Payton Jordan memorial to be held night before invitational
Payton Jordan’s memorial celebration is set. He didn’t get a funeral, but he’ll have a sendoff. It will be the night before the Payton Jordan Cardinal Invitational at Stanford University, according to several notes. One says: “If you are interested in attending, contact Coach Edrick Floreal at Stanford at floreal@stanford.edu. There will be a lot to celebrate, so I hope you can make it.” Coach Floreal has been working with Chuck Cobb and Pitch Johnson to plan the event. “They have decided to host a dinner in Payt’s honor on Friday night, May 1, probably in the Stanford Faculty Club,” said a note from Gary Cavalli in San Francisco. “They’re planning on a group of 300-500, with an open mike so that we can all get up and share our memories of the ‘ol coach.’ Details will be forthcoming. . . . Please spread the word as you deem appropriate, and I’ll look forward to seeing you in May.”
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I accepted a job at NASA Ames in 1959 and came out to the Bay Area that summer after four years as a quarter miler at Texas A&M. That fall I discovered a cross country race being run on the Stanford golf course and asked about tracks. Someone told me about the all-comers meets that Payton held on the Angel Field track, which at that time was slightly banked clay and sand with a long straight-away on one side.
I was delighted to be able to keep running and did so each winter and summer (off-season). I was very surprised to learn that Stanford was hosting the 1960 Trials and got a ticket to see a young Stanford half-miler in the finals. He went out hard and took the lead, making a valiant effort, but started to die at the 600.
At one of Payton’s meets I had a similar experience. I had pulled a muscle in the 220 a few weeks before and decided that I should be able to run the 880, my first ever. That morning a friend and I went up to help my Aunt Virginia move to a new appartment, in San Francisco, and she wanted one of us to finish an old bottle of champaign (too sentimental to pour it down the sink). There was only an inch in the bottom of the bottle, so I drank it. The meet was that afternoon, and at the end of the first lap I felt like I was floating (56s 1st lap), still leading the field until half-way around on the 2nd lap. Then the depressant kicked in. I got a side ache and stepped off the track. A friend came running over and asked, “Why did you quit, you were leading Lazlo Tabori.” I said, “Who is Lazlo Tabori ?” He was the Hungarian distance runner who got shot in the leg during the Hungarian revolt, but went to Melborne with his team anyway and got an opportunity to defect to the West. I didn’t run that distance again until I was 47 (another pulled muscle). I won that one, but at a much slower pace.
I owe a lot to Payton’s all-comer meets. My only monmento is a silver “Olympic Development” medal from 1960. If it were not for having the opportunity to compete during my two years in California, I’m sure I would never have continued as an adult. I’m now 71 and still competing, having finally won a few championships, but still no age-group records.
I remember Payton as a hansom blonde striding from event to event. I didn’t realize then what a great athlete he was, and was to be on the masters circuit. The last time I saw him run was in 1989 at the US National Masters championship meet in San Diego. He must have been 71 at that time, and he ran like a machine. As I remember it in my mind, it seems like his stride was so quick that either his right leg or left leg was ahead (no in-between), with his lead foot about to strike the track again.
He will live on in our hearts and memories.
Ron Kirkpatrick
rckpak@gmail.com
I never heard that Lazlo Tabori was shot in the leg. Is the story apocryphal, or do you have “proof”? It’s a great story – might explain some things…
I was coached by Lazlo while in high school (he wasn’t my high school coach, but I saw him outside of school). He made me faster, and I still have fond memories of those Tuesday and Thursday evenings of endless intervals at the LA Valley college track (what the passage of 20 years will do to one’s memory, allowing pain to be completely forgotten).
Lazlo paid me the highest compliment I’m likely ever to get. When I told him I was given a choice to run the mile or two mile in an upcoming meet, he told me to run the two mile and said “you have more guts than speed”. I knew I had no wheels, but I thought those were great words, and a great way to tell someone they had no raw speed. “More guts than speed”. I want those words engraved on my tombstone.
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