the side of Pre’s first pair of Nike spikes, fell off and littered the track on Pre’s maiden run in his new shoes.
He was incredibly focused. When the starter’s gun fired, he was in a different world; not many people ever get there. He raced like he was a prize fighter, throwing everything he had against anybody who climbed into the ring with him. His contests weren’t necessarily about speed, but about who was left standing.
Take your best shot. “A lot of people run a race to see who’s the fastest,” Pre said. “I run to see who has the most guts.”
The way Steve Prefontaine approached running, his aggressiveness, the tenacity, the desire to win every single race he ran, no matter what it took, that’s what I hope people get from thinking of Pre.
There’s been a lack of will among U.S. athletes to put everything on the line. Americans were basically satisfied competing against other Americans and running 13:30, 13:40 in the national championships, being first, second or third. “Great, I made the team.” Then, boom!, they go to a major championship and get destroyed. Steve Prefontaine would’ve never settled for that. Never.
– Bob Kennedy
Pre lost that 5000m at the ’72 Olympics, got outkicked for a medal but he made the race great. He forced the pace. He gave everything he had. Because he gave everything, he had a tendency to fade slightly in the final yards. He finished fourth. He was young. Still time.
“He wanted the gold medal so bad,” Elfreide explains. “It was the biggest disappointment in his life.”
Some say Pre was not the same after Munich, he was more human. He didn’t lose often, but when he did lose, he bounced back. He grew from his defeats. Resilient.
He was always talking about his future, the life he’d lead after he retired from running. He never slowed down, he was getting faster, his best running still ahead. But, for all of us, there is a finish line.
Pre drank. Pre drove. Pre didn’t wear his seatbelt.
Steve Prefontaine, age 24, died May 30th, 1975, on a road he knew every inch of, the metal of his gold MGB convertible pressing on his chest, powerful lungs unable to expand. And in a way, the future of track & field in this country died with him.
Transcending the sport, he was by far the most popular runner of his era. Like James Dean, ahead of his time, never replaced. Singular.
Pre died believing he would win an Olympic gold medal. Pre’s People will die believing it, too.
We miss him still.
(SIDEBAR)
Go Pre! At the time of his death
Steve Prefontaine held every
national long distance record
from 2000m to 10K. Pre’s
racing career began March 25,
1967 and ended May 29, 1975.
During those eight years, he
competed in 151 races, excluding
indoor or cross-country events.
He dropped out of one race with
a pulled stomach muscle. His
victories totaled 118, a winning
percentage of 76.5. He set
fourteen American Records, seven
while still a collegiate athlete.
He was the first track athlete
in NCAA history to win the same
event four consecutive years.
Faster runners have come along
in the past twenty years, none so
unforgettable.
Goodbye Pre!
==========================
This piece was written for Running Times, perhaps the second best running magazine ever. Written to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of Pre’s passing. 1995