From Walt Murphy. Shared with permission. Walt produces an info-rich daily ”This Day in T&F” newsletter. Contact him at waltmurphy44@gmail.com if you’d like to join his distribution list.
No question about what a historic year 2022 has been for mile and 800m performances by high school boys (and its far from over!), but let’s take a moment to marvel at what took place a lifetime ago in a single meet.
1964 – Two historic prep records were set at the Compton Invitational in California. First up was senior Gerry Lindgren (Rogers – Spokane, WA), who finished 4th in the 5000 meters with a time of 13:44.0, a U.S. High School Record that stood for 40-years until Galen Rupp ran 13:37.91 in 2004.
The winner of the 5000 was Bob Schul, whose time of 13:38.0 smashed Jim Beatty’s American Record of 13:45.0, which was set in 1962 (Lindgren was also under the previous AR!). Schul, of course, went on later in the year to win the gold medal in the 5000 at the Tokyo Olympics. Lindgren (10k) and Ryun (1500) would also later qualify for the U.S. Olympic team.
In the mile race, despite losing some time after he got bumped off the track on the 2nd lap, junior Jim Ryun (Wichita East, KS) finished 8th in the mile, but ran 3:59.0 to become the first high school runner to break 4-minutes in the event.
Dyrol Burleson (3:57.4) was the winner of the deep mile field over Tom O’Hara (3:57.6), Archie San Romani (3:57.6), Morgan Groth (3:57.9), Jim Grelle (3:58.5), Bob Day (3:58.9), Cary Weisiger (3:58.9), and Ryun (3:59.0). It was the first time in history that 8 men had run sub-4 in the same race.
