A few minutes with Gold Medalist Bob Schul

A few minutes with Bob Schul, 1964 Olympics Gold Medalist in the 5,000 meters.

Read The RUNOHIO Book Review – A Closer Look at - Bob Schul, "In the Long Run” - http://www.runohio.com/archive/news/07-28-04Book_review_schu...

A look at Distance Legends speaking at the Olympic Trials
http://www.runohio.com/archive/news/07-28-04Book_review_schu...

RUNOHIO
Bob how do you think the Eugene Olympic Trials are going so far?

Schul
I think the Trials are going well. The fans are great. The only thing I don’t like is the announcer. He is playing favorites. Nobody should do that. He is giving that hometown athlete that extra boost. And I just don’t like it at all.

RUNOHIO
What did you think of last night Men’s 5,000

Schul
Well it was a typical race that these guys get into. It comes down to the sprint and you knew that Lagat would win it because of that. So, everyone knew they were going for second and third.

RUNOHIO
What did you think of the women’s 10,000

Schul
Yea, that was a good race, the women really pressured themselves. It was a good race, good time. How they are going to do in Beijing with them who knows, I think Flanagan has a shot to medal. It a nice going in there knowing she does.

RUNOHIO

How many Olympic Trials have you attended since you won the Gold Medal in ‘64

Schul
I don’t really know, I can’t remember. Enough of them. It always has been fun. I wish there was one thing they would do..to pay more attention to the past people who have won medals…and allow use to congratulate the people in our events.

RUNOHIO
It would have been nice to have you down on the track assisting with the awards ceremony.

Schul
Well, I think the athletes would like it too. If the Olympic Goal Medalist was there in ’64 to give me my medal, it would have been a great honor to meet him.

RUNOHIO
Not a lot of American guys standing around with an Olympic Goal medal.

Schul
(laughs) I haven’t met one yet.

How is the Running Legend thing you done been going.

Schul
We are having a lot of fun with it. We have been getting a good crowd.

RUNOHIO
It is great to see a poster with all of those guys on it.

Schul
We have had great comments about the poster. We had to do a lot of work on it because we didn’t have pictures of everyone. WE had to do a lot of computer stuff to get it too look good. WE have a lot of people comment it is a great poster. They want to get the autographs and frame it. Some people get the autographs and go anyplace and sell it for $200. I think that is probably the case.

RUNOHIO
How many people from Ohio have you seen out here

Schul
I have seen a lot. Ohio has great track fans and gthey came out here to see a very good track meet.

RUNOHIO
How would you rate the crowd here compared to other Trials

Schul
They have had good crowds. Back when we ran track, track was big, in LA we had 40,000 people each day for a 2 day meet. We would go to sold out indoor meets. You look at a lot of venues today and they are not even full.

RUNOHIO
What do you think they need to do to get more people in the stands

Schul
It starts with TV. TV has made it boring. We have to do something to convince the TV people to do something about the interviews afterwards. They do one race every 15 minutes. If you are not a hard core track fan you are not going to watch it. They get bored to death and switch the channel. What we have to get TV to put these things together so there are raced every five minutes and people would be interested in watch it.
And then they will start to come back out to watch track meets