Don Kardong

<body> <table border="0" width="535" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" height="1"> <tr> <td width="39" height="1"></td> <td width="482" height="1" colspan="2"></td> <td width="31" height="1"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="39" height="188" valign="top"> <br> </td> <td width="482" height="188" valign="top" align="left" colspan="2"> <p align="left"> <img border="0" src="welcome.jpg" width="303" height="36"></p> <p align="left"><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"> Where running enthusiasts can find books, videos, free reading materials, strange photographs, and a few random thoughts courtesy of 1976 Olympic marathoner and current Runner's World senior writer Don Kardong. Looking for inspiration, entertainment, coaching advice, or a speaker for an upcoming event? You're in the right place.</font></p> <p align="center"><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><img border="0" src="hr.jpg" width="400" height="5"></font></p> <p align="center">                                                                                          </p> </td> <td width="31" height="188"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="39" height="69" valign="top"> <a name="funpict"></a> </td> <td width="482" height="69" valign="top" align="left" colspan="2"> <p align="left"> <a href="5utica.htm" target="main"> <img border="0" src="5uticasmall.jpg" width="250" height="190"> </a> </td> <td width="31" height="69"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="39" height="83" valign="top"> </td> <td width="268" height="83" valign="top" align="left"> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"> National Distance Running Hall of Fame get-together in July, 2001. I'm the fit-looking one.</font> </td> <td width="216" height="83" valign="top" align="left">    </td> <td width="31" height="83"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="39" height="1" valign="top"> </td> <td width="482" height="1" valign="top" align="left" colspan="2"> <p align="left"><a name="wordsofwisdom"></a><img border="0" src="wordswisdom.jpg" width="277" height="35"><br> <br> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><u><b>January 25th, 2002<br> </b></u> </font> <br> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3">Last night I carried the Olympic torch. The flame of the 2002 Winter Olympics has been making the rounds on its tortuous journey to Salt Lake City, and it finally found its way here to Spokane. It's the first official Olympic torch visit to these parts in history. And it felt good to get reacquainted.<br> <br> Reacquainted? Well, in 1976 I carried the Olympic torch through the streets of Montreal on the night before the opening ceremonies. Not every Olympian is so lucky, but I had been asked by a Montreal policeman if I'd be willing to join a group of that city's finest during their segment of the relay. They wanted an Olympic athlete in their midst, and I was happy to oblige. </font> </p> <p align="left"> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><a name="76torch"></a><a href="76torch.htm" target="main"><img border="0" src="76olympictorchsmall.jpg" width="200" height="124"> </a> </font> <br> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2">1976 Olympic Torch Run. I'm in there somewhere.</font> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><br> <br> I've always thought the Olympic flame was an especially fine symbol. Fire can be destructive, but it also represents the essence of human experience. The earliest cultures learned how to tame the flame, and how to carry it from place to place on their journeys. For ages people have gathered around fire for warmth, companionship and story telling. In various mythologies, fire has represented wisdom, passion, inspiration--traits that make us human. And in the Olympics, the flame burns throughout the Games, a testament to every athlete's dreams.<br> <br> I don't remember too much about my torch run in Montreal, except for the excitement of the citizens who lined the streets. they were proud to welcome the flame to their city, and uplifted for a moment as it passed.<br> <br> When I returned to Spokane after the 1976 Olympics, I felt like I brought a spark of the flame with me. When I suggested later in the year that Spokane have a downtown road race, dozens of volunteers stepped forward. And in May, 1977, over a thousand runners showed up for the first Lilac Bloomsday run. The next year, five thousand. Then ten thousand. Within a decade, the number had grown to an astounding 50,000--growth ignited, I think, by a bit of Olympic inspiration. </font> </p> <p align="left"> <a href="spokanetorch.htm" target="main"> <img border="0" src="torchrunspokanefsmall.jpg" align="right" width="200" height="125"></a><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><a name="spokane"></a>When I carried the torch last night, it rekindled some memories. So did the enthusiasm of Spokane citizens. This was the first official visit of the Olympic torch to Spokane. <br> <br> Somehow, though, it felt like it had been here before.<br> </font> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><br> <a href="spokanetorchback.htm" target="main"> <img border="0" src="torchrunspokanebsmall.jpg" width="200" height="99"></a><br> Spokane Torch Ceremony. I'm the one in the white uniform.</font><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><br> </font> </p> <p align="left"><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3">-Don</font><br> <br> <font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="2"><a href="words.htm" target="main">Words of Wisdom Archives...</a></font> </p> <p align="center"><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><img border="0" src="hr.jpg" width="400" height="5"></font></p> <p align="right"><img border="0" src="freeread.jpg" width="107" height="34" align="left"><i><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="4">February, 1992</font></i></p><p><i>This is one of the stories in Don Kardong's book "Hills, Hawgs and Ho Chi Minh." For information, <a href="books.htm" target="main">click here</a></i></p> <p ALIGN="CENTER"><font size="4">HO CHI MINH CITY MARATHON</font></p> <font SIZE="4"> <p> </p> </font> <p><br> <i><font size="4">"As marathoners, we play with this notion of survival. In real life, in times of war and peace, it sometimes becomes the only thing a human can focus on."</font></i><br> <br> <br> I was nearing 20 kilometers, not quite halfway through this sweaty stewpot of a marathon. Almost from the start, I had been feeling a tightness in my right calf. I wondered if I would suffer another muscle pull, the bane of my life as a masters runner. Perhaps, I thought, I will reinjure it, limp around for weeks, and pique people's curiosity back home.<br> <br> "What happened to your leg," they would ask.<br> <br> "I injured it in Vietnam," I would answer.<br> <br> Somehow that struck me as funny, a bit of incongruity to lighten the marathon load. I never served in Vietnam. I did my utmost, in fact, to avoid involvement in a war that seemed totally wrong, a vicious, dead-end quagmire of American foreign policy. So to consider limping from a Vietnam injury sustained 20 years later seemed...funny. Sort of. Maybe if there hadn't been disabled Vietnam veterans on this trip, it would have been funnier.</p> <p align="right">  </p> <p align="right"><font face="Geneva,Arial,Helvetica,Swiss,SunSans-Regular" size="3"><a href="freeread.htm">next page</a></font></p> <p>  </td> <td width="31" height="1"></td> </tr> <tr> <td width="39" height="48" valign="top"> </td> <td width="267" height="48"> </td> <td width="217" height="48"> <img border="0" src="footprint.jpg" width="60" height="102" align="right"></td> <td width="31" height="48"></td> </tr> </table> </body>