A native Washingtonian, Steve Surface and his wife Kerri moved to Spokane in 2015 to be closer to family and enjoy the pace of life and beauty of the Inland Empire. They have five adult children. Surface has spent most of his career as a project manager in health insurance, manufacturing and utilities.
He is passionate about distance running and appreciates the opportunity to support Coach Tyson with the Gonzaga men’s program. Surface began his running journey in 1971 in Eugene and has learned many life lessons from the sport: overcoming (a mild form of cerebral palsy), goal setting, team work, and having fun while working hard. He watched many meets at Historic Hayward Field and witnessed racing by the likes of Steve Prefontaine, Gerry Lindgren, Jim Ryun, Frank Shorter, Dave Wottle, Don Kardong and Pat Tyson.
Surface’s experience coaching runners began with starting a high school cross country and track program from scratch for a small school. He coached several state finalists, including an 800m champion. In recent years, Surface has also been a volunteer assistant track coach at two prominent Washington high schools. Coaching runners to achieve their goals is very rewarding to him.
Surface was fortunate to begin his distance career during the height of the 1970’s running boom. He benefited from legendary coach, Harry Johnson, and talented teammates at South Eugene High School, where he was a member of five state championship teams. In cross country Surface was a member of the first all-Nike shoe team in the world while placing 2nd in the 1972 state meet wearing the waffle shoe. The next season he was state champion. On the track, Surface was the 4th prep in Oregon history to break 9-minutes in the two-mile running 8:58. He also ran 13:52 for three-miles (6th fastest all-time nationally at the time).
He ran at the University of Washington, where he was a four-time qualifier for the outdoor NCAA Track & Field championships. Surface set the freshman school record for 5,000m running 14:05. That season he ran in the inaugural Prefontaine Classic three-mile run. As a junior, Surface set the 10,000m school record running 29:27. His senior season he captained the 1977 cross country team which was the first in school history to run in the NCAA Cross Country championships. The team placed 13th in 15-degree weather at Hangman Valley Golf Course (Spokane).
