Steve,
I realize this thread is several years old but I'm a little slow with new technologies and just discovered this web site while killing time on a business trip to Vietnam. If you are still looking I do have some old video from meets that have both Tom and yourself running. I would be happy to send it to you. State 2-mile in Eugene, 1973 and 1974. You can contact me via email:
.
Best Regards,
Dan
I just stumbled upon this thread and spent the last hour or so reading it. Great thread.
I just happened to run across this thread and thought I would share something I somehow never told anyone about. I was taking a long walk home by myself one day sometime in the early 80s when I was just a kid and McChesney was at his peak. I got caught in a classic Eugene downpour coincidentally as I was near Hayward field. I luckily found a gate open and was able to get in and find shelter in the west grandstand to wait out the downpour. It just so happened that Bill McChesney was doing some interval training. I just sat there and as far as I can tell it was just me along with Bill's coach in the infield shouting to Bill his time in the whole place. I was totally fascinated to see the intensity of McChesney doing his workout in the middle of a torrential downpour. The rain finally let up and I left. A few weeks later Bill ran at some big meet at Hayward field. I forget now what meet it was but it was a packed house and Bill beat his personal record. It may very well have been the school record that still stands today. It would have been right around 82'. I was destined to have other pursuits in life beside track but its always remained a special memory for me to be alone in the Hayward field stands watching that workout.
Bill Mc Chesney is one of my all time heroes. My first time running against him was1974 Grant High cross country invitational. We always invited south Eugene and I remember the year before when I was a freshman (on the varsity team) seeing Steve and Bill (who I believe was still in junior high) in the field. The race went off without a hitch as Bill and I were leading after the first lap off the track. Upon running up the top of the bowl, Bill took a sharp left turn, as that was the course of the prior JV race. I proceeded straight and yelled out,"Bill, this way!" He questioned me and I said, "its my course, I should know!" What an opportunity, but it wasn't in my nature to take such an advantage. What a stride that guy had! We were shoulder to shoulder through the whole race until we dropped down into the bowl for the last 330. I ran my guts out and he pulled away and beat me by two strides. When reviewing the films, we ran the last quarter in 55 seconds, finishing the two and a half miles in 12 minutes. He gave me my greatest compliment , saying that I was "tougher than crap". I watched him get better and better, rising out of my league. What a great runner. A great family totally dedicated to one purpose and succeeding in excellence. I also had the honor of running against Dan and Bob Fulton, two talented and dedicated runners, as well as Art Beauleau, all top notch runners. My sophmore city mile competition, I was fourth with a 420. Fifth place was right on my shoulder. But Billy was top notch. What an honor to run against him. Blaine Rodgers
Go on runningentertainment.com There are many pictures of 70's runners including links to videos.
This link is from youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vt7z5aQSpeA
It shows McChesney running a 5k against Steve Ovett and John Tracey.
Here's one of my favorite links of Bill McChesney.
http://www.eugenerunningcompany.com/home/erc1/smartlist_117/bill_mcchesney_jr.html
Does anyone know what kinds of mileage and or training Bill did during High School? His 1975 10k in 29:27 is quite good for a 15 year old.
Coming back to this thread after quite some time. It is a remarkable amount of information and memories that are collected here. Wanted to tell everyone that I have been working for the past two years on a book - "Purple Dynasty - Records, Championships, and Tradition: The South Eugene Axemen in Track Town U.S.A." At this point I do not have a publisher, but I've been working in cooperation with Harry Johnson and all former and present South Eugene coaches. The objective is for publication by June 2016. The book, of course, will include information about what sort of workouts and mileage helped produce the results of the '70's and '80's. I also noticed that in an earlier part of the thread I claimed Pre had been "run off the road" by another car. That idea has been revised upon further examination. The book will give one of the most thorough examinations so far of what probably happened that night on Skyline Drive, from the standpoint of car and driver dynamics, the vehicle in question, and the configuration of the road. But I will continue to emphasis that alcohol was probably not really a factor in Pre's death - rather it was just an unfortunate incident.
Ore/Ma. wrote:
To Insecure and PRs thank you for taking me to task. I offer no excuse, but I do offer that I was not meaning the offense to Craig that you see.
I apoligize to Craig, but I did not mean things to be taken as you may see them. Craig had a way of pulling Bill's strings that none of us near Bill took offense to. He could get away with it because he was a teammate at times and someone Bill wished to take into his home. The comments that I read seemed like kidding from one friend to another and if the writer was Craig I thought that they would be taken that way. If they were not Craig, I was reacting to people taking about my brother whom I loved. I should never have responded to them in pubic in the way that I did. I am so sorry that I did. Not for me, but for my family.
I admire Craig as a person that has shared time at our table and as one of the greatest runners in US history. More importantly Bill and Craig enjoyed time spent off of the track with each other. In seeing them together I did not sense that they were rivals.
Again I am sorry for what I have posted. I have not often commented on anything publicly about my either of my brothers since they died. As of a week ago I did not know that Letsrun.com gave any of you the forum to do so either. Since I was told of this sight I have been flooded by a good deal of puplic speculation not only on my brothers performances on the track, but also on how they died. In one week I have read so many rumors and falsehoods about my very own brothers lives and deaths. I hope none of you ever have to do the same. My desire to defend them has gone beyond my normal understanding of how we talk to each other and I am truly sorry. I have never in my past felt that I had to defend my dead brothers because everyone has been so kind to us in person. This is the first time I have seen anyone attack anything about Tom or Billy. That does not excuse me for wronging Craig which I did not intend to do. I simply reached a point that was beyond me and he happened to be the subject that was current. Craig, you have always been kind to me. I admire you a great deal and I value the time you shared with Bill as a teammate and a friend. Please reach my email if you see this.
This is not a post to me. This is my family.
I am posting this more than a dozen years after Steve wrote on this thread. I stumbled onto this while reading an article on my old friend and competitor Matt Centrowitz (not Mathew!). I wasn't really online back then and don't know the first time I ever read a thread on letsrun.com but it was probably many years after this thread was started. Apology accepted, Steve, but it was not necessary. I understood your tone and intent. I really respected your brother, Billy, and followed him from HS days until he retired. I am familiar with his struggles with running and injuries while being a "hometown hero" at UO and was ecstatic when he pulled it all together and returned to his earlier form before he graduated from UO and fulfilled his earlier promise. He had so much to live up to there and it seemed really hard on him. Billy and I were teammates on the 1980 US Olympic Team that ended up being forced to boycott the Moscow Olympics and it really hurt both Billy and myself. But, we did travel to Europe for some track meets that summer of 1980 and I got to spend considerable one on one time with Billy and we became good friends at the time. In fact, when I ran the 2nd fastest 10,000 m. in history at that time....(27:29.2 in Paris) just 2-3 weeks before Moscow's opening ceremonies.... Billy alternated 800 m segments with me for 3200 before I set off on my own in that race. He was one of the few Americans back then that would work with me to run fast times... the way that the Kenyans and Ethiopians would. I shared races with Billy for another 2-3 years and always enjoyed spending time with him before, during, and after the races. He was a happy go lucky young man ..... almost like a real life version of Peter Pan.... that was always open and supportive to me.... even if we were competing against each other later that day. I treated him like an equal when he was coming up... because our HS careers were somewhat similar....and because I recognized the marvelous talent and guts he possessed. Later, in 82 when he was running better than me that year... I tried my best to help him to fast times to return his earlier favor's. It was a shock to me when I finally read about his death when he crashed his light truck on a wet Oregon road. We did not have the internet and email back then to allow me to hear about it right away back here in the Midwest but I mourned him for days due to the friendship/experiences that we shared. I was always welcomed by the warm and friendly McChesney parents and was always invited to their home whenever I was in Eugene. I respected the whole family and felt so bad that they had to endure the loss of brother Tom earlier. They were the "first family of running" in Oregon to me. I have visited with Steve at both the Olympics Trials at Eugene in 2008 and 2012. Not sure if I saw him in 2016 as I write this. I saw so many people there last year that it is a blur to me now. But, I have enjoyed this thread and the historical perspectives it gives to the young runners/readers today. I also would have to agree that my old friend Matt Centrowitz is certainly in the running for Top 3-5 Distance Runners of All Time at UO. His range was amazing. Matt finished 2nd to me in the June 1973 IPI 2-mile where I broke Pre's nat'l HS 2-mile record w/ an 8:40.9 but he repaid me by outkicking me in at least 2X in major American 5000 m races between 1979-1981. I hope that Mathew's success in 2016 gives exposure to Matt's skill & success in his own right from 1972-1984. Matt deserves it.... take it from someone who was there. Thanks for posting this all these many years ago, Steve! Hope you are well and still coaching. Craig
Paragraphs.
Paragraphs?
You're gonna come onto a running website and insult a running legend?
Great stuff. Stories and comments like these above are why I read this website.
Thanks for the memories as Bob Hope would say.
Similar story to one of the commentators: I stood under the stands at Boston College one freezing rainy evening, stopwatch in hand, watching David Hemery, two years after his gold in Mexico City, in cotton long underwear and a sweatshirt and wool hat, do a brutal out of season winter workout for BU coach Billy Smith.
On of those moments you go, "oh, wow, that's what it takes."
Training:
Fairly high mileage in HS, higher volume as a teen than when he ran his best marks. HS training highlight: 12mi ~60'
Peak years:
Roughly 55-60/week. Lots of cross training to make the Olympic
team while injured. (Pool running was fairly new then.)
Early 90s
Later on, he liked fartleks the best but was dealing with achilles tendon issues and (I believe) some central fatigue issues. Treatment of achilles was not nearly so advanced then.