Barry Magee: Olympic Legend

Biography: Welcome to the first episode of the Olympic Legends Podcast! My guest today is Barry Magee, the Bronze Medalist from the 1960 Marathon in Rome. Barry hails from New Zealand, and he has had a long, distinguished career as a versatile runner of many distances including the mile, 5K, 10K, and the marathon. He was a protégé of legendary coach Arthur Lydiard (considered by many to be the greatest running coach of all time), and at the age of 81 he is still active in coaching people of all ages in the Lydiard Way. In addition to his bronze medal, he competed in the 1964 Tokyo Olympics and set a host of other national and international records throughout his career. Conversation: I had a great time talking to Barry for about an hour, but just as we were finishing up, technology reared its ugly head and sadly the record of our conversation was lost. I remembered much of what we talked about, so I summarized it monologue-style for the first part of the podcast, and when I called him back after our call dropped, he was kind enough to talk to me for a few additional minutes, so at least you can at least hear him speak for a little bit. 0:01 - Introduction 1:59 - My summary of the lost conversation 12:37 - Barry joins in 20:05 - Epilogue 21:02 - End of the show Your browser does not support this audio The embedded player works best in Google Chrome. You can also download the mp3 by clicking here. Additional Links: A great profile of Barry on the "Becky Runs Away" blog. Barry's Running School's website where he mentors New Zealand runners young and old The New Zealand National Anthem by Hayley Westenra. For my money, this is the #1 national anthem in the world. Other favorite anthems on my list include Germany, England, Canada, the U.S., Spain, and Italy, but "God Defend New Zealand" is the most goosebump inducing of them all.