Flash! Payton Jordon, 1968 U.S. Olympic Track Coach, Has Died at age of 91, by Larry Eder

Payton Jordan, one of the most venerable faces in the sport of track & field, died Thursday, at his home, at the age of 91. The 1968 U.S. Olympic Track & Field coach for the team in Mexico City, Jordan was also the long time head coach at Stanford University, a top athlete as a young runner as well as a top masters athlete, known in his second track career as the Silver Streak.
Runblogrun will do a longer piece on Payton next week, but for a complete and thoughtful obituary, look no farther than the one and only Frank Litsky (http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/l/frank_litsky/index.html?inline=nyt-per), who wrote an amazing piece this morning. Payton Jordan died after a long fight with cancer. Our thoughts are with him, his family and his friends.

Author

Larry Eder
Larry Eder has had a 52-year involvement in the sport of athletics. Larry has experienced the sport as an athlete, coach, magazine publisher, and now, journalist and blogger. His first article, on Don Bowden, America's first sub-4 minute miler, was published in RW in 1983. Larry has published several magazines on athletics, from American Athletics to the U.S. version of Spikes magazine. He currently manages the content and marketing development of the RunningNetwork, The Shoe Addicts, and RunBlogRun. Of RunBlogRun, his daily pilgrimage with the sport, Larry says: "I have to admit, I love traveling to far away meets, writing about the sport I love, and the athletes I respect, for my readers at runblogrun.com, the most of anything I have ever done, except, maybe running itself." Also does some updates for BBC Sports at key events, which he truly enjoys. Theme song: Greg Allman, " I'm no Angel."
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