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QuickTake:
K.C. Taylor started running seriously in his 50s, when many people start to slow down.
For about six years, when he was still working, K.C. Taylor would pull his Sherwin-Williams truck over at Willamette Pass, throw on his running gear, and run 12 miles in the wilderness. He did it nearly every week.
He trained that way from ages 62 to 67. Once done with his trek in the mountains, he’d towel off and climb back in the cab.
“I’d be sitting in that cab for six hours. I’d set the brakes right up there at the summit and go run into the Rosary Lakes,” Taylor said.
He fondly remembers those out-and-back runs on the Pacific Crest Trail, six miles in and six miles out.
“I just drink out of the lakes up there,” Taylor said. “A lot of people (worry) about that, but I’ve never gotten (sick) or whatever.”
Taylor, a Eugene native, is now retired and recently turned 70.
With his running, Taylor said, he’s “just getting started. I’ll be younger next year.”
A late start
He started competing in 1972 at South Eugene High School, where he ran the 800 meters. By his own account, he wasn’t a standout. He placed fourth at districts as a junior and skipped his senior season.
He returned to the 800 in his 20s, racing at all-comers meets at Hayward Field. In his 40s, he moved to road racing.
The biggest turning point came at 56, when he gave up alcohol.
“I had about eight to nine pounds of vodka to lose,” Taylor said with a laugh.
He lost the weight, and his times dropped as well. That year he won his age division at the Humboldt Redwoods Half Marathon in Weott, California, running 1:20:02, about a 6:06 per mile pace.
At the New York City Marathon in 2008, he swung his Oregon Ducks cap over his head like a lasso as he came around a corner into Central Park at mile 26. The crowd got louder.
“That would go on my Instagram lifetime reel,” Taylor said.
He ran the Boston Marathon in 3:01:52 in 2010, just missing the coveted three-hour mark that only about 1% of marathoners break.
His more recent results include the Oct. 10 Rogue Valley Half Marathon. There, he placed first in his age bracket (70 to 79) and 34th out of 277 total runners. He ran a 7:29 pace, finishing in about 1 hour, 38 minutes.
All business and old school
Taylor’s training is simple but intense.
He runs three or four times a week, often 10 miles at around 7:30 pace, along the river from Dorris Ranch to the Clearwater Park boat landing and back.
He fuels with coffee and raisin toast and doesn’t mind rain. Ice is the only thing that keeps him indoors.
After logging thousands of hours in a truck cab listening to books and music, he now runs without headphones.
“I’m old school,” Taylor said. “Running to me is all business. I like to hear people come up next to me. I like to listen to the river.”
When beads of sweat start to drop from his head a few miles into a run, it means he’s reached flow state.
“I start entering into another dimension, in a way,” Taylor said. “It’s the endorphins or whatever you want to call it, but maybe that’s what’s kept me in it all these years.”
Taylor’s all about his PRs, improving as much as he can, which requires little distractions.
“The margins get real tight; there’s no room for slop,” he said.
Taylor, a self-proclaimed chatterbox, says he loves running with people, though these days he mostly runs alone. That’s because the younger runners are a bit too fast for him, and he’s faster than most runners his age. That wasn’t the case in his mid-40s, when he joined a run club that met most mornings at 5:30 a.m. for track workouts, tempo runs and long Sunday miles.
Al Whalen, who was in a 5:30 a.m. run club with Taylor for years, and his wife, Patty, verify the chatterbox claim.
They’ve known him since the early 2000s.
At past Hood to Coast relays, Whalen said Taylor “always had squirt guns” and would break out a Super Soaker for runners baking in the sun. “Usually he got thumbs up,” Whalen said.
For many years, Whalen was the faster of the two runners, but it has since flipped. They haven’t been running together for at least a couple of years.
“If we went for a run today, he’d have to really throttle it back,” Whalen said. “He’s fit beyond his years.”
Patty Whalen said Taylor’s energy extends well beyond the trail.
“He just doesn’t know a stranger,” she said. “He is the friendliest guy you will ever meet, and he will talk to anybody at any time. They wind up being friends.”
That’s how Taylor ended up with an invitation to stay with a fellow runner he had met on the training app Strava when he runs the New York City Half in March.
His goal for the New York race, and for the Eugene Half in the spring, is simple: Match what he ran last year: a 1:30:05 in Eugene, a pace of 6:52 per mile.
“All I try to do is match what I did 12 months ago,” Taylor said.
As for what keeps him going on those 10-milers and marathon trips, his answer was simple.
“Life rewards action,” Taylor said. “Get out of the house. Keep moving.”
Do you know Lane County athletes age 65 or older who take their sports seriously? Send an email to Leo Heffron.
