Bill Bowerman

The story of Oregon's Legendary Coach and Nike's Cofounder

Kenny Moore, who has written for Sports Illustrated since 1971, has long been my favorite sports writer. He not only writes about athletes in a caring, knowledgeable, and inspiring way, he is an athlete. A member of the 1968 and 1972 U.S. Olympic teams, he was a distance runner on Bill Bowerman's Oregon University track team, broke the American record for the marathon in 1969 with a time of 2:13:29, improving to 2:11:36 the next year. He placed 4th in the Munich Olympic marathon. Moreover, his foot was the model for the running shoe that made Blue Ribbon Sports (BRS), the forerunner of Nike, a viable company.

After suffering a stress fracture in a shoe with no arch support, Bill Bowerman made a shoe with a shock-absorbing support for him to try and report back weekly. Moore ran more than 1000 miles on different versions of the shoe until Bowerman, a perfectionist, was satisfied he had it right. That shoe was the prototype of the classic and still popular Nike Cortez, which made running shoes fashionable. It was the beginning of a relationship, starting as coach-and-athlete and blossoming into a meaningful friendship, that lasted for more than 30 years.

No one was better suited than Kenny Moore to write Bill Bowerman's biography. Moore obviously loved Bill (he insisted that his athletes call him Bill), and in reading his 432-page Bowerman, I came to love him as well.

Bill and Barbara Bowerman chose well when, in 1991 as Bill was turning 80, they gave Moore the “commission” to tell the story of Bill's “life and times and of the athletes he's been fortunate to teach and learn from.” With full cooperation from the Bowerman family and Nike, and interviews with many relatives, friends, students, colleagues, enemies and competitors, Moore left no stone unturned, going down every street and side street, over a decade or more, to capture the epic story, warts and all.

Starting with Bill's pioneer ancestors who settled Fossil, Oregon, Moore explored Bill's unruly childhood, college years as a student and athletic, his spirited courtship of Barbara, his formative coaching years, Bill's heroic service in World War Two, several life-long friendships, building a track and field dynasty, innovative training principles, coaching and involvement in the Olympic Games, battles with the AAU and the U.S. and International Olympic hierarchy, coaching Steve Prefontaine, the birth and growth of Nike, his turbulent relationship with Phil Knight, his invention of waffle soled shoes, starting the jogging boom in America, community involvement, sons and grandchildren, thoughtful and creative philanthropy, return to Fossil in the final years, and more. You get the idea; he covers everything a reader would want to know, and sometimes a little more. It's a wonderful, fascinating, and inspiring story.

To whet your appetite for a really good read, here are thumbnail sketches of a few of my favorite episodes.

Hard-Easy Training

Bill Bowerman constantly thought about the best way to train his athletes. “Although he would experiment ...