Courtesy of New York Road Runners; Jason Speakman/MH Illustration

6 min read

DAVE OBELKEVICH DIDN’T grow up a runner. He was more a music kid, who did chorus, orchestra, and band. But on a whim for his senior year of high school in Johnson City, NY, Obelkevich joined the track club. A few years before, he had completed a mile in under 6 minutes while his brother and best friend finished around the 8-minute mark, so he thought he might do well. He was humbled immediately.

“The coach would say, ‘Okay Dave, you start running around the track. We'll give you a 10-second head start,” Obelkevich tells MH. “They always caught me by the end of the loop.” He never finished dead last, though. Second to last, but never last place.

Obelkevich eventually moved to New York City to attend Columbia University in 1961. But it wasn’t until almost a decade later that he took his first steps to building one of the most notable reputations in the city’s running community.…