Veikko Leo Karvonen (5 January 1926 – 1 August 2007) was a Finnish long-distance runner who mainly competed in the marathon.

Karvonen was born in Sakkola, a small Karelian town that then belonged to Finland but was invaded by the Soviet Union during World War II.

In the Track & Field News annual world ranking he was the second best marathon runner of 1950, after Holden.

In September he won the Enschede Marathon by over six minutes' margin before Tom Richards, Karvonen's winning time was 2:29:02.

Karvonen trained hard for the 1952 Summer Olympics, which were in Helsinki, the capital of his home country, Finland.

In spring 1952 he was at the training camp in Dinan when he suddenly started to suffer from back pain, which was diagnosed as a stress reaction of the intervertebral disc.

At the 1954 European Championships in Brussels Karvonen, Boris Grishayev, and Ivan Filin competed for the victory.

[2] In August 1955 Karvonen was second in the Finnish Championship marathon, four minutes after Paavo Kotila.

For the second year in a row he was ranked as world's best marathon runner by the Track & Field News.

In August 1956 Finnish Championship marathon Karvonen was only third after Paavo Kotila and Eino Oksanen.