Michiko "Miki" Suwa Gorman (August 9, 1935 – September 19, 2015)
was an American marathon runner of Japanese ancestry. Gorman did not begin running competitively until she was in her mid-30s, but rapidly emerged as one of the elite marathoning women of the mid-1970s.
[ She is the only woman to win both the ]Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
and New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
marathons twice and is the first of only two woman runners to win both marathons in the same year.
Early life
Michiko Suwa was born to Japanese
Japanese may refer to:
* Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia
* Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan
* Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture
** Japanese diaspor ...
parents in Qingdao
Qingdao (, also spelled Tsingtao; , Mandarin: ) is a major city in eastern Shandong Province. The city's name in Chinese characters literally means " azure island". Located on China's Yellow Sea coast, it is a major nodal city of the One Belt ...
, China
China, officially the People's Republic of China (PRC), is a country in East Asia. It is the world's most populous country, with a population exceeding 1.4 billion, slightly ahead of India. China spans the equivalent of five time zones and ...
, grew up in Japan's Fukushima Prefecture
Fukushima Prefecture (; ja, 福島県, Fukushima-ken, ) is a prefecture of Japan located in the Tōhoku region of Honshu. Fukushima Prefecture has a population of 1,810,286 () and has a geographic area of . Fukushima Prefecture borders Miya ...
during the post-war years and moved to the United States in 1964. Shortly after she moved, she married Michael Gorman. At 5'0½" tall and 86 pounds, she took up running while in her early 30s to gain weight. In 1970, as her first event, Michiko (later "Miki" Gorman) ran an indoor 100 mile run in 21:04:00 in Los Angeles
Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the largest city in the state of California and the second most populous city in the United States after New York City, as well as one of the world' ...
, California
California is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, located along the West Coast of the United States, Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the List of states and territori ...
.
Career
Gorman set an unofficial world's best for the women's marathon of 2:46:36 at the Western Hemisphere Marathon (now the Culver City
Culver City is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. As of the 2020 census, the population was 40,779. Founded in 1917 as a "whites only" sundown town, it is now an ethnically diverse city with what was called the "third-most ...
Marathon) on December 3, 1973, just four years after she started to run. Four months later, in April 1974, she won the Boston Marathon in a course record of 2:47:11. Gorman would also place second at Boston in 1976, and won Boston again in 1977.
Gorman also won the New York City Marathon
The New York City Marathon (currently branded TCS New York City Marathon after its headline sponsor) is an annual marathon () that courses through the five boroughs of New York City. It is the largest marathon in the world, with 53,627 finishe ...
twice, in 1976 and 1977, at the age of 41 and 42 respectively. Until 2017, when the race was won by Shalane Flanagan
Shalane Grace Flanagan (born July 8, 1981) is an American long-distance runner, Olympic medalist and New York City Marathon champion. She was the first American woman to win the New York City Marathon since 1977. She holds the NACAC area reco ...
, she had been the last American woman to win the New York City Marathon. She set a personal best during her 1976 victory with a time of 2:39:11, then the second fastest women's marathon in history and just a minute off the world record.
Gorman participated in the 1977 World Masters Athletics Championships
1977 World Masters Athletics Championships is the second in a series of World Masters Athletics Outdoor Championships (called World Masters Championships or World Veterans Championships at the time) that took place in Gothenburg, Sweden, from ...
in Gothenburg
Gothenburg (; abbreviated Gbg; sv, Göteborg ) is the second-largest city in Sweden, fifth-largest in the Nordic countries, and capital of the Västra Götaland County. It is situated by the Kattegat, on the west coast of Sweden, and has ...
, Sweden and in the 1979 World Masters Athletics Championships
1979 World Masters Athletics Championships is the third in a series of World Masters Athletics Outdoor Championships (called World Veterans Championships at the time) that took place in Hannover, Germany, from 27 July to 2 August 1979.
The main ...
that were held in Hanover
Hanover (; german: Hannover ; nds, Hannober) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Lower Saxony. Its 535,932 (2021) inhabitants make it the 13th-largest city in Germany as well as the fourth-largest city in Northern Germany ...
, West Germany
West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
. At Gothenburg, she easily won the 40–44 masters division in the 1500 meters, 3000 meters, cross-country, and marathon competitions. Her cross-country and marathon race times were the fastest among women across all age divisions. In Hanover, at the age of 44, she won her division in the 5000 meters, 10000 meters, and marathon races.
In 1978, Gorman set a women's world record in the half-marathon. Frequently injured in subsequent years, Gorman competed sporadically through the years 1978 to 1981. She decided to retire from competitive running in 1982. In Miki Gorman's hometown of Atsugi, Japan
is a city located in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 223,960 and a population density of 2400 persons per km². The total area of the city is .
While the name "Atsugi" is often associated with the Unite ...
, the city named a 10 km in honor of her called the Gorman Cup.
Recognition
Gorman was inducted into both 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 ...
Hall of Fame and the USATF
USA Track & Field (USATF) is the United States national governing body for the sports of track and field, cross country running, road running and racewalking (known as the sport of athletics outside the US). The USATF was known between 1979 and ...
Masters Hall of Fame, as well as the National Distance Running Hall of Fame
The National Distance Running Hall of Fame was established on July 11, 1998, to honor those who have contributed to the sport of distance running. Many of those who are inducted have achieved great success as runners, but some members are enshrined ...
. In 1979, the Supersisters
''Supersisters'' was a set of 72 trading cards produced and distributed in the United States in 1979 by Supersisters, Inc. They featured famous women from politics, media and entertainment, culture, sports, and other areas of achievement. The ca ...
trading card set was produced and distributed; one of the cards featured Gorman's name and picture. In 1981, a film called "Little Champion" (known on video in America as ''My Champion''), starring Yoko Shimada
was a Japanese actress, best known to Western audiences for her portrayal of Mariko in the 1980 miniseries ''Shōgun''.
''Shogun'' miniseries
Shimada was the only female member of ''Shōgun''s massive cast of Japanese actors shown speaking En ...
and Chris Mitchum and documenting the events of Gorman's life, was released.
Death
Gorman died from cancer at the age of 80 in Bellingham, Washington
Bellingham ( ) is the most populous city in, and county seat of Whatcom County in the U.S. state of Washington. It lies south of the U.S.–Canada border in between two major cities of the Pacific Northwest: Vancouver, British Columbia (locat ...
.[Overlooked No More: Miki Gorman, the Unlikely Marathon Winner]
New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...
October 31, 2018
See also
*List of winners of the Boston Marathon
The Boston Marathon, one of the six World Marathon Majors, is a race which has been held in the Greater Boston area in Massachusetts since 1897. Until 2020, it was the oldest annual marathon in the world, a distinction now held by the Osaka-Lake ...
*List of winners of the New York City Marathon
The New York City Marathon, one of the six World Marathon Majors, is a race which has been held in New York City since 1970. It is the largest marathon in the world; since 2013, every race except one has had over 50,000 finishers. From 1970 thro ...
References
External links
*
Running Commentary by Joe Henderson, April 17, 2001
{{DEFAULTSORT:Gorman, Miki
1935 births
Athletes from Qingdao
Japanese expatriate sportspeople in China
American female long-distance runners
2015 deaths
World record setters in athletics (track and field)
Japanese emigrants to the United States
American female marathon runners
Boston Marathon female winners
New York City Marathon female winners
American sportspeople of Japanese descent
American masters athletes
21st-century American women