Coos Bay

Today we went on a day trip out of Eugene and Springfield to the Southern Oregon coastline to a little town called Coos Bay. In the world of distance running Coos Bay is pretty famous as it is where the legendary American distance runner, Steve Prefontaine, was born and began racing in his early years. Prefontaine was a middle and long distance runner during the early 70’s and in his short career broke 14 American distance records before tragically dying in a car accident at the age of 24. During his running career Prefontaine gained national recognition for his aggressive front running style, never happy to sit in second place he would always force himself on the lead and make sure that everyone in the field had to run hard to beat him. He was quite a character, brash and popular amongst his peers. There are photos of Pre during his time at the University of Oregon where the whole stadium was packed with many people wearing “Go Pre” T-Shirts - while his rivals fans wore "Stop Pre" T-Shirts! We certainly don’t get enthusiastic fans like that at track meets nowadays! Pre’s legacy now is as much about his quotes as it is about his running style. The one which me and Andrea like the most is

To give anything less than your best is to sacrifice the gift

We find it very inspiring and something which we both try to live our lives by. Not just in sport but in the many other aspects of our lives. There are many memorials all over Oregon dedicated to Steve, with the majority of them in Coos Bay. Not to forget mentioning the Prefontaine Classic, named after Steve, which becomes a part of the inaugural diamond league this year. Today we wanted to see a few of the memorials as well as see some of the national parks surrounding Coos Bay which we had heard were very nice.

We were lucky as we got a great day for it. The weather has been a bit miserable for a few days but today it was around 17C and really sunny (almost shorts weather in fact). On the way to Coos Bay we stopped at ‘Eel Lake’ at the Willliam Tugman state park. We had our lunch and then took a walk down a track which winded through a beautiful redwood forest around the edge of the lake. It was very peaceful and was being enjoyed by fishermen and walkers alike. One of the most beautiful places we have seen so far in the US!


Eel Lake

It was then onto Coos Bay. We headed straight to some of the memorials and the art museum where they have a permanent exhibition dedicated to Steve. They had a lot of memorabilia from his running days as well as photographs and artwork by local and national artists who had been inspired by him. We then took a visit to the track where we stumbled across the high-school coach of the school that Steve had been to in his teens. It so happened that the coach had trained with Steve when he was younger and so he enthusiastically told us some stories before we headed back towards Eugene.


One of the many plaques dotted around Coos Bay


Steve Prefontaine memoribilia

On the way back we wanted to check out the Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area, which boasts the tallest sand dunes in North America. The park was right on the coast so we got our first views of the ocean since landing in the US. We took a short walk around the park which took us up one of the more tame sand dunes before driving three hours back to our apartment.


Oregon Dunes National Recreation Area