Eleanor Rynda, Duluth Track Coach and Pioneer of Women's Sports, Dies at 83

Eleanor Rynda, the first woman in the country to coach a collegiate men’s track and cross country program, died Sept. 7. She was 83.

From the farm to the university, Rynda was a pioneer of running and inspired others.

Rynda was a pioneer for women’s sports in particular.

Rynda pushed boundaries on behalf of women that many people do not think about today. She used to go out for runs regularly. The public was not used to seeing women out running, and Rynda was forced to ignore rude comments made by passersby.

Rynda grew up on a dairy farm in southern Minnesota with four brothers and one sister. She worked hard on her family’s farm. In her free time, she listened to radio broadcasts of the Minnesota Gophers.

Upon graduation from Montgomery High School, Rynda went to the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities to pursue a degree in physical education.

Later she went to Lansing, Michigan to attain her Master’s Degree in Physical Education. There she encountered more enthusiasm and training for track and cross country sports.

In 1960 Rynda traveled to the Olympics in Rome, where she watched the track and field events and saw Wilma Rudolph, the first American woman to win three golds in a single Olympics.

In the fall of 1965, Rynda began her 27 year career at the University of Minnesota-Duluth as an assistant professor in the school’s physical education department.

At that time UMD, had no men’s or women’s track and field program. There were weeds growing in the cinders track on the UMD campus. As a farm girl, she was accustomed to pulling weeds from places that they didn’t belong. You could say that she pulled weeds and then planted a program.

Rynda was inspired to start a women’s track team at UMD in 1966. She hosted the first state-wide track meet for the high school girls of Minnesota in the spring of 1967.

It was after this that the Minnesota State High School league decided to have regional areas for girls competition so that they would not have to travel so far.

Some of the men at UMD admired Rynda’s desire to run. They asked if she would be their coach and resurrect the men’s track and cross country programs that had laid dormant for 11 years. She accepted, and began the programs in 1968.

In 1975 she started the women’s cross country program.

Rynda coached the UMD men’s and women’s track and cross country programs for more than two decades.
She continued to teach until her retirement in 1994.

Rynda also coached the North Shore Striders running club, the founding group for the internationally known Grandma’s Marathon in Duluth, Minnesota.

Rynda teasingly called herself the “Great” Grandma of Grandma’s Marathon.

A desire to learn more about the sport led Rynda to attend track clinics around the country. One clinic offered her the chance to meet 1936 Olympic gold medalist Jesse Owens.

Rynda was a tough and dedicated coach. Anyone with good talent could go far under her leadership.

Among Rynda’s star athletes she coached include Garry Bjorkland. His abilities stood out to her while running with the North Shore Striders, and she encouraged him to go someplace where his talent could excel. Garry ended up at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and eventually ran for the 1976 U.S. Olympic team where he ran in the 10,000 meter track race.

Rynda had many other individual and team accomplishments as a track and cross country coach. According to the UMD, Rynda coached the Bulldogs to eight conference championships (women's cross country in 1988, 1992 and 1993; women's indoor and outdoor track in 1991 and 1992; and men's cross country in 1987) and coached 11 All-Americans, including UMD's first NCAA individual champions (high jumper Jodi Swenson in 1991), and over 250 All-Conference selections.

Her 1971 men's cross country team was the first from UMD to qualify for an NCAA national event.

She was a member of the UMD Hall of Fame, the NSIC (Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference) Hall of Fame, the Duluth Entertainment and Convention Center Hall of Fame and the North Shore Striders Hall of Fame.

In 1989, Rynda received the NCAA Division II National Men's and Women's Cross Country Coaches Association Distinguished Service Award.

Eleanor Rynda died on Wednesday, Sept. 7 in Elko, MN; two days short of her eighty-fourth birthday.
Mass of Christian Burial will be 11:00 a.m. on Tuesday, September 13 at Holy Redeemer Catholic Church in Montgomery.

Visitation will be from 4:00 to 8:00 p.m. on Monday, Sept. 12 and one hour before mass at the Schoenbauer Funeral Home in Montgomery.

Burial will be at the Calvary Cemetery in Montgomery.

She is survived by her siblings, Lloyd (Geraldine) Rynda of Montgomery, Joyce Korbel of Lonsdale, Milo (Carolyn) Rynda of New Prague, and Giles Rynda of Hastings, and sister in law Shirley Rynda of Montgomery, and her many nieces and nephews.

Top image: Ray Bouknight via Flickr /Creative Commons

Body image: Rynda Family, used with permission