Jeffrey Patrick Atkinson (born February 24, 1963 in Manhattan Beach, California

Manhattan Beach, California

Manhattan Beach is the wealthiest beachfront city located in southwestern Los Angeles County, California, USA. The city is on the Pacific coast, south of El Segundo, and north of Hermosa Beach. Manhattan Beach is the home of both beach and indoor volleyball, and surfing. During the winter, the...

) is a male former middle distance runner from the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

. He currently holds the mile record at Stanford University

Stanford University

The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...

. He competed at the Summer Olympics in 1988 in Seoul, South Korea

1988 Summer Olympics

The 1988 Summer Olympics, officially known as the Games of the XXIV Olympiad, were an all international multi-sport events celebrated from September 17 to October 2, 1988 in Seoul, South Korea. They were the second summer Olympic Games to be held in Asia and the first since the 1964 Summer Olympics...

 and came in tenth place in the 1500m race. He tried to make a comeback at the 1992 Summer Olympics

1992 Summer Olympics

The 1992 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXV Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event celebrated in Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, in 1992. The International Olympic Committee voted in 1986 to separate the Summer and Winter Games, which had been held in the same...

 in Barcelona, but did not get past the Olympic Trials.

Coaching

Atkinson currently holds coaching positions in both cross country

Cross country running

Cross country running is a sport in which people run a race on open-air courses over natural terrain. The course, typically long, may include surfaces of grass and earth, pass through woodlands and open country, and include hills, flat ground and sometimes gravel road...

 and track and field

Track and field

Track and field is a sport comprising various competitive athletic contests based around the activities of running, jumping and throwing. The name of the sport derives from the venue for the competitions: a stadium which features an oval running track surrounding a grassy area...

 at Palos Verdes High School

Palos Verdes High School

Palos Verdes High School is one of three public high schools on the Palos Verdes Peninsula in Southern California, USA...

 in Palos Verdes Estates, CA. Jeff, along with fellow head coach Brian Shapiro, coached both the boys' and girls' cross country program at PV to much success in 2007, when both varsity teams competed in both the Division III CIF Southern Section Finals and State Championships. The boys have since won a CIF-SS title and a CIF State Championship title (setting record team times for Division III) and gone on to compete at the Nike Cross Nationals in 2009. The girls also won a Southern Section title in 2010 under Atkinson.

Olympic Runner

Ranked 1st as the fastest American in 1500m in 1989

Ranked 3rd in 1500m in 1988

Former United States Track Record Holder

3:38.12 1500m, 1989 (record was broken by Bernard Lagat in 2005
Indoor American Record