Don Bowden

Don Bowden (born August 8, 1936) is an American athlete who was the first American to break the four-minute mile. He represented the USA at the 1956 Olympic Games.

Bowden attended Abraham Lincoln High School (San Jose, California) in San Jose, California where he was a star 880 runner, then entered the University of California, Berkeley where he again specialized in the 880.

Despite having previously run only a few full mile races, on June 1, 1957 in Stockton, California Bowden clocked a 3:58.7 in the mile, setting a new American record.[1] He also ran on a world-record-setting 4 x 880 team for University of California.[1]

Bowden represented the U.S. in the 1956 Olympic Games, running the 1500m.[1] He failed to reach the final, coming 11th in his qualifying heat.[2]

After college he helped develop the Tartan track, the first artificial running surface. He was inducted into the National Track and Field Hall of Fame in 2008.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Don Bowden, USA Track and Field - Hall of Fame. Retrieved 2013-10-28.
  2. ↑ Men 1500m Athletics Olympic Games Melbourne 1956 - Saturday 03.12, Sport Statistics - International Competitions Archive. Retrieved 2013-10-28.
This article is issued from Wikipedia - version of the 10/15/2016. The text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike but additional terms may apply for the media files.