Steve Christilaw: Running culture in Spokane is rooted

Spokane is a running town.

And me saying that is also a running joke – which is the one form of running in which I indulge. Personally, I’m one of those upside-down people. My nose runs and my feet smell.

It’s easier to say that now, with the incredible popularity of events like Bloomsday. But residents of an older generation will remember just how important running is to the Greater Spokane psyche. You grow up in this town understanding the importance of our hometown running legends.

We still speak the name Gerry Lindgren with reverence, especially those of us who watched him set the running world on its ear in 1964.

Standing just 5-foot-3 and weighing just 83 pounds as a high school sophomore, Lindgren made the world sit up and take notice of what was happening on the roads and the tracks in and around Spokane.

As a junior, he shaved 19 seconds off the state cross- country record. He took another 18 seconds off his own record as a senior, then ran a 2-mile race at the Cow Palace in San Francisco in 1963 in 9 minutes flat – lapping the entire field and shaving 29.8 seconds off the high school indoor record.

The skinny kid from Rogers High School set a record for a high school runner when he ran 5,000 meters on a clay track in Compton, California, in 13 minutes, 44 seconds. That record stood for 40 years.

We were thrilled when that same year Lindgren outran two seasoned Russian distance runners, Leonid Ivanov and Anatoly Dutov, to win the 10,000 meters event at the US-USSR track meet in Los Angeles.

That accomplishment was a signature – Lindgren became “that kid who beat the Russians.”

As an 18-year-old kid, Lindgren won the U.S. Olympic Trials and headed to Tokyo for the Summer Olympic games, but a sprained ankle hampered him for the Games and his teammate, Billy Mills, turned in a finishing kick for the ages to outsprint Ron Clarke, of Australia, and Mohammed Gammoudi, of Tunisia, to the finish line for an incredible, inspiring gold medal.

Mills has always maintained that a healthy Lindgren would have easily won the gold.

As a collegian at Washington State, Lindgren won 11 of 12 NCAA championships.

Lindgren was so influential at Washington State that a hilly, 10-mile loop is known as Lindgren’s Loop, and legend has it he would make that run three times per day. The runners who followed in his footsteps included Rick Riley, John Ngeno, Bernard Lagat, Julius Korir and Henry Rono.

In 1966, two years after Lindgren burst onto the national running scene, Riley set the national high school record in the 2-mile, running 8:48.3 outdoors.

Tracy Walters, who coached Lindgren at Rogers, and Herm Caviness, who coached Riley at Ferris, are legendary in the track and cross- country community.

Pat Tyson, who achieved his own legend status as the coach at Mead, going 180-8 over 20 seasons, including a nine-year streak where the Panthers never lost a meet.

In the newly released book, “Varsity Seven: An American Rift Valley” by Ferris grad Peter Hawkins, Tyson writes in the forward that, as a youngster, he would take the city bus to the Tacoma Public Library to read The Spokesman-Review in order to follow the exploits of Lindgren and Riley.

“The great Spokane sports writers of the time, Bob Payne and Kevin Taylor, wrote pieces that stuck with you,” he wrote. “Their words worked like an elixir; distilled in dreams and brewed in belief. They knew what they had in Lindgren, Riley and the rest that followed. And anyone who read about them or saw them was inspired. This includes (Oregon legend Steve) Prefontaine.”

It is amazing to outsiders, and an everyday fact to those of us who have grown up around here, that so many of these outstanding runners and coaches are still helping to cultivate the rich, deep running culture here.

Riley coaches runners at St. George’s School. Caviness is back at Ferris this year, helping his son, Chris, coach a Saxons team that features his grandson. In addition to Riley, Ferris grad Jon Knight has built a dynasty at North Central.

Tyson is head cross-country and track coach at Gonzaga University.

The generations keep turning over. Hall of Fame coach Bob Barbero coached at University High for 23 seasons and took 11 boys cross-country teams to the state meet, added a few seasons as girls coach at Mt. Spokane and cross-country coach at his alma mater, West Valley. His son, Mike, carries on the family legacy at U-Hi.

Jim McLachlan coached WV cross-country for 40 years and now assists his son, Sean, the head coach at Community Colleges of Spokane.

And that’s just for starters.

Boys cross-country in the Greater Spokane League, in my humble opinion, is the single toughest conference in the country in any sport.

Between Mead, University and Ferris, the GSL won every state team championship from 1988-89 through 2009-10. Since that first Mead title in 1988, GSL teams have won 24 state titles. In fact, since the first state cross-country title was awarded, in 1959, there have been a dozen state championships that did not see a GSL team finish in the top two. GSL teams have finished one-two at state 17 times.

You cannot drive in Spokane, especially during the summer months, and not pass small groups of young runners putting in their mileage, preparing for the upcoming season or fine-tuning themselves for their next big meet.

It’s our shining legacy.

And it’s classically Spokane.