Here is an article from "Ducks Illustrated," a magazine put out by Jerry Thompson of Eugene, OR. Steve Tannen is the feature writer, but I don't know which one did this interview. It's a good one, I thought many here would enjoy it. I had to type it out pretty fast, so sorry for any typos.
ALBERTO SALAZAR SPEAKS OUT
Alberto Salazar: Ran at Oregon from 1977 to 1981. He is third all-time at UO in 5K, second in 10K and 6 mile. Salazar is involved in marketing and promotional activities at Nike in the running department and is coach of the Oregon Project based in the Portland area. He coaches a group of distance runners training for the national team at an Olympic level. He was head cross country coach at Central Catholic for 5 years.
DI: How do you respond to the idea that some hold that Phil Knight and you forced the resignation of Martin Smith?
Salazar: The idea that we told the Athletic Department what to do is ridiculous. Phil Knight is completely against meddling even in his own company, and certainly not with the University of Oregon Athletic Department. That's not his style at all. He believes people need to be hired on their own merits, and not other people's influence. If you force someone to get hired there will be problems because they won't be accepted by others in the company.
We deny that we were the precipitating factor and we don't want to be linked with the new coach hire. It's been a very clear directive from Nike. We didn't cause that and we're going to stay out of it.
There's no doubt about what our feelings were as a major donor, just as any alum or contributor at any school. Phil has opinions about the program's direction, but does he say you have to do this because he's Phil Knight? No. Why shouldn't alums have questions and opinions on how things are run? A lot of Portland alums as well as me didn't like the way things were going, but we didn't tell the athletic department what to do. Did Nike cut back any of its contractual agreements with the UO? No. It was private giving which decreased.
DI: The track team was finishing first or second in the Pac-10 the past few years, getting great athletes like Jordan Kent and Tommy Skipper, and even without Galen Rupp they might have won the Pac-10 title this year. What was wrong? It appeared to be successful?
Salazar: It depends upon the definition of success. There are a lot of track teams winning conference championships with about 100 people in the stands. Attendance went down steadily. Community involvement was declining. Track was dying in Eugene. That is more important to look at. No one talks about cross country which has not been doing well lately. Is not cross country a sport? Some say the glory years are gone. That's nonsense.
DI: What needs to happen to bring track back?
Salazar: I believe you can get 10,000 in the stands if you had an unbelievable team and across the board middle distance runners. What if you brought in Arkansas vs. UO and did it in a way so they don't have to change their philsophy, such as a ten event competition?
My vision for U of O is to consistently be in the top 3 nationally, and sometimes win the NCAA Championship. The program doesn't have to be overhauled or have a disproportionate number of scholarships. For distance runners I think a reasonable number of scholarships would be four spread out among the runners. If you have very good distance coaching you should be able to get very good runners because of Oregon's heritage and climate. If equally good sprint coaches and distance coaches are going after equally good sprint and distance athletes, you'll get a higher number of distance runners than sprinters. Some say it's hard to compete with Stanford. There's a lot of distance runners who like Colorado, Wisconsin, and Arkansas. The U of O has as much or more to offer than those schools. Obviously the runners are going there because of the coaches.
DI: Many think Vin Lananna will be the new coach. What do you think?
Salazar: I talk to Vin frequently and to my knowledge he has not been offered the job. I think the idea that the job description was written for Lananna is complete nonsense. I bet there are at least ten coaches who are qualified. I think you need someone with the administrative experience beause of the complexities of track in Eugene and the other meets there. I think Lananna would be a good choice. Pat Henry at Texas A&M and Bubba Thornton at Texas also come to mind. The new coach doesn't have to be a distance coach, but he should recognize that middle distances, distances, and cross country has to be important. If you're not getting to the NCAAs in cross country your chance of success in track is greatly reduced.
To clarify my involvement, I have not spoken to Bill Moos for four months. Before Martin Smith was hired Bill Moos was obviously going out and beating the bushes from a lot of sources. He asked me what my list would look like. I worked on that list with Rudy Chapa and other alums. We recommended John McConnell, Vin Lananna, Martin Smith, Matt Centrowitz, Steve Placentia, and Pat Tyson. Those are the guys we sent to him. After that we never spoke to Bill Moos again about how to rate those candidates. No one from Nike was involved in any further evaluation or discussion of those candidates.
DI: Did you discourage Galen Rupp and other high school runners from coming to Oregon contributing to Martin Smith's resignation?
Salazar: A lot fo people were saying I was keeping Galen from going to U of O. I tried to get Joaquin Chapa there. I didn't tell anyone not to go to the U of O. The idea that the reason he resigned was because of Galen Rupp is ridiculous. The U of O wouldn't and shouldn't do that for one kid. You can't put all your money on one horse. He could be injured.
Galen's parents wanted me to keep coaching him. Galen needed to be in a friendly environment, one that welcomed me working with him. All we wanted was to continue to do what we had begun. Martin Smith and I didn't see eye to eye. That's not anybody's fault. We disagreed on training and the direction of program. Galen didn't want to be in the middle of that. When Joaquin Cruz was there Bill Dellinger allowed him to have a personal coach. It wasn't going to work here.
DI: What's your involvement now and how are things going?
Salazar: The NCAA allows outside coaches, but I am not allowed to give workouts at the U of O track. I can watch a meet but not yell out instructions. I am down in Eugene once a week and we talk once a day. The Rupp's pay me a monthly fee which is verified by contract and they keep the cancelled checks. It's a very unique situation where you have an extraordinary athlete who wants his high school coach to continue to work with him while he is in college. I don't think it's a problem, it doesn't happen very often.
My plan for Galen is to win NCAA titles and represent the U of O well, but in the end to become competitive internationally. You can use college meets as part of an overall program to develop one to his full level. We approached the Pac-10 meet where Galen finished second in the 10K and fourth in the 5K as training workouts. I called Galen's parents when I saw him hoisted up and accepted by the team when they ran their victory lap. That was a wonderful moment.
We weren't going to pull out all the stops at the Western Regional. The idea was the NCAA meet. He ran 29:25 in the Pac-10 and didn't even work hard. The next day he ran a 13:48 5K, another training workout. Ten days before the NCAA Galen ran almost a full 10K in 29:10. At the NCAA for a kid who just turned 19 to go into a race like that where everyone is 22, and for him to dictate the race and break them all but one, is pretty remarkale. We will run in Europe this summer and I know Galen will be a lot better next year. I anticipate that whoever the new coach is, he will be reasonable about my coaching Galen.