If golf has St Andrews, tennis has Wimbledon and cricket has Lord’s, then athletics has Eugene. Perhaps with the exception of Athens, few places in the world can lay claim to being as intrinsically linked with the sport as Oregon’s secondlargest city. It isn’t known as Track Town, USA, for nothing.
Track and field, as they prefer to know it in the States, not to mention long-distance running, really is part of the DNA there. It is a place associated with, and made for, athletic endeavour.
It is a place to which the legendary coach Bill Bowerman returned from New Zealand in 1963, bringing with him the idea that recreational jogging could make an almighty impact on the nation’s health. The free jogging classes he produced literally started a movement.…
