Don Bowden

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Donald Paul "Don" Bowden (born August 8, 1936 in San José , California ) is a retired American athlete . The middle-distance runner was the first American to run the mile under 4 minutes. He represented the USA at the 1956 Olympic Games in Melbourne .

Life

At high school in San José, Bowden showed himself to be a very good 800-meter runner and was twice California high school champion over 880 yards. As a result, he got a competitive sports scholarship at the nearby University of California, Berkeley , where he ran 800 meters with coach Brutus Hamilton . The training mainly consisted of intensive speed runs on the track based on interval training . Since there was less competition on the 1500 meters than on the 800 meters, he decided in 1956 for the 1500 meters in the trials on 28/29. June to run this distance and qualified as third and youngest middle distance runner in the USA. At the Olympic Games at the end of November he was no longer in shape and was eliminated in eleventh place in the preliminary run. However, he had seen that by the end of the college season in June he would be in good shape for the longer middle distance and successfully tried to break the mile record a year later. This was achieved on June 1, 1957 in Stockton (California) . He ran the American record with 3: 58.7 minutes and was the first American to under four minutes for the mile. He was also a member of the University of California squadron, which ran the 4x880 y world record. After his bachelor's degree in 1957, he worked as a representative for various manufacturers of sports surfaces, tried to qualify for the 1960 Olympic Games , but failed due to an Achilles tendon injury . Thereupon he ended his sporting career and became a representative for tartan tracks before setting up his own company for hard tennis courts . Don Bowden was inducted into the National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 2008.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Archived copy ( memento of the original from March 22, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / trackandfieldnews.com
  2. ↑ s9.com on. 22nd March 2017
  3. ↑ Arnd Krüger : Many roads lead to Olympia. The changes in training systems for medium and long distance runners (1850–1997). In: N. Gissel (Hrsg.): Sporting performance in change . Czwalina, Hamburg 1998, pp. 41-56.
  4. ↑ [1] , accessed on March 22, 2017
  5. ^ Don Bowden , USA Track and Field - Hall of Fame. up 22nd March 2017
personal data
SURNAME Bowden, Don
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Bowden, Donald Paul (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American athlete
DATE OF BIRTH August 8, 1936
PLACE OF BIRTH San Jose , California