Donald Franklin Kardong (born December 22, 1948) is a noted runner and author from the United States. He finished fourth in the 1976 Olympic marathon in

Montreal Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple ...

Biography

Kardong graduated from prestigious college-prep school, Seattle Prep in 1967. He then went on to earn a bachelor's degree in psychology from Stanford University in 1971. While at Stanford, Kardong ran primarily the

5000 meters The 5000 metres or 5000-metre run is a common long-distance running event in track and field, approximately equivalent to or . It is one of the track events in the Olympic Games and the World Championships in Athletics, run over laps of a stan ...

(3.1 miles). In 1974, Kardong earned another bachelor's degree in English and a teaching certificate from the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattl ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

. Afterwards, he taught at

Spokane Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Ca ...

's Loma Vista Elementary from 1974-1977. In 1976, the 6' 3" Kardong finished 3rd in the United States Olympic Trials held in Eugene, Oregon with a time of 2:13:54. That summer, in Montreal, Kardong finished a close fourth in the men's marathon at the

1976 Summer Olympics Events January * January 3 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 11 – The 1976 P ...

, just three seconds behind the bronze medal winner. In 1998, controversy arose concerning steroid use by East German athletes at the 1976 Summer Olympics, including Gold medalist Waldemar Cierpinski. If medals were re-assigned only to drug-free athletes, American Frank Shorter would take the Gold; followed by silver medalist Karel Lismont of Belgian and bronze medalist Don Kardong for Team USA. Don Kardong Footbridge Spokane 2018

From 1977 to 1986, Kardong owned and operated a retail running store in Spokane; he founded the

Lilac Bloomsday Run The Lilac Bloomsday Run, also known as Bloomsday, is an annual timed road race in the northwest United States, held on the first Sunday of May since 1977 in The course length is 12 km (7.456 mi). The run has had over 38,000 participants every ...

() in 1977. As a journalist and author, Kardong was a contributing editor for ''Running'' magazine from 1980 to 1983, and a contributing editor (1983–1985) and senior writer (1985–1987) for ''The Runner'' magazine. Since 1987, Kardong has been a contributing writer for ''Runner's World'' magazine. Kardong was president of the

Road Runners Club of America Founded in 1958, the Road Runners Club of America (RRCA) is the oldest and largest distance running organization in the United States with over 1,500 running club and event members representing 200,000 individual runners active in their running c ...

from 1996 to 2000. He served as executive director of the Children's Museum of Spokane from 2002 to 2004, and as race director of the Bloomsday run since then. Kardong started the

Bloomsday Bloomsday is a commemoration and celebration of the life of Irish writer James Joyce, observed annually in Dublin and elsewhere on 16 June, the day his 1922 novel '' Ulysses'' takes place in 1904, the date of his first sexual encounter with his ...

race in Spokane - the community and a

The Spokesman-Review ''The Spokesman-Review'' is a daily broadsheet newspaper based in Spokane, Washington, the city's sole remaining daily publication. It has the third-highest readership among daily newspapers in the state, with most of its readership base in ...

newspaper article prompted the start of the race.The Just Athletics Podcast Episode 59 - Don Kardong
The Just Athletics Podcast. March 18, 2021 Spokane's Don Kardong Bridge was renamed for him.

Achievements

Books

* ''Thirty Phone Booths to Boston: Tales of a Wayward Runner'' (Macmillan Co., New York, 1985, selected an editor's choice of the American Library Association) * ''Bloomsday: A City in Motion'' (Cowles Publishing, Spokane, WA, 1989) * ''Hills, Hawgs and Ho Chi Minh'' (Keokee Co. Publishing, Sandpoint, ID, 1996)

External links

Bloomsday.org
- Bloomsday 12k website

- 'Don Kardong' (biography), National Running Hall of Fame

References

;General *
More than you'll ever need to know about Don Kardong
' at Don Kardong's official site (

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

) ;Citations {{DEFAULTSORT:Kardong, Don 1948 births American male long-distance runners Athletes (track and field) at the 1976 Summer Olympics American male journalists Living people Olympic male marathon runners Olympic track and field athletes for the United States Stanford Cardinal men's track and field athletes American male marathon runners