Had a great couple of nights.. If you could imagine talking about men running fast around a track.. a quarter mile track.. It was long ago and far away .. but I met a man who met Kip Keino.. I told him about meeting Edwin Moses and as a miler we talked about quarter mile splits... I ran the quarter, he ran four of them to a mile... and I remembered why my heroes were simple men. A few years back, I met a man who walked into Ruggbys with a T-shirt that said PRE on it.. to those of you that have no clue.. Steve Prefontaine was the man who told the AAU and Jimmy Carter to kiss his ass.. He was the man who along with Bill Bowerman (the track and field coach at Oregon who trained 31 Olympic athletes, 51 All-Americans, 12 American record-holders, 24 NCAA champions and 16 sub-4 minute milers).. and in his spare time co-founded NIKE. Yes, it was Bill who took a waffle iron and created Pres track shoes.. This is the man who asked the world to forget all the bullshit and come to run in Oregon PRE is like a god to runners and those who used to run competitively. That year hHe put on a meet in Eugene, Oregon with the best track atheletes after president Carter boycotted the Olympics.. It was the Olympics of the very best Track and Field atheletes you could ever imagine.. The AAU sanctioned him, threatened to take away his amateur status as well as all the atheletes who performed.. It was the greatest event ever run, men and women who didnt care about politics.. ran, jumped, shotput, javelined, pole vaulted, and so much more on a college field. They only cared about one thing (it had nothing to do with national politics) , they just wanted to see how they fared against the best in the world. They sat, talked, drank, probably smoked.. LOL.. and became friends forever... When it was over, they had answers to their questions.. Pre left knowing that he had won and the AAu knew they had lost forever.. Couple days later he was gone... He allegedly died on a high mountain road shortly after telling the AAU and the politicians to KMA. In all the times that I have met President Carter in my travels (on airplanes out of Atlanta and here).. I always wanted to ask him if he was ashamed for what he allowed to happen to Pre... There is no doubt in my mind that Pre was eliminated for going against the BIG Money AAU which today has become the NCAA.. Politics not withstanding, they eliminated a threat, which in the end killed them all. So the next time you run down a path and you hear PRE LIVES.. you respond..To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift.. PRE LIVES and he was right.. KMA to those who did not understand and only cared about money...ChrisC
Posted on: Sat, 01 Mar 2014 04:41:10 +0000
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