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 is the List of towns in Quebec, largest city in the Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Quebec, the List of the largest municipalities in Canada by population, second-largest in Canada, and the List of North American cit ...

Biography

Kardong graduated from

Seattle Prep Seattle Preparatory School, popularly known as Seattle Prep, is a private, Jesuit high school located on Capitol Hill in Seattle, Washington, United States. After it was founded in 1891, Seattle Prep merged with Immaculate Conception Parish Sch ...

in 1967. He then went on to earn a bachelor's degree in psychology from

Stanford University Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a Private university, private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth ...

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 sta ...

(3.1 miles). He finished third at the 1970 NCAA University Division cross country championships. In 1974, Kardong earned another bachelor's degree in English and a teaching certificate from the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW and informally U-Dub or U Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington, United States. Founded in 1861, the University of Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast of the Uni ...

Seattle Seattle ( ) is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Washington and in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. With a population of 780,995 in 2024, it is the 18th-most populous city in the United States. The city is the cou ...

. That same year, Kardong finished third in the 5000 meter race at the

USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships The USA Track & Field Outdoor Championships is an annual track and field competition organized by USA Track & Field, which serves as the American national championships for the sport. Since the year 1992, in the years which feature a Summer Oly ...

with a time of 13:35.6. Afterwards, he taught at

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

's Loma Vista Elementary from 1974 to 1977. In 1976, the 6' 3" Kardong finished 3rd in the United States Olympic Trials held in

Eugene, Oregon Eugene ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Lane County, Oregon, United States. It is located at the southern end of the Willamette Valley, near the confluence of the McKenzie River (Oregon), McKenzie and Willamette River, Willamette rivers, ...

with a time of 2:13:54. That summer, in Montreal, Kardong finished a close fourth in the men's

marathon The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of kilometres ( 26 mi 385 yd), usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There ...

at the

1976 Summer Olympics The 1976 Summer Olympics (), officially known as the Games of the XXI Olympiad () and officially branded as Montreal 1976 (), were an international multi-sport event held from July 17 to August 1, 1976, in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Montreal ...

with a time of 2:11:15, 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 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 ...

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 is named after Leopold Bloom, the protagonist of Joyce's 1922 novel ''Ulysses (novel), Ulysses' ...

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 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

) ;Citations {{DEFAULTSORT:Kardong, Don 1948 births 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 University of Washington alumni American male marathon runners American masters athletes 20th-century American sportsmen