Mike Murphy

Who was Mike Murphy?

Michael Charles "Mike" Murphy was an athletic trainer and coach at Yale University, Detroit Athletic Club, University of Michigan, Villanova University, University of Pennsylvania, and the New York Athletic Club. He also coached the American track athletes at the Summer Olympics in 1900, 1908, and 1912. He also spent a year in approximately 1884 as the trainer of heavyweight boxing champion John L. Sullivan.

The Washington Post in 1913 called Murphy "the father of American track athletics." He was considered the premier athletic trainer of his era and was said to have "revolutionized the methods of training athletes and reduced it to a science." He is credited with establishing many innovative techniques for track and field, including the crouching start for sprinters.