Because magazines like this have long “lead times,” I’m writing this editorial for the March/April issue four days before the world comes to an end, at least according to the folks who gave us Y2K and other such travesties of the predictive arts. (Obviously, “arts” is more appropriate than “‘sciences.”) I want to get this into the M&B archives so it’s there for whatever subsequent species comes along to take our place out of the ruins of a world many think we’ ve disappointed, or, for the more radical, raped. I hope that it will provide a little insight into the Year in Marathoning 2012, which was a more-interesting-than-usual year from several perspectives, perhaps because it will be the last year we get to do this.

The year had just about everything, from more-rapid-than-usual growth ina specific company to a pair of Olympic marathons totally different from previous Olympic marathons. It had severe heat and floods and then some more floods. And now we’re waiting for the apocalypse. May we live in interesting times.

The year started out with The Competitor Group (the folks who peppered the planet with Rock ’n’ Roll marathons

and half-marathons) drinking a case of Red Bull in order to schedule more and more of their signature races so they could elevate the profile and the profit margin of the company to make it increasingly attractive to a potential buyer. It makes perfect sense, and it’s done all the time in business. In the process, the company received mixed reviews: some favorable from runners who enjoyed the new venues, and some apprehensive from long-running race directors who feared that the whole process was overwhelming the sport and creating a format that new runners might think is supposed to extend to all races, big and small. In the end, The Competitor Group did find a suitor in the folks who own and put on the Tour de France. If we can manage to escape the flames or the floods or whatever means the Mayans have in mind for our destruction, 2013 should be a very interesting year on this front. Ido hope The Competitor Group hurried to the bank to cash the check before Friday’s destruction of the world as we know it.

In January, the folks in Dallas hosted both the men’s and the women’s US Olympic Marathon Trials. As expected,

their organization was flawless. The criterion course was excellent, attempted to replicate the criterion course the runners were going to experience in London later in the summer, and was a spectator’s dream. The only shortcoming was all of the concrete in the downtown portions of the course, which was hard on the legs of the competitors. The Dallas organizers put on their regularly scheduled marathon the next day, and that was followed by the annual Running USA conference. All in all, it was a mighty fine exercise in race management. And what a way to go out! They went out on top of the last US Olympic Marathon Trials ever to be held on planet Earth.

Then there was April and the annual trip to Boston, where the weather can

be anything from snowflakes to furnace. This year it was furnace’s turn—perhaps a practice run by the Mayan high priests for what’s to come at the end of the year, should it come by solar flare. The B.A. A., in a wisdom not always apparent by organizers of anything (from marathon to July 4 parades), offered the option to runners who were not heat trained to defer their entry to 2013. The offer was magnanimous and heartfelt and was appreciated by many runners, but not as many opted for the deferral as we thought, probably figuring that, since the world is going to end on December 21, this would be the last opportunity to run the famed race. As predicted, race day didn’t quite dawn… it more or less erupted on the runners, with the mercury hitting 80 degrees at

the start in Hopkinton. Sensing the need for extra volunteers, my brother and I volunteered to help. (Over the years, we have developed an extensive itinerary on race day, one that includes listening to the mayor’s Patriots’ Day speech, dropping by the Brattle Book Store, hiking back along the course, dropping in ona pub or two along the course, and so forth.) We spent this year’s race on Boylston Street handing out melting PowerBars to exhausted runners. As frequently happens, the volunteering experience was so satisfying that, if we get past December 21, we may just volunteer again next year. If the world does end, know that our intentions were honorable.

The following month, the Prague International Marathon hosted the AIMS World Congress, which celebrated its 30th anniversary as an organization founded by race directors for race directors and their clients, dedicated to elevating the art and science of putting on a race on the streets and roads of hundreds of courses around the world. The next Congress will be in Durban, South Africa, in 2014. . . if the doomsayers are wrong about December 21.

The London Games marathons were typical of Olympic marathons. The winners were impossible to call in advance. Both were complete surprises, as Olympic marathon winners frequently are. Unlike the 2008 Olympic marathons, where unlikely runners went out early and dared the rest of the field to go with them, and failing to do so, the field lost and the brash and

daring runners prevailed, this year the outcome wasn’t apparent until the final miles. The course, tough but colorful and entertaining, added to the strategy and the challenge. Hats off to London and to the two fresh faces wearing the gold. Sorry your careers will be so short.

Then there was Sandy. Like many a hurricane, it was followed for more than a week with as much avidity as a paparazzi stalking the starlet of the moment. Computer programs compared notes on the predicted path but pretty much agreed when and where the thousand-mile-wide monster was going to hit. (Could the Mayan calendar makers have been off by six or seven weeks and Sandy was supposed to be the end?) Like the perfect storm, Hurricane Sandy drove to the northwest, saturated with warm ocean water, while a nor’easter came down out of the north, and to make the mix even more awesome, bracing Arctic air came scudding across the north middle of the country, all of it headed toward a confluence with the heart of the East Coast.

The Marine Corps Marathon came off on what turned out to be a lovely autumn day, getting itself in before Sandy’s slow but steady pace could bring it onshore. New York City the next weekend wasn’t so lucky. More than enough words have been spewed over what should have been done regarding the marathon. Days of going back and forth, back and forth between the mayor’s office and the New York Road Runners accomplished nothing but ramped-up chaos. It’s easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback and

preach what should have been, but even while the confusion over whether the marathon would be held or would be canceled, it was apparent that changing your mind about whether to jump off the railroad tracks when the 4:15 out of Poseidon Station is barreling down on you is deadly. Part of our problem these days is paralysis. Everyone is so scared of criticism that they often do nothing or do something when it’s too late. There are too few who step forward and, damn the torpedoes, make a decision and then stick by it. As much as busybodies and frustrated critics are ready to pounce on the outcome of a decision that may not have worked out perfectly, even they would offer grudging admiration for someone who steps up and does the hard thing.

There were no winners in New York City when it came to the marathon, only an enormous number of losers. But through the criticism and the approbation, many of the runners who came to New York for the race left with a feeling of camaraderie among themselves. They would have felt even

better with something cogent coming out of the NYRR HQ. And, in spite of the no-refunds stand, the NYRR would have scored much-needed points if, the day after the police and fire departments in New York returned the money to the NYRR for police and fire protection, it had turned around and refunded at least that portion of entry fees to runners; it was, after all, not the marathon’s money now that the police and fire departments returned it. Hey, ano-refund philosophy is a no-refund philosophy but one that the police and fire departments had the good grace to ignore.

To cap off the weird weather trifecta, California at the end of November experienced what some were predicting as the Golden State’s Katrina as a trio of large storms lined up in the Pacific and, like unwelcome visiting relatives, marched in one after the other, dumping swimming pools of rain on the state. Unlike Sandy, however, these were Pineapple Expresses, a series of storms coming from the vicinity of Hawaii where the water was warm, and because it was warm, there was

a lot of it, but it wasn’t frigid and had no intentions of turning cold. At the California International Marathon in Sacramento on December 1, the rains came in like damp curtains on pulleys, pushed through by high winds acting as stagehands, flooding streams and parts of the course but eventually petering out before the end of the race. There was so much rain that where I live we have, at this point in the rainy season, three times the amount of rain we had last year. But it was nowhere as bad as it has been some years; the Russian River barely burped over its banks, and the new storms we’ve been having as I write this are cold from the north and persistent. The parts of California that were hit with brushfires and forest fires several years ago are now suffering mudslides because the hillsides have no grass or shrubbery to hold the earth in. That’s what California does: it wallows in disasters, from earthquakes to mudslides to heat waves to floods to forest fires to all the things that godless California has earned over the centuries.

Ithas gotten to the point that out here in California we might not even notice when the end comes on December 21, but just to be sure that something survives, I’ve been saving my beer and wine bottles, and I’m putting copies of this column inside and sealing them with candle wax. I’ve set a dozen bottles out on the front stoop so that if the end is by floodwaters, they’ll sail away to somewhere where people of the future will learn that this was one helluva year

for marathoning. So if you’re reading this in Marathon & Beyond, ignore everything I wrote above about the end of the world. However, if you’re reading this as a rolled-up set of pages you pulled out of a three-quarter-liter bottle of Russian River Winery 2010 pinot noir, well, you know the rest.

Postscript: The day before the scheduled end of the world on December 21 and seven weeks after the scheduled ING New York City Marathon, the New York Road Runners, organizers of the race, announced that runners would be eligible to receive full refunds of their entry fees, minus the $11 charge for entering the lottery to gain entry. Those who wished to run the race at a future date (in 2013, 2014, or 2015) would be guaranteed entry, but would both have to re-pay the entry fee set for the 2012 race, and forfeit their entry fee for the 2012 race. Included in that lost entry fee is the fee assessed to pay for fire and police protection that was not delivered.

Assuming the world does not end on December 21, hopefully over the next years, the NYRR will be able to regain its vaulted position as a positive nonprofit entity within the borders of the Greater New York City area. And hopefully, after all the water evaporates and the houses of devastated New Yorker and Jerseyites are rebuilt, the situation will generate a perspective that restores the NYRR’s well-earned place on the East Coast landscape.

—Rich Benyo

COma-wees-Ve MCLG ie se

New York, New York: The Perfect Storm

Friday, November 2, 2012: 6:00 p.m.

“Tt truly felt like a punch in the guts,” said Hamish French, owner of the Shoe Clinic chain of running stores in New Zealand. “I was checking into my hotel when I heard that the New York City Marathon had just been canceled. I’d spent several thousand dollars on the trip from New Zealand, raised $14,532 for charity, and sacrificed hours from work and family to train. I knew I was going to run well, and now I was not going to run at all. I sympathize with the storm victims, but you wonder why they waited to tell us. Maybe I’m a tad bitter, but perhaps they wanted to make sure that the city wouldn’t miss out on the revenue. I felt devastated, and I feel I owe my sponsors a marathon.”

“As soon as I arrived in town, two days ago, I knew this marathon should not take place, and I had decided not to tun in solidarity for the storm victims. I am so glad it was canceled,” said Gabby Foyle from England. “I think all the entry fees should be given to assist storm victims, and I’m heading out to Staten Island to help out.”

“T more than understand the cancellation for the people who have lost their homes, but they should have told us sooner,” said Eline Oidvin, a visually impaired mother of two from Norway who requires a guide to train with and accompany her. She used her savings and donations to pay the $7,500 needed to get to New York to run.

“You pays your money and you takes your chances.”—Jim Robinson, multisporter and journalist from Ohiwa Harbor, New Zealand.

Monday, October 29, 2012:

5:00 p.m. (less than six days before the scheduled start of the 43rd NYC Marathon)

I flopped in a chair and poured myself a drink; I had done all I could to prepare and now could only wait for Hurricane Sandy to arrive. I had spent three days on this storm; they were days I needed to prepare for the broadcast of the ING New York City Marathon. Sandy was a guest I didn’t want, but I had to be ready. Just the year before, her sister Irene had arrived with a vengeance,

devastating our Hudson Valley town with unimaginable flooding. That was a hurricane that was supposed to hit New York City but jumped the city and instead hit us 90 miles north and inland.

Since hurricanes don’t usually come to the Hudson Valley, that experience taught me that nothing is predictable and always to be prepared, so this year Ispent three hard days taping windows; filling barrels and trash buckets with water; freezing ice blocks; cooking a week’s worth of food; assembling candles, batteries, charcoal, and oil lamps; and loading in firewood so it could dry. All around me, covering almost every table surface in my house were pots, pans, pitchers, jars, and jugs filled with enough drinking water to last two weeks.

On TV, reporters were bending into the wind along the Jersey shore and on the Wall Street (southern) end of New York City’s Manhattan Island predicting when the big surge would hit. Mathematically, it was fascinating; realistically, the prospect was terrifying. The big surge was the “perfect storm”: a diabolical simultaneous combining of the moment of the hurricane’s greatest impact with the incoming high tide and a maximal sea surge due to a full moon.

Squares on the TV map of the region would darken as power outages spread outward. It was rather like watching election returns. Then flick flick, all was darkness in my house, too. The wind was rising, and outside, rain clouds over the moon turned the world to silver mist; when they broke momentarily, the night was fully illuminated, showing bending

trees and whirling debris. It was like a scene from a gothic film. I got back inside quickly and, despite a pounding heart, went to bed. I knew I would be up at 3:00 a.m. with crashing trees and seeping water.

Tuesday-Thursday, October 30-November 1, 2012

Instead, I slept soundly and woke at 7:00, startled by total silence and bright sunlight. [couldn’t believe it; the storm had bypassed us completely, and it was a beautiful autumn day. I could only wonder what was happening just south of me. Since there was no power, the only information I could get was from my land-line phone. Indeed, I spent hours on that trying to reroute my husband’s incoming international flight to Albany rather than New York City, where the airports had been closed and would continue to be for nobody knew how long. There also was no rail or bus transportation into the city, so attempts at earlier arrival were pointless.

My husband’s was only one of 19,000 canceled flights, and we were only two journalists trying to get into New York City for the marathon. How on earth would the 47,000 runners get there, and how would the elite runners get there in time for press conferences? Thad no idea how naive these kinds of questions were at the time, and I wasn’t the only one.

For several days, none of us knew the full extent of the disaster that Hurricane Sandy had wreaked on different areas of New York City. More shockingly, it seems that Michael Bloomberg,

the mayor of New York City—the richest, most communications-savvy city in the world—appeared not to know, either. Phones and Internet were out, much of the city was in blackout, tunnels and subways were flooded, and there was no public transport. When we were able to get news, it was mostly about the condition of Manhattan and the Jersey shore.

Race route OK, marathon to go on

Although the route of the New York City (NYC) Marathon itself was not greatly damaged, it is understood that the New York Road Runners (NYRR, race organizers) offered to cancel the event on Tuesday, five days before race day. The mayor’s office, however, proclaimed that the marathon would go on, emphasizing that many small businesses depended on the income that the marathon generated, and in a disaster, economic income is more important than ever. The NYC Marathon generates $340 million in spending, mostly from the 20,000 or so overseas runners who spend money shopping and in hotels, restaurants, and theaters. The tax revenue from this goes a long way toward paying for police and fire officers as well as teachers.

We were reminded, moreover, that since it was first run in 1970, for 42 years, the marathon has always brought New Yorkers together, in good times and bad. We recalled our pride in staging the marathon after 9/11, and we could do it again now.

Unfortunately, there were two flaws in this thinking: in 2001, the marathon

took place seven weeks after 9/11, not six days. And perhaps more important, nobody was talking about Staten Island, where the race makes a token start. (The significant word here may well turn out to be “token.”)

Now “The Race to Recover”

Mary Wittenberg, president and CEO of the NYRR, hastily announced that the marathon would become “The Race to Recover,” including a fund-raiser for the relief of the hurricane victims, and several million dollars was pledged. For the next three and a half days, the mayor’s news briefings included messages that the marathon would go on. From around the globe, people went through hell and high water to get to New York.

On Thursday at the marathon expo, Wittenberg was distressed to encounter a group of runners who told her she should cancel the marathon. They felt it was a disgrace to run in a city while there was suffering going on.

Unknown devastation, controversy, anger

There was massive coastal destruction both north and south of New York, but Staten Island took a direct hit that left an especially frightening amount of death and destruction. Twenty-two of the 40 people killed in New York were killed in Staten Island. These were not people killed by falling trees in the suburbs— this was a working-class place where houses were crushed and people were drowned in their homes by what the New York Times said was “a rampant

wind driving a wall of water.” You can see Staten Island from a midtown Manhattan rooftop; it is only four miles away. Yet the news of this destruction was very late in coming.

I think it is honest to say that most people in Manhattan were deeply troubled at not knowing about this kind of devastation to neighbors so close at hand. But to Staten Islanders, that was like the rich landowner being shocked that his peasant laborer did not have enough to eat. And instead of being a spiritual unifier, the marathon only inflamed this feeling. Enraged Staten Island residents screamed, “How can you even think of having a marathon—a race!—when we are still pulling bodies out of houses? How can

hundreds of police and firemen be put on marathon duty when we need their help to survive?”

Mayor Bloomberg tried to explain that no resources were being pulled from Staten Island to stage the race, but it didn’t look that way to people who were cold, wet, and sleepless and had just lost their homes. Accusations flew that Bloomberg was more concerned about his rich constituency in Manhattan than life in Staten Island. As for the marathon, the unspoken cruncher here was that it started in a tiny part of Staten Island only so the race could brag that it was in all five boroughs of New York. Then the runners ran off it, showcasing other parts of the city, especially glamorous Manhattan. Staten

March/April 2013

A Mary Wittenberg, president and CEO of the New York Road Runners, said, “This isn’t the year or the time to run it” The NYRR was blindsided by accusations of selfishness and

community insensitivity.

Island was a token to the marathon; the residents had no real ownership of it, and they felt like a token in terms of receiving help.

It was the generators that finally did it

Emotions and personal experience always cloud real truth, but of one thing there is no doubt: the tabloid press, to its great shame, fanned the flames of this controversy into hatred and then congratulated itself for its cleverness. Why? To sell newspapers? Yes, but quite possibly also because the prestigious New York Times is a big sponsor of the marathon. Here was a great way to taint its sponsorship and spoil the party at the same time. For sure, the tabloids damaged the spirit of the marathon as well.

Probably the tabloids’ biggest coup was their rant against the big generators the NYRR used to heat the large, tented press center that is in the finish line area in Central Park. The NYRR owns or rents several large generators that are needed in the operation of several of their many events, and these were well in place before the hurricane hit New York.

Headlines screamed, “Abuse of Power! These massive generators are providing electricity to the marathon’s tent in Central Park while NYers suffer!” The articles went on to say “.,. the humming generators were not used to aid the powerless but to make the marathon’s press tent cozy.” Claiming that such generators could “heat 100 homes” for the cold and miserable, these news sources implied that the

NYRR was heartless and selfish. The NYRR, which raises millions of dollars for charity, is an integral fixture in the community and rarely encounters serious criticism, so it was blindsided by the accusation.

The rant next continued about the hundreds of portable toilets and the thousands of bottles of water and Gatorade that were in place for the start of the race but were “off limits” to people who lived nearby and were without drinking water or sanitation. It began to get dangerous.

Friday, November 2: “| can’t hold my position!”

The full stream of delayed travelers from all over the world began to pour into the city. Most tunnels had been pumped, but only some lights were on in lower Manhattan, and public transportation was spotty. Check-in lines at hotels were nearly a block long. Everyone had a story to tell, including some of the elite athletes who told of circuitous routes to finally get them to the Friday morning press conference at which time the mayor confirmed again that the race would go on. Bloomberg said he had even called former NYC mayor Rudy Giuliani, who assured him that the marathon should go on because the event symbolized the city’s comeback.

Then a few marathon workers around the city began radioing in that they were encountering animosity and aggressiveness from residents. In particular, a NYRR executive with a group of marathon volunteers at the staging

area on Staten Island felt so threatened that he radioed in using military terms, saying, “I am pulling my people back

. .. I cannot hold my position. We are leaving the area.” There were real fears that volunteers and runners would be hurt and that the race would be disrupted.

Suddenly, the event that had brought the city together for over 40 years was tearing it apart. Mary Wittenberg and key NYRR people met yet again with Mayor Bloomberg and his staff. At 6:00 p.m., they jointly announced the cancellation of the 43rd ING New York City Marathon. The mayor’s office said, “This was a difficult decision but the right decision.” Wittenberg, emotionally ravaged, said, “This isn’t the year or the time to run it.”

It caught everyone by surprise. From people doing registration at the expo, to the elite athlete recruiter and the top runners, to the networks preparing for the evening news, and most of all to the thousands of runners who had just arrived in the city, many standing in line to check into their hotels or pick up their bib numbers, it was like a bomb had gone off: shock, disbelief, dismay, even relief. Everyone had questions, almost all of which began with, “What about my . . .”—but there were no answers to anything. It would take a long time—weeks, months, possibly even years—to figure this out.

Force majeure

The ING New York City Marathon and the New York Road Runners are not-for-profit enterprises, but they are

A real Woodstock Moment of Running: on what would have been marathon morning, thousands of runners from around the world descended spontaneously on Central Park, New York City, for a symbolic group run.

still big, professional organizations that now find themselves having to recover financially. Of course, they are insured for many situations, including event cancellation, but they are going to take a major financial hit because the marathon generates more than half of the NYRR’s annual revenue, and it is reported that even if the insurers paid the maximum amount in coverage, it would not be enough to cover the expenses. Among other costs, the NYRR will have to pay all of its sponsors, the canceled national TV coverage, and the appearance fees for the invited athletes, who rely on those fees for their incomes. Sadly, the loss in revenue will also mean that there will be a lot less that the NYRR can donate to its

March/April 2013

charities, such as the very successful “Team for Kids.”

In many of our contracts or insurance policies there is something called “force majeure,” which means an unforeseeable course of events that excuses the fulfillment of a contract. Sometimes it’s called an act of God, and certainly Hurricane Sandy was an unforeseeable act of God.

The question that many runners and insurers like Lloyd’s of London are asking is: just when was the hurricane an act of God? To many runners, the delay in cancellation smacks of a New York determined to cash in on 47,000 visitors. To many who were there, the delay was justified because the extent of damage was unknown. To insurers, the

ON THE ROAD WITH KATHRINE SWITZER | 21

delayed announcement could result in their refusal to pay out millions for the damage. Given the number of floods, earthquakes, and tsunamis that have happened recently and my personal (and thus cynical) observation that insurers are extremely reluctant to compensate people fairly, this settlement will be very difficult.

The end of the age of innocence

Running has become big business. It produces billions in products and events and raises multimillions for charities. The ING New York City Marathon is a very important component to the finances of a big city; it’s no longer just a chummy race. In my own lifetime, running has grown to what it is now from achalk line ona village street anda ‘Ready, set, go!’ sending 20 people running off, with the first finisher stopping the stopwatch we left lying alongside of the finish line since it was the only stopwatch we had. Amazingly enough, some of the sweetness and exuberance of those early days has lingered through these years of growth; it is one of the things that has made our sport so refreshing and empowering.

With big business, however, comes big criticism. Within the sport, there are plenty of old-timers who carp that running is ruined by big organizations and fields of 30,000. There are also plenty of new-timers with no sense of perspective who demand instant gratification from big events that they can check off their bucket lists. Maybe most worrisome of all, there are more than enough agents, managers, and

athletes who will condone any means to obtain a competitive edge to cash in. All of them sour the experience. Now the reaction to the 2012 marathon from whole communities, runners and residents alike, has shown that not everyone likes us.

For profit-making or nonprofit organizations, the sport is coming of age and is coming under scrutiny. The cancellation crisis in New York created its own perfect storm in this maturing time of our sport. It has shaken every runner a little to reconsider and reflect on many personal and public aspects about our sport and its future. We’re growing up, too. That may be a pretty good outcome to a bad storm.

Sunday morning, November 4, Central Park

With no formal organization whatsoever, the runners began arriving. Lightning-fast communication by cell phone, Facebook, Twitter—and no doubt, the sheer adrenaline instinct of race morning—had runners from all over the world streaming into Central Park. Congregating at the finish line, some symbolically ran laps of the park for the full marathon distance while others helped as “volunteers.” Most did 10K workouts or easy jogs or just mingled. Many grouped with others to head down to Staten Island to help with hurricane relief. It was a happening, a real Woodstock moment of running, a moment again of shared significance. In time, this Sunday morning run may prove to have been one of the best marathons ever to be a part of.

A Farewell to Guy Morse

The man who played a huge role in saving the Boston Marathon moves on.

and left the organization at the end of 2012, leaving it much better off than

when he started. His accomplishments are many and have been documented such that a generation from now the organization and the city of Boston will look upon the growth under his tenure and will be able to put the era in perspective.

Though the B.A.A. marked its 125th anniversary in 2012, Morse started as its first employee when the club recognized the need to move the marathon to a professionally run organization. The marathon was growing and change was imminent; otherwise the event would be left behind, surpassed by progressive and more appealing approaches.

Morse knew the B.A.A.’s main event would require the assistance of many. Though the terms may be more prevalent today than in the 1980s, he effectively sought to rebrand and relaunch the Boston Marathon, though he did not have the luxury of employing the strategy in a vacuum. There would not be an ability to pause, skip a year, and come out with his guns blazing on an 18- or 24-month horizon. No, this challenge would have to be met within the many constraints and limitations that are inherent in an event with many distinctions and traditions. In fact, while they were assets, those same qualities were holding back the race from being able to be agile and adaptive.

Morse set out to rebuild internally and on the move. It was as if an automobile needed to have its engine and its body swapped out, but the work needed to be done while the vehicle was in motion, traveling at high speed down the highway. The complete makeover would occur not in a studio but rather during rush hour.

One by one the changes began to be implemented. The Boston Marathon would become not just a race, but an event. The idea of a single race would be replaced by arace weekend crammed with activities. Prerace events and parties, a celebration of Boston in the eyes of the community, and a projection that the Boston Marathon was important were among the first changes to occur. Major sponsors soon followed. These powerful name brands—John Hancock, adidas, Gatorade

G uy Morse spent 28 years—beginning in December 1984—with the B.A.A.

b> Jack Fleming (left) worked with Guy Morse for more than two decades.

(among others)—brought resources and marketing activities and had the effect of adding support where the B.A.A. needed it most. A race committee was formalized and committed to meeting regularly to concentrate on aspects such as the start, on-course logistics, the finish, and registration. These concepts seem straightforward in 2013, but they were novel and innovative when Morse and the B.A.A. instituted them.

Morse capitalized on the fact that runners and the community wanted the Boston Marathon to succeed. He allowed them to share in the sense of ownership. Morse’s approach was that you can get more with honey than with vinegar, but he needed buy in if the Boston Marathon—and by extension the B.A.A.—was going to survive and live to write its next chapters. There was a lot to look forward to, but in many ways the challenge was when and how to pull the strings. In the most positive sense, Morse moved methodically and conservatively. He created stability and respect for the B.A.A. and the Boston Marathon, and then he moved the event into a leadership position.

With an emphasis on quality versus quantity, he paid special attention to the way in which the principal sponsor, John Hancock, regarded the event’s status. He knew that Hancock was crucial to the Boston Marathon’s future. Ensuring the principal sponsor’s role would allow him and the B.A.A. to turn their attention to the details. He took nothing for granted and moved forward with playing to the event’s strength: its attention to qualified runners, the relationship with the eight cities and towns along the 26.2-mile course, and the charitable efforts within the communities. Key relationships with the YMCA to lead the hydration station coordination and with the American Red Cross to aid on-course efforts were immensely helpful in providing coverage. These two programs became the core of the volunteer program, which is now more than 7,000 strong.

Soon after, now in the 1990s, the residents of the communities along the course recognized that the marathon was once again a source of immense pride. If you lived in one of the towns on the course, then you were different. You were part of one of the world’s most prestigious sporting events on an annual basis. Kids were participating on sponsored Little League baseball teams and Pop Warner football teams because of the B.A.A.’s contributions to the towns. Tennis courts were being resurfaced and decks at swimming ponds were being refurbished because of the marathon’s success. A sense of involvement by nonmarathon participants emerged, and this had never before been the case.

Then the 100th Boston Marathon was held in 1996. It was the world’s largest marathon at the time, and the industry stood up and took notice. The success of the event spawned rapid growth across the industry. Individuals running for charitable programs saw that training for and gaining support for worthwhile causes resonated with their friends, family, and the media.

At the B.A.A., Morse channeled the legacy of the centennial race into the establishment of its own youth and charitable programs. He assembled a staff that resembled the athletic and admissions departments at a university. Morse and the B.A.A. were running the organization as a business with clear objectives and long-term aspirations. Other events followed, such as the half-marathon, the Olympic Trials, and workshops, seminars, and clinics. Again, the focus was on quality rather than quantity. Every event would be an opportunity to leave a new, positive impression. Every event or program mattered. “You’re only as good as your last race,” Morse would often state.

But for all of the accomplishments, successes, and accolades, Morse will be best remembered for his style and demeanor and his manner of dealing with people. He was characterized by calmness, patience, and respect. Rarely angered, he was able to redirect frustration into retooling a presentation or thinking of a new angle worth trying. He was not averse to letting go of an idea if he thought it might result in long-term, negative repercussions. “Pick your battles,” he said frequently.

Through it all, he maintained his sense of humor and held himself to the highest ethics. He knew that both his board and his staff would be watching as his leadership (and, over the decades, as the industry) took note of how he was able not only to navigate the B.A.A. through crisis but also to deal with success. “Lead by example” was another common phrase spoken by the man who did not wish for fame and recognition but who wanted the event and the organization to take center stage. In the process, he restored the B.A.A.’s reputation and defined its spirit and identity. It is in place—tright in Boston’s Back Bay—for all to see and experience each Patriots’ Day.

Jack Fleming is the marketing and communications director for the B.A.A. and worked with Guy Morse for 21 years.

Inside the box

At one time the Boston Athletic Association owned a grand clubhouse. It loomed over the city as an opulent symbol of athletics with a swimming pool, an indoor track, Turkish baths, a bowling alley, a boxing room, tennis courts, a barbershop, and a wine and cigar department.

After the clubhouse’s completion in 1888 by rich men in Boston—the great Brahmin movers and shakers of the Hub of the universe, bolstered by money earned by their forebears in the China trade, whaling, and the triangular commerce of slaves, rum, tobacco, and cotton—the B.A.A. prospered for 40 years. Then all B.A.A. business and assets collapsed in the great economic crash of 1929 into not much more than a one-day event run out of a cardboard box.

The B.A.A. lost its money, most of its membership, and all of its activities except for the marathon and a track meet. The marathon, however, did not require a great deal of management past the Great Depression years when its numbers rarely exceeded 200. A few men as volunteers could manage the race with pencils and paper. During the war years, the number of runners decreased to a low of 67 starters in 1945. Numbers did not increase in the early 1950s when the volatile and dedicated Scot John Duncan Semple managed the B.A.A. and the calmer and just-as-dedicated Will Cloney managed the race. The 1960 race did not need a professional director with just 156 starters. Numbers had not changed for 50 years. But the remaining years of the 1960s changed all that.

Five hundred entered by 1966. The next year, Semple had his notorious run-in with Kathrine Switzer. Women wanted in. By 1969, 1,342 runners entered the race. The cardboard box could no longer contain them.

The number of runners doubled in the mid-1970s. Then, in 1980, disaster struck in the form of another runner, but this time instead of a courageous, visionary reformer, it was a cheat and a criminal. Rosie Ruiz jumped into the last mile of the race and duped

Hired in 1984, Guy Morse was
the first professional director of the
Boston Marathon.

race management into crowning her with the winner’s laurel wreath on the podium in front of the finish line crowd and media. She had stolen the race. Clearly, the marathon needed professional, full-time management, but it needed money to do that. Then the third great scandal of the marathon arrived.

Will Cloney struck a deal with a clever, opportunistic attorney named Marshall Medoff, who obtained the right in perpetuity to “sell” sponsorship of the marathon and keep for himself any amount of money above $400,000. Medoff would own the marathon. The upshot of Cloney’s trying to raise money to save the marathon caused an uproar in the B.A.A. board, resulted in his firing, and came near to the outright loss of the marathon. The board engaged Tim Kilduff as volunteer director. He quit after two years in frustration as the rest of the world paid prize money to athletes and Boston refused to do so. The world could not tolerate an amateur marathon run by amateur management. The Boston Marathon began to shrink in field quality and newsworthiness as top runners elected to go elsewhere to compete for a possible big-time payday—the fourth great scandal of the marathon. It needed professional, full-time management to survive the 1990s. Without such management, the marathon would have ricocheted from disaster to disaster—breaking into dusty pieces left only to be swept back into the cardboard box.

Just in time, Guy Morse, the first professional director of the Boston Marathon, took control in December 1984.

Tom Derderian is the author of The Boston Marathon, a columnist for New England Runner, and a sub-2:20 marathoner.

The no-martini lunch

I first met Guy in 1983 when he worked at the Prudential Insurance Company of America as an associate manager responsible for all external communications and activities for the company and for Prudential Center property, where the finish line of the Boston Marathon was located. As such, he served as the Boston Marathon press officer and provided credentials for media, managed the finish line press room, and coordinated the marathon press conferences.

As a 1974 graduate of Northeastern University in Boston, he was hired by the Boston Athletic Association (B.A.A.) as its first full-time paid employee to coordinate all race activities, including sponsorship, working with the board of governors, acting as spokesperson, and coordinating the volunteer groups.

Guy entered the B.A.A. during a time of recent management turbulence. The organization was in turmoil, the survival of the marathon was in question, and new leadership was desperately needed. Will Cloney was forced to resign in 1981 and was replaced by Tim Kilduff, who resigned after directing two races. Guy was hired in December 1984.

A Gloria Ratti (left) and Guy Morse (right) escort Boston Marathon legend John A. Kelley to the finish line at the 2004 Boston Marathon. Kelley served as the event’s grand marshal after his retirement from running the race until his death.

He established the first official Boston Marathon headquarters at the old Boston Garden, where the only piece of furniture was a black telephone on the floor in an otherwise empty room. His first hires were Marja Bakker as his director of administration and then Jack Fleming as media coordinator. He went on to hire Dave McGillivray as the race’s technical consultant. (McGillivray was given the title of race director in June 2000 when Guy was promoted to executive director.) In addition to his duties as executive director, Guy supervised a staff of roughly a dozen people in Boston and Hopkinton.

Guy’s style of management was entirely different from the two-martini lunch that was perceived at that time in public relations circles as the norm. Guy had none of that flamboyant style. He hired the best people, encouraged them to collaborate on many new issues, and instituted weekly staff meetings. His low-key approach to management earned him the respect of his staff.

Married with four small children at the time, he approached his job with a quiet, no-nonsense attitude and was determined to “‘save the Boston Marathon” by whatever means he could. He quickly became the face and voice of the Boston Marathon and, most importantly, was able to earn the respect and admiration of city officials and community leaders as well as the officials of the cities and towns along the famed marathon route.

© Marathon Foto

In 1986, John Hancock Financial Services became the principal sponsor of the Boston Athletic Association. The introduction of John Hancock ushered in a new era, and for the first time, prize money was awarded to champions and top finishers as well as financial aid to cities and towns along the route. Guy improved the hospitality provided to runners and introduced T-shirts and pre- and postrace parties both for runners and volunteers. Also foremost was his decision to maintain qualifying times for the runners.

A little-known fact is that the B.A.A. lost its clubhouse during the Great Depression in the 1930s, along with all of its records, archives, and memorabilia. In 1995, with the 100th anniversary of the Boston Marathon looming the next year, Guy, an early advocate of maintaining our tradition, tasked me with seeking out and collecting B.A.A. Boston Marathon photographs, trophies, and any other memorabilia or artifacts. Guy must have known that I was a longtime collector of anything that didn’t move, and today our offices house a respectable collection of these items. We continue to gather items pertaining to the early days of our history.

Guy has traveled extensively throughout the world promoting the Boston Marathon and was instrumental in establishing the World Marathon Majors, an organization of the major marathons consisting of Boston, Berlin, New York, Chicago, London, and Tokyo. He is also the Boston Marathon representative to the Association of International Marathons and Road Races (AIMS).

Several years ago, Guy was diagnosed with prostate cancer and was required to curtail his activities. After 26 years as executive director, he decided to accept the position of director of external affairs, which he has held for the past two years and from which he retired from the B.A.A. after 28 years.

Guy has indeed left his mark on the Boston Marathon and brought it through an era unprecedented in road racing. He is the recipient of many awards and leaves behind a template emulated by many large marathon races throughout the world. He has departed with a significant legacy in marathon circles and richly deserves the admiration and respect of all those who follow him. It has been a pleasure to work with him.

Gloria Ratti has been associated with the Boston Marathon for many decades; she is currently a vice president of the B.A.A. and a colleague and professional associate of Guy Morse.

Tripping up lowe my entire B.A.A. career to Guy Morse. After all, it was he who hired me back in 1988. This was the year after the infamous “trip rope” incident at the start of the marathon. The official starter shot the gun at high noon as was tradition even though race officials were still standing in front of the starting line holding a rope to keep the runners back. The B.A.A. decided it was best to hire someone to pay a little more attention to the start.

Thus started my 25-year “run” with the B.A.A. All I basically did then was remove a rope, and now | am the race director of the Boston Marathon. Go figure! Guy has been a mentor to me and countless others over the years. He helped keep this venerable event from fading away and has kept it in the forefront of road racing throughout the world. We all will miss the guidance and the good, kindhearted nature he has brought to the B.A.A. and to the running industry worldwide.

Dave McGillivray is the race director of the B.A.A. Boston Marathon and president of DMSE, Inc., a race management company.

“Guy” has long been used as a term of endearment by many people to show appreciation for friends with whom they closely associate and appreciate. Guy Morse is no exception.

Ihave known Guy for four decades, having met him shortly after he came on board the B.A.A. in 1984. This was just after my last win in Boston in 1983 and alongside my win in the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. It has been a friendship that has enjoyed numerous B.A.A. Marathons and other notable races around the United States and the world.

One of Morse’s final responsibilities for the B.A.A. was to organize a celebration of the its 125th anniversary at the TD Garden in Boston. Pictured (from left to right) are Joann Flaminio, BAA. president; Richard Johnson, curator of the Sports Museum of New England; Gina Caruso, B.A.A. treasurer; John Hanc, author of The B.A.A. at 125 book; Joan Samuelson; and Morse.

From the starting line to the finish line, Guy has been there to support and encourage our sport and its runners through both challenging and celebrated times. He understands that the word “marathon” is a metaphor for life and has worked tirelessly to make sure that our sport is as inclusive as possible by bringing people, corporations, communities, and charities together in a way that has promoted marathoning and goodness well beyond our racecourses. He has waved the B.A.A. colors high and proudly. In so doing, he has supported and encouraged marathons of all sizes to aspire to achieve their own laurels that so define our sport and its rich and storied history.

It has been my pleasure and honor to share many exciting moments with Guy in Boston and beyond throughout the years, including the 100th running of the race in 1996. That year, I gave the bragging rights of running that greatly anticipated event to my husband, Scott, while I cheered from the sidelines with our two children, Abby and Anders. I am happy to say that they are both runners and have grown up associating the Boston Marathon with Patriots’ Day. Like our patriots who exude love and support of our country and each other, Guy has demonstrated those qualities and in so doing has given opportunity and a sense of well-being to millions of people who have benefited from marathoning for all the right reasons.

Guy, you are a true patriot and endurance champion. Thank you for all your good works.

Joanie Benoit Samuelson won Boston twice, was the first woman to win an Olympic gold

medal in the marathon, and has been a leading spokeswoman for the sport for decades; she still competes at a high level in age-group competition.

The epitome of calm

I don’t remember the exact moment that I met Guy Morse in 1992, but I do remember thinking after the first few months of our now 20-year friendship: What a cool job, and what an even cooler ‘Guy: And when Guy invited me to my first 11:00 P.M. meeting with the rest of the B.A.A. staff during marathon weekend, I was hooked!

What I do remember and what has remained constant since that time is Guy’s calm demeanor regardless of the crisis or circumstance. He had the ability, quite simply, to always get through it, whether it was dealing with a nasty reporter or even nastier race conditions. Guy spent most of his professional career with the B.A.A. and grew up alongside the marathon. As it grew in prominence, so did Guy. His name is synonymous with running in Boston, and he has become a true running ambassador. He has traveled extensively representing the B.A.A. and has been to races in remote corners of the world. But the best race in his opinion? Boston, of course.

On a more serious note, what Guy oversaw in his 28 years of association with the Boston Marathon was both transformative and inspirational. In the first year of Guy’s tenure, the marathon had 6,924 entrants, 5,290 finishers, and one sponsor. To give some perspective, that was about the same size as our most recent B.A.A. Half-Marathon. In his very last year, the marathon had 27,000 registrants and nearly 20 sponsors. He oversaw a charity program, started in 1989 with one organization, that has grown and has raised more than $150 million if you include the program of our principal sponsor, John Hancock. The city of Boston and our race committees, local charities, sponsors, and the thousands of runners who cross the marathon finish line each year—all have benefited from the resurgence of the B.A.A. and the Boston Marathon under Guy’s leadership.

The most important thing that can be said about any leader upon his departure is that he was true to his mission, gave it all he could, and persevered. The success of today’s Boston Marathon is a true testament to Guy’s vision, hard work, and steadfast commitment to marathon running. From all of us at the B.A.A., well done.

Joann F laminio is the president of the B.A.A., the first woman to hold that prestigious position.

“Common sense”

I met Guy Morse in April 2010 when I was accompanying our AIMS president, Mr. Hiroaki Chosa, in a visit to Boston—actually, to the grave of Will Cloney, first president of our association. Mr. Chosa, having decided not to stand for reelection for president at the upcoming AIMS World Congress in Athens some months later, wanted to give his recognition to what Will and the whole Boston Athletic Association had done for the whole running movement.

At left, Dimitri
Kyriakides, son of 1946
Boston Marathon
champion Stylianos
Kyriakides, and Paco
Borao, president, Association of International
Marathons (AIMS), flank
Morse at the AIMS
meeting in November 2012 when the
Boston Marathon was
recognized by AIMS

as the oldest annual marathon in North America.

= ‘6 a

Having been an AIMS board member since 1996, I was well aware of the Boston Marathon background, built up from many facts surrounding the race and making out of it one of the best running history in athletics, and in particular about someone called Guy Morse who had transformed the marketing way we all were dealing with sponsors by setting up so-called long-distance partnerships.

We just met that day, made a short tour of the B.A.A. offices, visited Will Cloney’s grave, exchanged some view on our common running passion, and had a friendly lunch together—Gloria [Ratti], Tom [Grilk], and Guy for the B.A.A., and Chosa, Sasai [Mr. Chosa’s translator], Horst [Milde], and myself for AIMS.

Things ran simply, warm, easy—so well and so deep that I immediately thought that our association and myself, should I be elected president, could not miss the opportunity of getting in our AIMS board the know-how, the sense of balance, the rational approach that I felt Guy had naturally within his personality. I immediately tried through mail and phone calls to persuade him to join us, he finally agreed, and our members voted him in unanimously.

These several years as a board member confirmed his professionalism, his teamwork, and his love for running. For myself, I finally found the right definition of “common sense”—simply, Guy Morse. I’m very proud to have him as a friend.

Paco Borao is the current president of AIMS and is the event director of Spain’s Valencia Marathon and Half-Marathon.

An iconic figure and a friend

I have known Guy ever since he took over from Tim Kilduff as director of the Boston Marathon. At the time, he managed to sever ties with Marshall Medoff, who had hoodwinked Will into a terrible sponsorship deal. If memory serves, the deal was that the Boston Marathon received the first $400,000 and Medoff got the rest—an absurd deal. I found Guy a very forward-looking person who wanted to modernize the race and bring it into the 20th and then the 21st centuries, which he has done. Guy has managed to keep the finish line clean from commercial sponsorship while increasing sponsorship in other areas. It is beyond comprehension that he has managed to secure a 15-year deal with John Hancock after it was sold to another company. The running community will be losing an iconic individual and a friend who has blazed new trails for all of us. At every runningrelated occasion that I can think of, whether a press conference or informal gettogether (especially at the Boston Marathon), I have never seen Guy in anything but his famous, professional-looking blue blazer. Sometimes he even gets down and casual by wearing the blazer without a tie. He is always a professional. He will be greatly missed on the world marathon scene.

Allan Steinfeld was the president of the New York Road Runners, was the race director of the ING New York City Marathon, and is still active in AIMS and RunningUSA.

The Zelig of marathoning

Once a year, on a holiday dedicated to a group of citizens who were immortalized for standing their ground, Guy Morse did indeed appear to be Zelig, the Woody Allen character who had an uncanny ability to turn up out of nowhere. “Sometimes I’ve appeared to be in more than one place at a time,” mused the man who ran the Boston Athletic Association and, ex officio, the marathon for more than a quarter of a century. Each Patriots’ Day, Morse covered substantially more ground than did the Minutemen, making sure that the world’s most fabled road race stayed on course from the Hopkinton start to the Copley Square finish.

If glitches were rare, it likely was because Morse, race director Dave McGillivray, and their staff worked all winter behind the scenes to craft plans b, c, and d that could hold up to whatever April’s mercurial weather might throw at more than 20,000 runners. Their greatest challenge—and triumph—came in 2007 when wind-driven rain produced the worst conditions since the scorching “Run for the Hoses” in 1976. “A day that by all accounts shouldn’t have happened,” B.A.A. president Tom Grilk mused after that race had come off smoothly.

Not even prostate cancer and a pair of ruptured quadriceps tendons, which Morse dealt with simultaneously a year later, could daunt him. He simply shifted operations to the Copley Plaza across the street from the B.A.A. headquarters and did his work by cell phone and e-mail, orchestrating preparations for both the marathon and the women’s Olympic Trials a day earlier. Had the man not been up to it—and how many would have been?—his lieutenants and their troops would have soldiered on without him and handled things with military precision. That was what made Morse the best in the business. He had assembled a staff that was so skilled that it could function without him.

When Morse signed on in 1984, the Boston Marathon still was in its Jurassic Period, offering little more to competitors than beef stew and blisters. He oversaw the transition to the prize-money era and the professionalism of an event that still is amateur in its heart.

John Powers has worked for the Boston Globe since 1973; he shared the 1983 Pulitzer Prize

for national reporting for a special Globe Magazine feature on the nuclear arms race. He is the author of eight books and has covered the Olympic Games since 1976.

A true friend of the local media

Guy Morse is a truly likeable fellow, with a quick smile and a quick wit, delivered deftly and dryly. You get the impression he would rather conduct business with a handshake than a press conference, yet for a quarter century his was the face of the B.A.A. The public welcomed his appearance at the podium every Patriots’ Day weekend, the front man synonymous with the world’s greatest marathon. Away

from the office, Guy and his wife, Nancy, were raising four children, watching proudly as high school proms gave way to college and marriage and the arrival of the next generation. With the passage of time, from the bleak days in the early °80s onward, his passion for the sport never wavered.

In 2008, New England Runner and 16 like-minded running publications (including Marathon & Beyond) sought greater control and transparency in their endeavors and broke from their previous advertising-sale agency to form the Endurance Sports Media Group. It was a move fraught with anxiety. Many regional publications are mom-and-pop operations; plus, we were in the midst of a serious recession. With one paragraph in ESMG’s inaugural press release, the move was legitimized and subsequently applauded in running circles. To wit:

“Regional running publications are the cornerstone for the sport’s news and promotion,” commented Guy Morse, executive director of the Boston Athletic Association. “Local races and local runners benefit from the energy and effort that these publishers pour into their work. In our own region, New England Runner fills an advertising and information niche with no equal.”

Asan internationally recognized leader in the industry, Guy Morse did not have to do this. That he did speaks volumes about who he is and what he stands for.

We wish Guy the best of luck in all his future pursuits. He has been a true friend. In a culture of self-aggrandizement, there is a tendency to underestimate those in prominent positions who don’t seek out the spotlight. In reality, what Guy Morse brought to the B.A.A., and then sustained and expanded on for close to three decades, cannot be overestimated.

Bob Fitzgerald is the editor/publisher of New England Runner magazine.

Welcoming “Home Dad”

We [his four loving children] have a running joke about “Work Dad.” Normally, we get “Home Dad” at home, whose corny one-liners and references to The Birdcage and Big Business are always well received. On the weekends, “Home Dad” trades in his navy-blue blazer for his Saturday uniform, which consists of a (very) faded denim button-down shirt and either plaid flannel pants or athletic shorts, depending on the season, always paired with adidas sneakers, untied. It’s quite a sight. And his all-business attitude is replaced with an easygoing, smalltown sensibility.

From time to time he does morph into no-nonsense, detail-oriented “Work Dad” at home, specifically when developing a meticulous itinerary for a family trip to Disney World or even a seemingly simple list of Saturday chores. He can’t help but direct our annual holiday card stuffing/addressing/stamping/mailing evening where he walks around the room with a glass of chardonnay, blasting Christmas music, and doing spot-checks over our shoulders as we work diligently (and

Morse circa 1991 with his
children, Kaitlin, Elizabeth,
Daniel, and Jillian.

merrily) at the dining room table.

We are immensely proud of his work with the B.A.A., the World Marathon Majors, AIMS, and beyond, but we are even prouder of what a strong, supportive, and inspirational man he is at home. He is incredibly dependable, loyal, and surprisingly understanding and forgiving (especially considering some of the girly teenage antics he has had to deal with over the years). He has taught us by example to always do the right thing—even if it isn’t the easiest or most popular option. His dedication to his faith and his complete adoration of our mother continue to impress us and inspire us to enjoy the little things in life (like those bad jokes) and revel in the big wonderful things, like family.

Kaitlin Morse Creedon is Guy and Nancy’s second-oldest daughter; she is the integratedpromotion director at Cosmopolitan magazine, a member of the Hearst Corporation.

The Easter Bunny needs help!

We decided to move from Marlboro to Cape Cod in 1980. Having vacationed here early in our marriage, we loved the quaint village atmosphere, and we realized the benefits of our children being near their grandparents. Commuting from the Cape to Boston would add 20 minutes to Guy’s usual hour commute from Marlboro. In 1984, when Guy was offered the job with the Boston Athletic Association, he was already a pro at commuting the 90 minutes each way. A commute like that is a curse and a blessing. Yes, it is a long time in the car dealing with traffic, but Guy used the time wisely and always had a pad of paper to jot down his neverending list of calls to return and additional thoughts from dealings each day. It was a time to clear his head, so when he arrived home, he was really home and could devote the evening to his family. During any given day, he could have met with elite athletes, business heads, or politicians, but at home, he made it clear that his family were the most important people.

Courtesy of Morse family

Guy and Nancy (his wife of 38
years).

One year early in his Boston Marathon career, the race and Easter fell on the same weekend. Guy had been staying in Boston for much of the week preparing for the race. Late Saturday night, after meetings and his other responsibilities had been completed (this was a simpler time, before the addition of the Sunday 5K), he drove home to “help” the Easter Bunny. He knew he couldn’t miss the all-important Easter egg hunt that his four young children so looked forward to. After sharing in the festivities on Easter morning, he was back in the car returning to Boston for any of the last-minute matters that tend to creep up the day before a Boston Marathon. He was completely devoted to giving his best to his family and to his job. How can you not love a “Guy” like that?

Nancy Morse has been Guy’s wife for 38 years.

Taking the long view

The Boston Marathon is well known as the world’s oldest continuously run marathon. It was begun in 1897 in Ashland, Massachusetts, a year after a crew of very fit B.A.A. athletes competed very well at the Athens Games of 1896—and the world saw a tiny Greek, Spiridon Louis, take the gold medal [in the marathon] and bring the first modern Olympic Games to a successful close.

Though many—myself included—consider the Boston Marathon the most prestigious marathon in the world, not all marathoners and fans of the sport know how weak the Boston Marathon had become in the middle of the 1980s. Because of the B.A.A.’s stubborn reluctance to change to a professional event—with prize money—the world’s top runners ran in other marathons that had already made the move to professionalism. The London Marathon is an example of one of those professionally run marathons.

Finally, after the involvement of numerous former champions like Amby Burfoot and Greg Meyer, the mayor of Boston, Ray Flynn, did a search [for a savior] and found the John Hancock Life Insurance Company. The Boston Marathon also changed at that time with a new race director, Guy Morse. Guy led the

Courtesy of Morse family

B.A.A. out of the amateur wilderness and into the sunshine of professionalism. The marathon became bigger and better in every way, leapfrogging into the 21st century, past most other sports—the Boston Marathon gave equal prize money to men and women.

Under previous Boston race director Will Cloney, a group raising funds for multiple sclerosis was an unofficial fund-raiser via runners for several years. I was involved with Will in the effort, but it paled in comparison to the staggering results under Guy Morse’s leadership: $125 million has been raised by Boston marathoners for a wide array of groups that benefit all of America—groups like the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the Melanoma Foundation of New England, the Alzheimer’s Association, and scores more each year.

Under Guy’s guidance, Boston organized the women’s Olympic Trials marathon in 2008. This was a major step for the sport with a major city hosting the event in the United States.

Of course, hosting the 100th Boston Marathon and opening the entries to nonqualified marathoners led to the running of the largest marathon in the world in April 1996: 38,708 runners. This smoothly run race was organized by Dave McGillivray, who was originally hired by the B.A.A. and Guy Morse in 1988. Under Dave’s direction, it was the best possible race for all participants on a uniquely historic occasion.

Finally, Guy led the B.A.A. to be more than a one-trick pony; it began to put on other road races: the B.A.A. Half-Marathon, the B.A.A. 10K, the B.A.A. 5K, and the mile before the annual running of the marathon.

Personally, I know Guy to be friendly, a strong family man, and supported by his gracious wife, Nancy. I also know that, like me, he is a prostate cancer survivor and that in 2008, despite surgery after slipping on ice, he worked hard on the Boston Marathon from the race hotel headquarters, the Boston Copley Hotel. Guy was getting around

Guy with former Mayor
of the City of Boston Ray
Flynn, who ran the Boston
Marathon while in office,
and four-time Boston
Marathon champion Bill
Rodgers at the B.A.A. 125th
Anniversary celebration in
December 2012.

on crutches but was steady as day after day he handled the business of keep[ing] the world’s most venerated marathon going smoothly! Thank you, Guy, from all of us runners!

“Boston Billy” Rodgers won Boston and New York four times each.

Leading from the front

It was wonderful seeing Guy in Prague last May. More than 100 people from 50 countries, mostly race directors, attended the AIMS World Congress there. It was a special meeting because among other anniversaries, we were celebrating the 30th anniversary of the founding of AIMS.

Guy gave a tremendous presentation on involving communities in your marathon. Nobody knows more about involving communities in events than Guy Morse and the Boston Marathon—the race has been doing it for over 100 years! And then I thought about other communities that evolved through and were accepted by Boston, notably women!

Indeed, another anniversary AIMS was acknowledging was the 40th anniversary of women being allowed to officially run the marathon, and that permission was first granted at the Boston Marathon in 1972. In April 2012, Guy Morse and the B.A.A. beautifully acknowledged this anniversary for women and invited eight of us original runners from that race back to Boston. At the same time, Sara Mae Berman, one of our original ’72ers, applauded the Boston Athletic Association for giving women equal standing and prizes in the marathon just as soon as doing so was approved by the AAU, then the sport’s overall governing body. Since that time, women have played an increasingly important role, and during Guy’s tenure as executive director, they have enjoyed their greatest growth in the great race. But this is only part of Guy’s continuing legacy.

Currently, many big marathons—American ones especially—are looking inward, ironically becoming more provincial in a time of global expansion. However, Guy always maintained his connection and leadership within AIMS, reaching out, making Boston a bigger part of the global running community by doing more than just inviting a few foreign athletes. His presentation in Prague was typical: Boston willingly shared the knowledge it has gained as the world’s oldest annual marathon, passing on philosophies and skills to younger races around the world.

It’s a huge credit to Guy that he thought outside Boston in that way, and it has brought benefit to AIMS, the B.A.A., and running everywhere. It is our sincere hope that even in retirement, Guy continues to give AIMS some of his valuable attention, wisdom, and insight. We are especially grateful that he has passed his legacy to the B.A.A. team he has built so well and which will continue his work.

Kathrine Switzer has been a pioneer in women’s running, a radio and television commentator on road racing, and an author of major books, such as Marathon Woman. Ce

Boston Femme

The women who broke the Boston barrier.

man.”

With that single line on page 80 of the 1971-1972 Addendum to the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) Handbook under Track and Field Rule Changes—Women, the crack began to open slightly. After years of knocking on the governing body’s door, the National AAU Women’s Track and Field Committee finally adopted this language, which allowed women to officially compete in road distances longer than 10K and 10 miles. Soon that door would no longer be on its hinges.

The initial “approval” did come with some caveats, however, as women were instructed by the committee chairwoman, Patricia “Pat” Rico, to start 10 minutes before the men and not on the same start line. But when 240 men lined up for the 1971 New York City Marathon and for the first time were joined by official female entrants, they found five women who had waited those 10 minutes in order to start in one unifying race. Seven months later at the 1972 Boston, a larger mix of veterans and rookies toed the line in Patricia Barrett, Sara Mae Berman, Ginny Collins, Nina Kuscsik, Frances Morrison, Elaine Pedersen (Koverman), Valerie Rogosheske, and Kathrine Switzer (sometimes reported as Kathy Miller, as she was then married to Tom Miller).

For the 40th anniversary of the long overdue watershed moment on that Patriots’ Day Monday, the octet was honored at the 2012 Boston Marathon. “There were people—some of whom [ran the 1972 Boston]—who worked very hard to change that [injustice]. A group of pioneers who led to a situation now where we have more than 40 percent of our field as women runners,” said Boston Athletic Association (B.A.A.) Executive Director Tom Grilk.

Kuscsik, the first official women’s winner at Boston, recalls having earlier been told by Berman about the AAU’s stance that women could not run more than five miles. Along with Switzer and others, that jump-started Kuscsik to make a change.

“IT went to the AAU convention, I worked hard to establish a long-distance running committee for women, I put in legislation so that women could run marai M arathons may be conducted with the approval of the National Chairthons. And they said, ‘OK, women can run up to 10 miles, and certain women could run the marathon.’ But we had to start at a different starting line and starting time from the men. We drew a starting line on the sidewalk, and we just started wherever we wanted,” she laughs. “And when I worked to change the rules so we could run a women’s marathon, then we thought we really should have a marathon in the Olympics. Seeing Joanie Samuelson finish the [1984] Olympic marathon [in first] was the high point of my running career.”

Switzer, who in 1967 was the first woman to run Boston with an official number (having registered as K. V. Switzer) and subsequently “met” race official Jock Semple on the course in front of the media en route to history, also made it her focus to include women as official entrants worldwide.

“While Nina was doing legislation, I was doing races,” she noted of the teamwork. “I organized—thanks to Avon cosmetics—a whole series of global races, eventually 400 of them in 27 countries for over a million women. And in those different countries then, we could legislate the different athletic federations to come on [board] for the Olympic Games.”

Women knew they could run 26.2 miles. It was already a proven point. In Boston, in particular, there were Roberta “Bobbi” Gibb (1966-68), Switzer (1967, 1970-71), Pedersen (1968-69), Marjorie Fish (1968), Berman (1969-71), Kuscsik (1968-71), Sandra Zerrangi (1970), and Diane Fournier (1970). And according to

A The inaugural group of eight official female entrants from the 1972 Boston Marathon were honored at various 40th anniversary events at the 2012 Boston, including at the Boston Athletic Association’s Champions’ Breakfast where, from left, Sara Mae Berman, Nina Kuscsik, Pat Barrett, Valerie Rogosheske, and Kathrine Switzer received their bib names. Also recognized were Ginny Collins and Frances Morrison, who the B.A.A. could not locate, and the late Elaine Pedersen.

Photo by Fay Foto; courtesy of the BAA