Bloomsday Perennial: Still ‘crazy’ after all these years, Linn Sampson readies for 50th Bloomsday

Recently retired attorney Linn Sampson has been a runner for as long as he can remember, so it was only natural for him to sign up for the first Bloomsday in 1977.

“I’ve been running all my life,” he said. “I had older brothers who were on the track team.”

Sampson, too, would also join the track team. While attending the University of Iowa, he began doing steeplechase races, where participants have to navigate various barriers and go through water.

“The steeplechase was insane,” he said. “You had to be crazy to do it and I was.”

He served in the Navy in Naples, Italy, where he married his wife Donna. After his service the couple settled in Spokane, drawn by the nearby mountains.

“I had been through Spokane in 1968,” he said. “I really enjoyed it.”

Sampson, who will turn 81 in February, thoroughly enjoyed his first Bloomsday. “I thought it was a hoot,” he said. “When I first started, I always tried to run faster than my age.”

He may not have met that goal, but he recalls once running the first mile in five minutes, back when the beginning of the route went downhill into the Peaceful Valley.

He describes being able to zone out while running, taking one step at a time. “Sometimes, I get lost in my head,” he said. “It’s just so gratifying. I don’t know that I’ve ever had a bad run in my life.”

He loves being part of a big crowd during Bloomsday. “You’re just part of a huge thing,” he said. “It’s such a unique thing. It’s the environment, all these people out there with a single purpose. It still feels like fun. I enjoy it.”

He particularly enjoyed the years his family would run as well, though they didn’t necessarily run together. They would meet after the race and compare notes. “Those were good times,” he said.

Sampson said that when he started running Bloomsday, he had no idea it would still be going strong 50 years later.

“I never would have guessed Bloomsday would last this long,” he said. “Things come and go.”

Perhaps his most memorable Bloomsday was the one where he got bumped by another runner at the top of Doomsday Hill and fell, dislocating his shoulder. But he wasn’t about to stop. “I just grabbed it and ran,” he said. “I guess at one point I was able to push it back in.”

It popped back out again after the race when Sampson tried to change his shirt, so he went to the emergency room. He recalls the doctor talking about doing a procedure to reset his shoulder that would involve stopping his heart briefly, something Sampson wanted no part of.

He waited until the doctor left the room and then took matters into his own hands, slamming his shoulder into the wall to pop it back into place.

He’s completed Bloomsday in pain on other occasions as well. He once lost a toenail only a couple weeks before Bloomsday, but managed to finish. More recently, he’s been diagnosed with Morton’s Neuroma, which causes nerve pain in the feet.

Sampson said he nearly didn’t finish the 2025 race because of the condition, but his son was with him and helped support him until he reached the finish line. It took him 3 hours, 9 minutes to complete the course, making him the fourth to last perennial to finish. “It was grim,” he said. “I have to give my son credit on this last one.”

Despite the pain, Sampson is determined to be there for the 50th Bloomsday in May. “I’m going to run come hell or high water,” he said. “I’m working on it.”