On THE Road

WITH Scott Douglas

RUNNERS: YEAH, WE’RE ALIKE

When he was running for president in 1988, Richard Gephardt would tell this story:

The Air Force had these bases up inAlaska, way up, Arctic, freezing up there. And they noticed, the Eskimos, the native guys, could work out there—three hours, six hours—whatever you needed. But the guys from the lower 48 states, you’d put ’em out there, and after an hour, they’d be finished, frozen stiff, just couldn’t do it… same clothes, same jobs, same everything. …

So they run these tests, physical exams, complete work-ups, everything. They couldn’tfind any physical differences atall. So then they ran psychological tests, the whole battery. They had to find out: What was the difference ? You know what they found?

The Eskimos, the natives .. . they expect to be cold!”

Gephardt told the story to induce in his troops the stoicism needed to soldier on during his candidacy. With the right attitude, Gephardt told them, you could do anything, no matter how improbable; given enough time, any

July/August 2000

steady stream will cut into the deepest rock, his mother had told him. History buffs among us will note that Gephardt has yet to take up residency in the White House. Similarly, runners are sometimes defeated in pursuit of their version of a presidential bid, a good marathon. But reading about Gephardt’s Eskimos a few days after my latest failed attempt at marathon satisfaction, I thought, “Yes, this is why, without consciously trying to make it so, most of my friends are runners—we expect to be cold.”

STACEY CRAMP

SONG OF MYSELF ET AL.

That is, at the risk of taking a highly controversial stand, I offer the following observation: it’s really great to be around other runners. In large part, that’s because our mental outlooks distinguish us from our sedentary acquaintances of comparable physical gifts. We expect to be cold—or hot, or tired, or thirsty, or achy, or just downright sick of donning running garb for the 312th night in a row—

ON THE ROAD WITH SCOTT DOUGLAS m 7

and we carry on. And when we find ourselves in the company of others who think and live as we do, we rejoice, or at least relax. .

Certainly, this was my experience at March’s Sutter Home Napa Valley Marathon, to which I had somehow weaseled/lucked my way into an invitation to be part of the race’s “Marathon College.” (Read: Talking heads of various levels of accomplishment, with my accomplishments being decidedly toward the bottom of the class.) Rather than cringing at the thought of enforced socializing, I actually looked forward to the gathering. What was up with that?

After all, I am not what the human-resources types call “a people person.” Riding Washington, DC’s crowded subway to and from work each day drains, rather than boosts, my energy level. So, too, does the amount of small talk necessitated by working in a 100-person office. Vacations? They’ re for getting to as remote as possible a spot that still has good coffee. My Christmas present to myself last year was meeting a long-held goal of talking to nobody but my wife for one day. Bill Clinton, I’m not.

The above stems primarily not from misanthropy, but nature, nurture, and a modicum of existential angst. It’s not that I consider myself above talking with others. It’s just so much easier to live inside my head that ’’d most often prefer to stay there than, say, come up with a few space-filling words in the office kitchen about a

sporting event or news item that Ihave no interest in.

So what was different at Napa? Let me putit this way: one of the more esteemed members of the Marathon College was masters marathon worldrecord holder, Priscilla Welch. She once missed watching a Super Bowl because she was running in a pool for two and ahalf hours. I’ve done a twohour pool-running interval session. From this one incident, Welch knows more about my personality than do the women who work on either side of my office 40 hours a week. Why would there not be pleasure in spending time with someone with whom so much can be unstated but still understood?

I felt similar bonds—and similarly immediately comfortable—with other of the weekend’s VIPs. A Shakespearean actor of British descent and of my parents’ vintage wouldn’t seem like an obvious social peer, but I reveled in the company of John Keston. (Keston, for the record, is not only the oldest person to break 3:00 in the marathon, having done so at age 69, but he also holds the world record for the finest 7:00 a.m. a cappella performance of “The Star Spangled Banner.”) Even mild-mannered Joe Henderson, unapologetic proponent of Gallowalking, came across as a kindred spirit.

It’s not just that, should the conversation hit a lull, there was always running to fall back on. (My wife, after all, who is not a runner, was also at ease amid the group.) Rather, it’s the

July/August 2000

shared experiences and expectations about life that we bring to running and that running instills in us. It doesn’t take much digging to unearth differences between Henderson’s writings and mine, but we have something far more important in common—in Henderson’s home, Eugene, it rains more than half the year. This is a guy who expects to get wet.

My race at Napa was a disaster. I effortlessly passed through 15 miles on pace for a huge PR. A few minutes later, a lifelong neck problem that had been plaguing me the previous three weeks twinged into full fruition, and I dropped out just before 16. (No, that’s not a typo; Don Kardong subsequently congratulated me for being the only person he knows who has DNFed at a marathon because of a neck injury.)

Being the mature sort, I mostly wanted to hide in my room, but that evening, we of the Marathon College were scheduled to eat together. What I dreaded as a desultory dinner became near-therapeutic—my new friends, having been there themselves in some way or another, knew my mental state exactly. Keston, for example, faced far more roadblocks in his several attempts to break 3:00 than just one bit of biomechanical bad luck. And who was I to play the despondent dropout in the presence of ur-survivor, Dick Beardsley? Why, by the time the 23rd glass of free wine was poured, I was even getting a little psyched about making another marathon attempt in May.

July/August 2000

A DEATH IN THE FAMILY

Life, alas, isn’t always a junket in California’s wine country. Quite often, it’s rushed, task-filled, disjointed, and scarce in its allotment of doppelgangers. (No doubt some of my co-workers wish that someone more lively than that quiet, skinny guy occupied my office.) Enter the Internet. It’s not dining with Henderson or running with a good friend, but when it comes to connecting diasporic homologues, it ain’t chopped liver, either.

I spend too much time on a Webbased runner’s forum, the address of which I’m not going to give out because too many people might log on and ruin the intimacy of our little community. Yes, community. The word is probably thrown around too casually these days, and I used to hesitate to apply it to our ragtag band of posters, 99 percent of whom I could see on the street—or even the track—and not recognize. Then Tom died.

One unambitious Monday afternoon in February, I checked the forum’s message board from the office. (Let he or she who is without sin cast the first stone, etc.) A message from someone claiming to be posting on behalf of forum regularTom caught my eye and then, when I read it, sunk my heart. At the Las Vegas HalfMarathon the day before, Tom’s cousin was reporting, Tom had been hit by a taxi while trying to board a shuttle to

ON THE ROAD WITH SCOTT DOUGLAS m 9

the start. He had suffered massive head injuries and was in a coma.

The forum quickly put on hold its usual debates about which top runners are on drugs and whether quarters or mile repeats are the path to PRs, and our wait for more news became a virtual vigil. Tom’s cousin promised to post updates, and we all checked back frequently, hoping to read good news.

Two days later, the message with the ominous subject heading “Final Post” contained the news that Tom was dead. The virtual vigil became a virtual wake, as most of us posted our thoughts about and memories of Tom. The same occurred off-forum, as members traded e-mails fleshing out their desperate search for meaning in such an event.

What I found most striking was the intense mourning that we experienced for someone most of us had never met. Upon reflection, I realized that, while technically I didn’t know Tom, in some important ways, he and I knew more about each other than we knew about many of the people we see each day.

Tom was 30 at the time of his death. He had begun running in earnest only five years ago, but he was quickly improving, from a 4:04 debut marathon in 1995 to a 2:34 at Chicago last fall. He was eager to get faster and was a voracious student of the sport, seeking any information that could help him shave more minutes from his PR. As a small part of that quest, he wrote me and asked

how [had trained for my 10K and 10mile PRs, marks that he wanted to try to get near to help meet his marathon goals. I copied out several months of training from my fastest years and figured that was that.

Tom wrote back with many questions. Why had I done this sort of workout? What would I think if he did that sort of workout? Had I been pleased with my mileage in those years? Should he do more? Less? When should he run twice a day?

A regular feature of our running forum is the weekly training post. Tom’s were always among my favorite to read. Like many others on the forum, he asked a lot of questions and debated a lot of training theory, but he also did something a lot more important: despite being a partner in a budding Internet company, he got out the door, every day, usually for extended periods of time. Soon before Las Vegas, Tom had run 105 miles, his biggest week ever.

Here, then, was someone who expected to be cold. (Well, figuratively speaking—Tom lived in San Francisco.) He lived deliberately, seeking to identify the many variables that affected his marathoning success, then working to have control over those that he could influence. “I wish, therefore …” not, “I wish, but…” guided most of Tom’s decisions. In that sense, most of us on the forum knew Tom very well, because we try to live similarly. The contrast between Tom’s purposeful life and random, sudden death was especially hard to take.

July/August 2000

ON REMOUNTING HORSES

As I write this, Tom has been dead for two months. If the accident hadn’t occurred, he would now be tapering for Boston. In the interim, he would have left his office nearly every night and headed out in the dark for 10 or 12 miles. He might not have done so without complaint, but, as my seminary professors used to say, truth is expressed in action—the fact that he would have done the miles is the fundamental one.

Atsome point, it’s likely that Tom and I would have met in person, perhaps hooking up for a long run. After more than two decades of being a runner, here’s one of the aspects of this life I still hold most dear: I wouldn’t have given a second’s thought to wondering, “What on earth

are we going to talk about for two hours?”

By the time you read this, my attempt at post-Napa redemption will have long been over. Obviously, [hope it goes well. (I wouldn’t have run 109 miles last week if I didn’t care.) But I suspect that, 20 years from now, what will be most important about running May’s Flying Pig Marathon is that I entered it. My older, wiser Napa cohorts knew this and were unanimous in their urgings that I quickly find a new goal to aim my fitness at.

Oh, and if any of Gephardt’s Eskimos are reading, even if you’re not runners yet, I suspect that we’re a lot alike. My wife and I would love to have you visit us for a few days here in Maryland, but I should warn you: expect to be hot.

Scott Douglas can be reached at scottdouglas @ mindspring.com.

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The Perfection Chasers

The Marathon Provides the Perfect Crucible in Which to Test Your Mettle and Your Resolve.

INCREASINGLY, PHYSICAL, mental, and spiritual challenges are vanishing. Modern society has propagated the notion that the American Constitution somewhere guarantees happiness, safety, and complete medical coverage, instead of merely proclaiming the equal right to pursue these conditions. Parents want education for their children but don’t want it to be challenging or painful. Middle-aged folks want good health and fitness but don’t want to work for it. The overweight seek a svelte body by ingesting diet pills. The young demand respect merely because they exist. The old demand respect because they have existed. The voters want honest politicians until one of them tells the truth.

Against the backdrop of millions of timorous souls hoping for that guaranteed safety, one-tenth of one percent each year go against the grain and embark on a perilous journey covering 26.2 miles on their own two feet—a journey in which the only guarantee is that there are no guarantees.

Some new marathoners attempt to make the journey as painless as possible. Other, more grizzled, marathoners continue to experiment with their training and racing, hoping against hope for that one “perfect” marathon. The pursuit of perfection, by definition, is fraught with frustration, for it is never really reached. Each approach pushes the perfection beyond the next hill. Yet the marathon provides an arena in which intelligence, determination, and hard work can combine to approach perfection, at least against the constraints with which each of us is born. The marathon provides an opportunity for us to compete against our own limitations.

Jonathan Beverly, who’s been our European correspondent this past year, posed to us the concept of the marathon as a test in which each of us can pursue our own unique perfection. We thought it would be interesting to pose the challenge to an entire spectrum of marathoners to share how they have used the marathon as an opportunity to go for the best they are capable of achieving. Jon broke the reasons for the pursuit into four areas:

A great equalizer. More than any other event, the marathon rewards persistence, planning, and experience. It is impossible to cram for a marathon, to rely solely on natural ability, or to buy success. This area appeals to those of us who

may not have had the natural athletic ability to enjoy success in other sports but have found in the marathon a thinking person’s sport.

A test of character. George Sheehan called the marathon a “fitting stage for heroism.” From the initial decision to train for and race the marathon to the final two-tenths of a mile, the marathon provides occasion to prove our integrity and courage, rare in this comfortable, compromised age.

A means of escape. Sherlock Holmes once commented, “My life is spent in one long effort to escape from the commonplaces of existence.” Sherlock solved mysteries; others run marathons. Each marathon presents an infinitely expandable challenge, with a new and unique set of variables to consider and overcome, requiring total involvement of the mind and body.

A grand inspiration. The scale of the marathon is so large, it provides purpose and meaning to daily activities. The experience is so intense and complete, it inspires us to rise above the status quo. Like Machiavelli’s “Prince,” marathoners are in a constant state of preparation for battle, each day providing another opportunity to better prepare and move one step closer to the goal.

Herein we’ ve enlisted a range of marathoners, from an Olympic marathoner to a marathoner who has broken 4:00, to share their motivations, agonies, challenges, inspirations—and their souls—as they strive for a perfection impossible to achieve but only too possible and enticing to imagine.

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THE PERFECTION CHASERS vk

Running Was My Best Friend

(age 40, 9 completed marathons, 2:12 PR)

\ N ] HEN I first began running in high school, I hated it. The possibility of

running a marathon seemed aboutas likely as giving up television after school. But after memorizing every episode of “Gilligan’s Island,” I decided that I valued my own self-worth and was capable of achieving accomplishments even more worthwhile than knowing the Skipper’s hometown. So, after a long, boring winter during my freshman year at Miramonte High School in Orinda, California, I decided to pursue track as my high school sport. Since running long distances seemed especially painful at the time, I opted for the event that most mixes speed and endurance—the 800 meters.

In my first 800 that season, I placed third in the frosh-soph race but found myself writhing in pain on the infield afterward as I tried (in vain) to catch my breath. But the accomplishment of scoring a point for the team felt awesome— I was hooked. Ten minutes after I finished, a girl ran the distance nearly 12 seconds faster than I had, setting a new girl’s high school record. I understood that my work was cut out for me.

The summer following my freshman year, I hooked up with the number one runner on the cross-country team, who lived just down the street from me. He would become my training partner for the next two years. We would go 1-2 in nearly every race we ran. Toward the end of my junior year in cross-country, I began beating him. I also became zealous about my running, hitting the trails for lots of miles after cross-country practice. I reached a high one week of 108 miles. After that week, I decided to run the Livermore Marathon.

My first marathon was going pretty well, but I found the last five miles of Livermore excruciatingly painful. My legs locked up to the point where simply lifting my knees was a near-futile experience. I remember thinking it was cool that I could still break 2:45. At that point another young person blew past me, and I lost my spirit, struggling in with a 2:54. The young person who blew by me was a high school girl on her way toward setting the national record for her age group.

POSTMARATHON INJURY BLUES

If I was ever going to run another marathon, which at the time I seriously doubted, [knew Ihad a tough road ahead. After my experience at the Livermore, I developed sciatica and was unable to run track my junior year. Welcome to the world of overtraining and stupid race choices.

The following year, my senior year, I finished with good results in crosscountry and track. I made sure not to run a marathon that year. In fact, I planned to avoid the marathon for quite a few years, until I finished my collegiate running career at Humboldt State.

I became a voracious trainer in college, at times reaching 140 miles a week. My senior year, I was running 120 mile weeks in the winter, with many of the miles in the 5:00- to 5:10-per-mile pace. Friends told me I should run a marathon. Shush, I would tell them. Talk to me after college.

My first year out of college was a running bust. Surgery on my Achilles tendon set me back roughly a year of running. After moving to San Luis Obispo, where I recuperated from surgery, I started to question if I really wanted to train again. I had often questioned my reason for running. Was it for fitness? The endorphins? The thrill of racing well? I was never quite sure. I just knew I was hooked, because it didn’t take long for me to decide that I wanted to come back from the surgery.

I did make a comeback, running personal best times at 5,000 and 10,000 meters. Iran a good half-marathon. I had a recharged urge to try a marathon once again, and I even began looking toward the 1988 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. To attempt to qualify for the Trials, I signed up for the 1987 California International Marathon. My coach, Jim Hunt, and I came up with a training plan focused on running several weekly miles at my anaerobic threshold pace or faster.

The California International went well until 21 miles, when my legs began to feel like 50-pound sledgehammers driving into the pavement. Running in severe winds and rain, I finished third, which qualified me for the Olympic Trials to come five months later. Despite my success, at this time I still couldn’t answer my age-old question: Why was I running in the first place?

TRIALS PREPARATIONS

After recovering from a pulled quadriceps muscle in the wake of the marathon, I began preparing for the trials. Again, Jim Hunt and I decided to go with relatively low mileage (about 85 miles per week) while maintaining high-level AT- and VO,max-boosting workouts.

What happened in the Trials is the stuff dreams are made of. It was so divine that I even thought I had found my answer to why I ran in the first place. On that

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dream performance, 3 “=

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ran in the first place.

day, inthe U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials along the New Jersey waterfront, I felt fantastic from start to finish, andI won the race. Iran 2:12:26, defeating some of America’s best and earning a trip to the Seoul Olympics.

In Seoul, I blistered badly and again injured my Achilles. I was unable to finish the race. I had to undergo surgery on the Achilles, which meant another missed year of racing. Again, I asked myself if it was all worth it. And again, I quickly answered my own questions and vowed to make another comeback. But I was frustrated, as the question of why I ran in the first place remained unanswered.

In 1991, Iran well, running two good marathons, while notching personal best times at 10 miles and 15K. I thought I had a decent shot at making the 1992 Olympic team. But as I escalated my training toward the 1992 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, I developed weird flu-like symptoms. I would enjoy a few good days of training, only to break down again. I wound up taking 10th at the trials, perplexed by my ability to ricochet from one session of illness to the next.

In 1993, conditions became worse. I was finally diagnosed with Hodgkins disease, a cancer of the lymph nodes, and had to undergo six months of chemotherapy. It was during this dicey period that my question of why I had become a marathon runner was finally answered. During my chemo, running stood firmly in my corner as my best friend. On my worst days, I would head out the

Cancer in remission, Mark qualified for and then competed in the 1996 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials, finishing 71st in 2:31:01, an accomplishment more gratifying than winning the Trials in 1988.

door, even if only fora slow 15-minute jog. Just to feel the wind against my face, to feel vital and alive—this was enough. It wasn’t about how fast or how far. Running was that special personal time to clear my head and cleanse my body. Running was my best friend, my therapy.

Marathon preparation trained me well for dealing with my cancer. Like marathon preparation, my cancer battle was about a six-month process with a lot of ups and downs along the way, but in the end was a worthy goal—not to run a fast marathon in this case, but rather just to live to one day simply run another marathon, or walk down the street, or experience the world.

PHOTO RUN

THE TOUGHEST MARATHON ACCOMPLISHED

After my cancer went into remission, I wanted to try to qualify for the 1996 U.S. Olympic Marathon Trials. So, one year after completing my chemo, I signed up for Grandma’s Marathon. I ran the race in 2:20:35—-good enough to qualify for the Trials seven months later in Charlotte. I was spent, exhausted going into the 1996 Trials, knowing what my body had endured mentally and physically over the last several months. But I finished the 1996 Trials in 2:31:01 for 71st place.

After everything I had been through, finishing 71st in the 1996 Trials was much more gratifying than when I won the Trials in 1988. Plus, I finally had my answer on why I ran. Running provided me with self-esteem. It taught me how to accept challenges and endure the lengthy process of working toward and reaching worthwhile goals. It taught me that when you have put in the work and earned your self-esteem, you can conquer anything in life, including cancer.

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Warning: Participating in the WhistleStop Marathon & Half-Marathon can be a serious threat to the health of individuals who are not in excellent physical condition. For, and in consideration of, my participation in the WhistleStop Marathon & Half Marathon, | myself, my executors, administrators, heirs, and assignees do hereby release and discharge the Tr-County Corridor Comission, Town of Pilsen, Ti Lakes Timber Campground, Township of Iron River, Chequemegon National Forest, Ashland County, Bayfield County, Cty of Ashland, Ashland Chamber of Commerce and al sponsors, agencies, subsidiaries, affilates and benediciaries jointy and severally and hold and waive harmless from and against any and all actions, claims, injuries, demands, lables, loss damage or expenses or whatever kind and nature including, but not limited to, attomey fees which t any time may be incurred by reason of my partcigtion in or my preparation for any of the afore said events. | attest and verity that | have full knowledge of th risks involved n this event, and Iam physically fitand sufficiently tained to participate. I however, as a result of my participation in WhistleStop Marathon & Half-Marathon, | require mecical atention, | hereby give my consent to authorized medical personnel of \WhistieStop Marathon to provide such medical care as itis deemied necessary by such authorized personnel ‘The undersigned grant full permission to any and all foregoing use to his/her likeness, including photographs and videotape for publicity and advertising purposes without compensation

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July/August 2000

THE PERFECTION CHASERS

The Grail ‘Was Sub-2:20

By MICHAEL SANDROCK

(age 41, 17 completed marathons, 2:24 PR)

R OB DECASTELLA used to say I was a 2:17 marathoner—I just had not done it yet. Now that nearly a decade has passed since Deek was in Boulder training, I can look back and say with certainty that I never will run 2:17. Instead, when I jog up through the Pearly Gates and talk with St. Paavo, St. Phidippides, St. Abebe, St. Jim (Peters), and others, I will be forced to admit (because you cannot lie in heaven, especially about your PRs) that my personal best is 2:24:30. And there it will remain for all of eternity.

Not that I didn’t try to run faster. For five years after clocking 2:24:30 at Grandma’s Marathon, I ran nearly every day with de Castella and his training group, which included Rosa Mota, Steve Jones, Arturo Barrios, Ingrid Kristiansen, Steve Kogo, Derek Froude, and various and sundry other worldclass marathoners. The training went well; the racing did not.

The perfect race for many of us living in Boulder in the 1980s was 2:19anything. That was an Olympic qualifier. We were not Frank Shorters or Rob de Castellas, nor were we meant to be. We were Napolean’s rear guard, the royal bodyguards so to speak, filling out the field behind the world- and nationalclass runners at local road races.

Sub-2:20 was our Holy Grail. Qualifying for the Olympic Trials would have been as good in my mind as making the Olympic team. Back then, it was expected we would run that fast. It was attainable. It had to be, because so many people were doing it. On the University of Colorado cross-country team on which I ran, we had six runners 2:14 or faster: Kirk Pfeffer, Mark Spilsbury, Mike Buhmann, Mark Anderson, John Hunsaker, and Chuck Hattersley. I was embarrassed to tell newcomers to town that my bests were 2:24 and 30:23 (for 10,000).

BEST ATTEMPTS

I had two good attempts at sub-2:20, and I will never forget floating along at 5:20 per mile feeling strong and full of running. My first attempt was the

Michael Sandrock still competes in races such as the University of Colorado alumni cross-country meet, but he no longer dreams of running a sub2:20 marathon.

California International Marathon. The opening miles went by quickly and easily, and I remember counting off the miles and hitting halfway feeling like I was jogging. The better I felt, the higher my aspirations rose, like some sort of mental Egyptian obelisk. At 20 miles, I was cruising alongside a Kenyan runner, thinking I was going too slow and that I should pick it up to five-minute-mile pace the last 10K. I was strong and fast, confident in my months of 100-mile weeks. In fact, by 21 miles I was even scoffing a bit at the distance.

Bad move. I should have known better than to tempt the marathon gods. I went from running effortless 5:20 miles to feeling my legs stiffen up like pieces of petrified wood.

Despondent, I struggled in, still managing to finish close to my PR. But I was humbled. I vowed to run a better marathon at Las Vegas. That race, however, was more of the same. Half the battle in running your perfect marathon is getting to the race rested and ready to run, which is often a struggle for young runners.

Those were my salad days, when I was young and impecunious. Unable to afford a plane ticket and unwilling to drive my 1966 Volvo through the mountains in the winter, a buddy and I hitchhiked out to Las Vegas. I caught a ride south of town that took me over the Continental Divide to Grand Junction. There, a trucker hauling a load of frozen meat brought me to Las Vegas the day before the race.

To save money, we slept on lounge chairs at the Circus Circus pool. I woke up rested and feeling good. Fate, however, threw a stiff wind directly in our faces. Instead of Vegas’s traditional southern tailwind, we were greeted by a wall of wind. The leaders went out in single file. I tucked in and was able to click off 5:20s, running fast and knowing I was running fast. But, once again, just past 20 miles, I was forced to a crawl, slowing to 6:30 pace in a matter of minutes.

As many of you reading this know, in cases like this you can do nothing but try to keep moving and struggle in to the end.

I was reading all the extant plays of the ancient Greek tragedians that year and had brought Sophocles’s Oedipus Rex along on the trip. On those endless last few miles running in toward The Strip, I recalled how Sophocles sums up the fall of Oedipus—and all of us—with, “Let no man be truly called happy until he dies.” We long-distance runners who have run smack into the wall with such force that it nearly knocks us over can revise Sophocles’s ending this way: “Let no marathoner be truly called happy until the race is over.” Such are the vicissitudes of the marathon that disaster can strike at any moment, even with the finish line in sight.

PERFECTION PAST TENSE

Tcan see now that my first 2:24 was as close to perfection as I was able to get. That is not to say it was easy; it was not. In that race at Grandma’s, a gentle breeze seemed to push me along the shores of Lake Superior, and I was able to “redline” it just right. I can remember waiting for the wall with each passing mile, but it never came.

Thad a pack of gum with me and every five miles would take out a new piece. Even a second or two faster per mile and I would have crashed. I reached the finish line completely spent, feeling like Roger Bannister looks in photos of his sub-4-minute mile. There was no feeling of elation afterward, only a great weariness that settled over me for the next several days.

What made Grandma’s my closest-to-perfect race was what occurred afterward.

A marathon is more than a race; it is the sum total of our experiences before, during, and afterward. And this trip to Northern Minnesota turned into a peak experience. The day after the race, I loaded up with former Grandma’s winner Garry Bjorklund, his attorney friend Dave Munz, and Dave Welch, husband and coach of Priscilla Welch. We spent a week canoeing in the Boundary Waters National Park, as pristine a place as you’ II find in North America. It remains just as it was the day the glaciers retreated north thousands of years ago, leaving behind countless beautiful lakes. There are endless miles of cold, clear water,

fir-covered islands, loons with their haunting calls, eagles, large bass—and portages. Several times Welch had to carry the canoe by himself along the passageways between lakes as I trudged along the path behind him. It was a wonderful journey. We camped at night, built fires, told stories, went skinnydipping off cliffs, fished, and learned about nature from BJ, a born outdoorsman. One evening as we searched for a campsite, Bjorklund decided we should forego one likely-looking spot. When asked why, he pointed to some claw marks about eight feet up a tree.

“A bear made those recently,” BJ said. “A very tall bear by the looks of it.”

“How recently?” I asked.

“Oh, maybe an hour or two ago.”

I soaked my legs in the cold lakes every day during that trip, and when I returned home I had that great postmarathon feeling of knowing I had accomplished something significant.

In the years to come, I had long runs that went so smooth and so well that Iknew a better marathon was there somewhere inside me, even though I never ran faster. I did, however, have the perfect half-marathon at the Denver Mayor’s Cup. I stayed in the pack in the opening miles, and one by one the good local runners dropped back. Soon I was running in front, side by side with former University of Colorado All-American John Hunsaker. I pulled away and ran through crowds lining the mall in downtown Denver, with Hunsaker out of sight behind me. The headline in the paper the next day read “Cram, Sandrock Win Mayor’s Cup”. Mile world-record holder Steve Cram, in town for his spring base work, had won the accompanying 10K. “This was easier than our Sunday long run,” I was quoted as saying afterward.

TRAINING VERSUS RACING

That was the problem. Deek’s motto was “Train smarter, not harder.” Instead, I trained harder, not smarter. The fitter I got, the more miles I ran. Instead of recovering on recovery days (gee, what a novel concept), Iran 10 in the morning, 7 in the evening on my off days, because the group was so much fun to be with.

The problem was that while the elites were napping, getting massages, and doing whatever it is world-class runners do when they are not training, I was working 40-plus hours a week at a newspaper. I realize now I was training to train more, not running to race my best, and thus I left my perfect marathon up Left Hand Canyon or out on the dirt roads north of the Boulder Reservoir, where we did our weekly 22-miler. I was never rested, and I did not stretch. One cold November day I pulled an overworked and underappreciated quad muscle

Michael Sandrock THE GRAIL WAS SUB-2:20 HM 23

running 200-meter repeats on the track. That was the beginning of the end of my marathon aspirations.

I do, however, continue to train and to race. And I still chase perfection, trying to run as well and as fast as I can within the limits of 50 miles a week. The perfect race for me now is not based on getting a personal best, but rather on how well I can prepare and peak for a race within the framework of the busy 21st century Internet lifestyle I share with many of you.

I am proud of my 2:24, disappointed that I never ran faster only because I had put in the years of high mileage necessary to do so. That is one reason I wrote Running with the Legends—to pass along some of the wisdom of the greats, so that others might be able to get the most out of their talent and training.

And now I appreciate the effort all runners make, no matter what their finishing time. I have enough respect for the marathon to be happy when a friend breaks four hours. It might not be the perfect race, but for me, finishing any marathon is an accomplishment, one reason why then-world-record holder Steve Jones insisted on crawling in at over 2:20 during the European Championships marathon after cramping up.

Iremember once asking Deek which runners he respected the most. He did not say Jonesy, Carlos Lopes, Toshiko Seko, Arturo Barrios, Rosa Mota, Ingrid Kristiansen, Lorraine Moller, Priscilla Welch, or any of the other elite marathoners with whom he was friends. Instead, he mentioned a 2:16 guy who trained with the group every day. “He does all the training we do, even though he is not going to make a living racing. The ones out there every day like that are the people I respect the most,” de Castella said.

I felt proud to be included among that group, and many of you reading this fall into that same category. Most of us choose to be marathoners (or does the marathon choose us?) not for any external rewards, but for myriad reasons, often unknown to ourselves. Training for the marathon is part of who we are. Eventually we reach the flash of insight the modern Odysseus gets when he realizes that Ithaca does not exist; but he keeps traveling to get there as if it does exist. So itis with us marathoners: we are perfection chasers, knowing we will likely never run our perfect race.

JUST REWARDS

De Castella said that what he liked about running was being able to see the concrete results of his hard work. That is how many of us feel, whether we are running 10-minute or 5-minute miles. We may never reach Ithaca, clock our sub-2:20, but will have many good runs and adventures along the way.

I have been running for more than 25 years now, and I still remember my first run as if it had been this morning. I was in high school in suburban Chicago.

There were few runners back then, and I walked to the local forest preserve wearing my gym uniform beneath my street clothes. I undressed and hid my clothes in the woods, then took off jogging on the soft bridle path. How good it felt, like jumping into a cool lake on a hot summer’s day, or feasting on a spaghetti dinner after a long run. I felt so free, so light, sprinting through the woods, then settling into a pace and feeling the breathing come regularly and smoothly. I am just as motivated to run today. Early this morning I took a run in the mountains, through the cold and snow, and had that same bearable lightness of being I had on my first run.

Have you ever visited the Parthenon atop the Acropolis in Athens? If you have, perhaps you understand why we continue to pursue our perfect race. The marathon is like the Parthenon’s steps: not so steep that you can’t ascend them, but far enough apart that you have to stretch out to make it up them. Isn’t that what being a marathoner, and a human being, is all about? Knowing there are limits, yet still determined to stretch past our limits? Knowing the perfect marathon does not exist, yet training every day as if we are going to run the perfect marathon? And perhaps this above all—running fearlessly along the edge of the abyss, knowing that Time, Gravity, and Entropy, those indefatigable allies, will win in the end, yet sticking it out to run our best race Pa anyway.

This exciting weekend, which benefits Special Olympics promises to be a family adventure of fitness activities and cultural events.

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 14

Location: Forest Park

5K Run

1 Mile Children’s Fun Run KMOX 10K Volksmarch Walk a

sponsored by:

Pasta Party Expo JEROME

TLOUN’ §=sunpay, ocTOBER15 = ergupe VMADATHON Location: Downtown St. Louis (Covey Oren ovis

Marathon Marathon Relay

Michael Sandrock THE GRAIL WAS SUB-2:20 M 25

Detroit Free Press/Flagstar Bank 23rd Annual International Marathon Sunday, October 15, 2000

Challenge your body on historical terrain and compete against runners from more than 40 U.S. states and Canadian provinces. Highlights include crossing over the Ambassador Bridge from Detroit to Canada, crossing back through the Detroit-Windsor Tunnel and running around Belle Isle (Prize money exceeds $25,000.).

For more information or to request an entry form: Write to: Detroit Free Press Marathon, 600 W. Fort, Detroit, MI 48226 Phone: 313-222-6676 © Fax: 313-223-3233 E-mail: marathon @freepress.com On-line: www.freep.com/marathon

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THE PERFECTION CHASERS a ny

Enjoying

the Process

BY JONATHAN BEVERLY (age 36, 17 completed marathons, 2:46 PR)

WO FACTS characterize my marathon experience. Number one is that

I have been successful. I have not set world, national, or even local records, nor often won awards, but my success in the marathon far exceeds that in any other of my athletic endeavors. Number two is that Ihave never mastered the distance. I’ve never finished a race and been able to state, “Everything went right. I gave everything I had. This is the best I can do.”

These two facts draw me to the distance again and again. The potential of success first lured me to the marathon. After a childhood of experience that convinced me I was unsuited for athletics, I was thrilled to discover distance running in high school. I learned I had always been a marathoner. I hadn’t known it then, having never heard of the event until the late 1970s, but the essential characteristics were present from the start: a wiry frame, a penchant for challenging puzzles, and, most important, a tenacity that compensated for my small size and lack of athletic instincts.

By my sophomore year I discovered that the longer the event, the greater my

“I do not dream of a day when Saturday mornings won’‘t find me on a road or trail 10 miles from home and still heading out”—Jonathan Beverly, shown here running the 1999 Rotterdam Marathon.

Jonathan Beverly ENJOYING THE PROCESS 27

comparative advantage. That spring, Joan Benoit (also from a small town in Maine) ran an American record at Boston, and the marathon began monopolizing my thoughts and dreams.

During the summer break I ran my first road races, culminating in a hilly 16miler where I cruised comfortably past fading runners in the final miles. Afterward, my cross-country coach was more impressed than I was with my sevenminute-per-mile average. Her enthusiasm, and the congratulations of other runners, convinced me that this ability to keep running was not shared by everyone.

My road success didn’t translate back to cross-country as well as expected. Iran respectably on varsity that fall, but my heart had moved to longer things. When spring rolled around, I chose to skip track and train for a marathon.

A MARATHON VIRGIN

They say you never forget your first time, good or bad. Mine was great. I loved every aspect of it: researching training theories, laying out a plan, developing discipline, exploring ever farther from home, testing my fitness at races, meeting other marathoners, feeling growing confidence and fear, cruising through 22 miles on race day, enjoying new scenery, flying with the energy of the event, hitting the wall, surviving to the finish, and returning home a hero. I ran a 3:23 and won the 18-and-under age group, complete with a prize of a Nike jacket. Thad found my event and thought I was on my way to stardom.

I did lower my marathon time by 20 minutes the next summer. Assuming a sub-3:00 was inevitable and a sub-2:50 just around the corner, I instead followed my summer marathon with two disappointing efforts (a DNF and a crippled, cramped, survival finish). Lack of success restored my respect for the distance, and I was reluctant to return without a new level of preparation. Different goals usurped priority in my life, and I became a former marathoner for eight years.

When I returned, the desire for mastery had risen to the top of my motivations. Ino longer dreamed of winning Boston or making an Olympic team. I did, however, need a goal—something that could be defined and measured. Itneeded to be difficult but achievable, unsullied by the political and economic realities of daily life. I had found that life often isn’t like the marathon: rarely could I set my own goals, develop a plan, and succeed or fail on my own efforts. Many paths led to nothing; many goals were either achieved too easily or blocked by factors outside my control.

Over the ensuing years, now approaching a decade, the marathon has never disappointed me. I have enjoyed success beyond my expectations as well as

spectacular failures. Each year I add to my knowledge and ability yet never exhaust the challenge or despair of further progress.

Progress in the marathon, however, is wonderfully difficult. It cannot be bought, bullied, or conned. Each improvementrequires refined planning, stricter discipline, and expanded confidence. Mastering the marathon has become the process of mastering myself. Competition with others, though sometimes interesting and motivating, pales beside the desire to explore the limits of my ability, to discover how close I can come to the perfect race.

For several years I chased the three-hour marathon. When I achieved it, I hesitated to set a new goal, but the marathon had become too much of a habit to quit. Iran the next one without a goal and gave less than 100 percent. While I enjoyed the scenery, the camaraderie, and the energy of the pack, the race lacked passion and purpose. Like a noncredit class in school, removing the possibility of failure also eliminated the chance for success and the drive for excellence.

Six months later, mentally preparing the day before another attempt, I found that I again lacked purpose for the effort to come. Sure, I could set a time goal based on my training, which had gone remarkably well, but why should I put myself on this treadmill that runs ever faster and never ends?

FASTER BY FIVE

My answer came to me in the words of a song: “Each day I live, I want to be the very best I’m meant to be… . Give me one moment in time, when I’m more than I thought I could be, when all of my dreams are a heartbeat away, and the answers are up to me… .” [ran my best the next day—over five minutes faster than I had ever run.

The song, written for the 1988 Olympics, still expresses my goal as I line up for another marathon. Running may be only a small part of who Iam. I hope to be my best in every aspect of life. But the marathon provides a rare moment where I can prove my resolve and set an indisputable mark of excellence. And perhaps because I have been given the chance for success, however limited, I cannot be satisfied with anything less. Fortunately, even as I celebrate each new mark, I discover areas in which I can improve the next time.

Enjoying the marathon as much as I do, Iam often tempted to jump into one without adequate training, but have learned to resist. I respect the event too much to treat it lightly. The marathon is like a beautiful woman; showing up unprepared is like meeting her unshowered in shoddy clothes. At worst she’ ll make me suffer for my mistake; at best, she may let it pass, but don’t expect any romance or passion. I know her well enough to know it is worth my while to be at my best.

Could another activity, another goal, fill the same place in my life? Perhaps, but I have yet to find another event that encompasses so many facets of my being—an event that stretches my physical limits, challenges my mind, and tests my character. A challenge large enough to provide context and significance for the smallest daily decisions and complex enough that experts fail to agree on the best path to success. A goal as full as life, yet reducible to three digits.

also admit that I enjoy the process as much as pursuing the goal or achieving the success. The long runs, the hills, the speed work—a looming marathon gives them urgency, but they are not enemies to be overcome on the road to a destination. They have become my daily affirmation of life and part of my identity. I do not dream of a day when Saturday mornings won’t find me on a road or trail 10 miles from home and still heading out.

I know there will come a day when I can no longer expect to improve on my best. Until then, I will keep refining my knowledge, pushing my limits, and celebrating improvements. Though I’m not sure how I will respond on that day, I believe the marathon will still turn my head, that I will still find in it a motivation and inspiration grand enough to get me out of bed each morning, working to be my best.

Adventure Running At Its WORST!

In 1989, two runners set off to become the first to run from Death Valley to Mt. Whitney and back—in mid-summer. Lottsa luck, fellers!

Send $22 in US funds (shipping/handling included) to: Rich Benyo, Box 161, Forestville, CA 95436, USA

Street

Town. State/Province.

Zip/Mail code Country

Allow 6 weeks for delivery. If you wish a personal autograph, please include name of person for whom book is intended.

RN SUNDAY,

OCTOBER 1, 2000

his is our 29th year! We are proud that with

‘age our event has gained credibility and tremendous accolades. However, our goal remains to make everyone who participates feel like a winner Goodies and Awards We do nat spend our bucget on purses for an elle few – we spend it on each entrant. Qur Marathon runners and walkers receive high-quality, longsleeved fnisher’s shir, medal, poster, food and drink, space blanels, and a great goody bag. Our related event participants also receive shirts and an assortment of goodies.

Last year over 1,250 awards were given out. We have five-year age divisions, masters, Clydesdale, state and country competion, as well as team, race walker, wheelchai, and other special handicapped categories,

‘An Event for Everyone

‘You do not have to be a marathoner to enjoy the Portland Marathon because there are seven other ‘events that take place on marathon moming or during the weekend.

(Our Five-Miler isan excellent event for beginning and competitive middle dstance runners. ‘The Mayor’s Walk is 6.2 miles of fun along the last 6.2 miles of the marathon course. The Kids’ Marafun is a noncompetitive approximately twomile event for kids 12 and younger and anyone else who wants to join them. The 262 mile Marathon Wak allows the walkers to share the thr, excitement and the same perks as their running counterparts. And our other two events are a 24-hour ultra track run, and a three mile run ‘and shoot biathlon, both held on Saturday, October 2, 1999.

Our other weekend events include a first-class race directors’ conference, a spectacular sports and fitness expo, the best pasta partyin the west, and a great post-racelawards party. In short, we coffer an event for everyone inthe family.

Course and Weather

The marathon course is roling with a few long gradual hills on the fist part of the course. The Toute wanders through downtown Portiand, China ‘Town, Old Town and neighborhoods with treelined streets. There are plenty of dramatic views of the Cascade mountain range, our city skyline and river font.

The second half ofthe course can easily pro duce a “negative spit” for our runners. An average of 33% have set PRs! The weather is normally in the low 50s. Itis the best time of year to be in Portland.

Organization

‘Our event has gained its reputation for excellence through organization: 3,500 volunteers, 20, ‘enthusiastic aid and medical stations, splits called at points on the course, over 65 entertain- ‘ment groups, and a finish line where every marathoner’s name is announced to the thousands of spectators. All of our event participants I

share in a great array of food and beverages.

Hilton

i Portland

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°>ORTLANID MARATIION

Be a part of what is ranked

The Best Organized Marathon in North America!! — tie uttimate Guide to Marathons

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I 2000 PORTLAND MARATHON ENTRY* I

| Please read carey belore competing form. Please print clear. Please note deaines for sending applications and late fees. Marathon

| 204 Marathon Wak enti by mai ($80) must be postarked ono before mihight, September 1. No mal entries ater micnight Sept. 1 Note: runners and walkers may enter in person for all events atthe Portland Hitlon at the late $100 fee rate on September 29 and 30. 1

I (No refunds, exchanges or transfers) 1 1 (Pease begin your name in the large box) Check one box: [LJ Marathon Run [LJ Marathon Walk 1 1 TT 1 i Ol Creve LETT wo! mo 7 = 2, aaaress |_| l TTT TTT TTI J — ; —— cy l state LI] zip code L LT) country (ifother than US.) 3 Date o Bir | LIL TL} age on sooo LI] s.sex mb] FL] 6. Total years ot sonoot |_|] 7.shinsie: SL} mL] LC] xf) 200 1) (100% cotton) a. hone work) | | J—[ 1 [ |- tvomey [TT J-CTTI-CL revious Marathon Time: |_|} ne. LL] min | ee eee eee cuauwon ] This form may be reproduced, MB 1/00 10, redetos Tie: IJ Lin “lupieated crewargen 11. Completed Maratons: [_]

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asf] mC] LL) x10] short sieeve $15.00

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(check size) Souvenir Shirt ($15/S20/$35) 8 asl] mC] 101 xtC1 short sieeve $15.00

onto & Handing eee chan) S 8.5L] mL) LL) XL) Long sleeve crew Neck. Tshirt S20.00

c.sCi ml) tO) xL0) sweatshirt $35.00 ‘Total Enclosed: $. (US Dotar amounts ony: No foreign checks or money orders) US. Foreign Shit Posage & Handing Fees SISS25 $80 88 | Make checks payable to: Portland Marathon; iio 6 wrecker deters) Over $50 $8 312

| this ts aN IMPORTANT LEGAL DOCUMENT. READ CAREFULLY BEFORE SIGNING. Waiver of Liabily: In consideration of your accopting I this entry. 1, the undersigned, intending to be legally bound, hereby, for myself, my family, my heirs, executors, & administrators, forever waive, release & aischarge any and al rights & claims for damages & causes of sut or action, known or unknown, that | may have against The Portland | Marathon, The Oregon Road Runners Clb, The City of Poland, Munomah County andallother pola ens, the Portland Terminal RR Co, 4 ‘and i’s owners, including PDC, Union Pactc, Southem Paciic & Burington Northern Rairoads, al independent contractors & construction firms ‘working on or near the course, all Portland Marathon Race Committee persons, Officials & Volunteers & al sponsors ofthe Marathon, & the relat- | e4 Marathon Events & ther officers, director, employees, agents & representatives, successors, & assigns fr any and al njries suffered by me J | inthis event. latest that am physically ft, am aware of the dangers & precautions hat must be taken when running in wasm or co condtions., 4& have sufciently trained for the completion of this event. | also agree to abide by any decision of an appointed medical oficial relative to my 1 silty to sately continue or complete the Fun. | futher assume and will pay my own medical & emergency expenses inthe event of an accident, # liness, or other incapacity regardless of whether | have authorized such expenses. Further, | hereby grant full permission to The Oregon Road | J| Runners Club andor agents hereby authorized by them to use any photographs, videotapes, motion pictures, recordings, or any other record of his event for any legtimate purpose at any time. | have read this waiver carefully & understand it

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MARATHON ENTRY BOOKLET OR AN ENTRY BOOKLET

THAT ALSO DESCRIBES THE FIVE-MILER, THE MAYOR’S aetna mci WALK, THE MARAFUN KIDS’ RUN OR THE 26.2-MILE MARATHON WALK, PLEASE SEND A LEGAL SIZE SELF ‘ADDRESSED STAMPED ENVELOPE (55¢) TO THE ABOVE ‘ADDRESS.

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July/August 2000

THE PERFECTION CHASERS x = il

Running’’s —

Been Good

By RICHARD BENYO (age 54, 37 completed marathons, 2:57 PR)

R UNNING HAS been very, very good to me. As askinny kid with a severe

stuttering problem, running many times saved me froma vigorous thrashing at the hands of my fellow kids. Early on, I discovered that although I was not terribly fast, if I could get a three-stride jump on a bigger kid, Icould always outlast him. I spent much of my childhood on the alert for attacks from hidden assassins.

Although our high school had no track or cross-country teams in the early 1960s, the gym teacher did conduct an annual intramural track meet on the rutted dirt road that encircled our football field. The longest event was billed as the half-mile, although considering the ambling rutin which we ran, it was more accurately a 5/8th-mile steeple chase. In my junior year I finished aclose second in the half; in my senior year I read War and Peace while waiting for the secondplace finisher to come in; everyone went out way too fast and died on the back sort-of straightaway.

I engaged in (and managed to pervert) cross-country in college. Training three times a day left me so tired by race day that I never placed better than fourth on our team. In my junior year my running was complicated by a toe injury that I would freeze in a bag of ice before meets. During my senior year the toe would undergo seven surgical procedures (most of them incompetently performed in a podiatrist’s chair with two aspirin as anesthesia) in attempts to correct the problem.

In 1977 I joined the staff of Runner’s World, which in a big way rekindled my interest in running. That fall I covered the New York City Marathon from the rickety press truck. Witnessing Bill Rodgers run like a god behind the press truck while he sucked foul exhaust fumes from the NYPD Vespas and chatted with press guys convinced me that the marathon was a race worth pursuing.

Upon my return to California, I vowed to end my marathon virginity come spring. I entered the lottery for one of the 2,000 spots at the early May Avenue of the Giants Marathon in far northern California. My entry was accepted, so

I proceeded to train like a demon during the winter. Unfortunately, I got waylaid along the way….

In April, the Runner’s World staff traveled to Boston to host our annual “open house.” I let a friend persuade me to line up at the back of the Boston field as a bandit in order to get in a last long workout before my marathon debut two weeks later. Hal Higdon, who had been instrumental in my getting the position at Runner’s World, advised me to wait until I crossed the start line to click on my stopwatch so I’d get an accurate time. Three hours and 29 minutes later, I crossed the finish line accompanied by Hal, who I’d caught up to a mile from the finish when a chronic calf injury slowed him.

In May, Iran Avenue in 3:27; in June, I did Avenue of the Flowers (Lompoc, California) in 3:24; in July, Iran San Francisco in 3:52, accompanying a friend through his first marathon; in September, I ran Silver State in Nevada in 3:33; in October, Iran New York in 3:29; in November, I accompanied an undertrained friend through his first marathon (Golden Gate) in 4:07; then I closed out the year at Honolulu in December with 3:22. For good measure, I experimented with ultras, running 36 miles of the AAU 50-mile track championship in Santa Monica over the summer and then running the first Cow Mountain 50-miler in early October. Write this period off as a serious case of marathon addiction. Call it a case of running to run with no specific focus.

After a similar 1979, I’d had enough. I was stalled between 3:10 and 3:30. I wanted to run faster, to seek the Holy Grail of sub-3:00, so I embarked on a serious training program. I sustained a good mileage base, but I eliminated “junk miles” and got serious about speed work. It helped that Runner’s World was sponsoring the Corporate Cup series; two dozen of the RW employees did track workouts together on Thursdays and competed in shorter races on open weekends. We raced at the track on Corporate Cup weekends. My 400-meter times dropped, my mile times dropped, my 10K times dropped, and my marathons, now restricted to three per year (one for fun, two for serious) improved.

THE ROAD TO THREE

In October of 1980 I rolled through a 2:57 at the Humboldt Redwoods Marathon. I kept expecting something to go wrong, but the run was so under control that upon finishing I began sniffing around for a hotdog, an unheard-of postrace luxury I’d never previously lusted for while puking up postrace bile. In October of 1981, I returned and ran a 2:59 with less-than-adequate training.

In 1983, I was still focused and rationing out the marathons very gingerly. I decided I wanted to qualify for Boston. The qualifying time for my age (36 at the time) was a sub-2:50. The Napa Valley Marathon run in early March became my qualifier. As my last long run, I “jogged” through the Second

Richard Benyo RUNNING’S BEEN GOOD @® 33

Rich Benyo rolled through a 2:57 PR at the 1980 Humboldt Redwoods Marathon.

Manila International Marathon two weeks before Napa in an easy 3:10 under hot, humid conditions. I felt ready.

It had rained heavily the week leading to Napa. Access roads were submerged, and the race start was disorganized. Slower runners seeded themselves in the front rows. I encountered Jack Leydig, then president of the West Valley Track Club, who was also planning to run 2:49. As the field filled, we caught up on our respective lives. At the gun, we headed off at an easy 6:30 pace, chatting away, passing runners in droves.

A half-mile into the race we passed arunner in red shorts. He crossed behind me and caught my trailing leg, knocking me flat onto the road. Jack continued rolling along at 6:30 pace, still talking to me until he realized I wasn’t there. Meanwhile, both of my kneecaps were misaligned, my elbows were cut and dripping blood, and my glasses were broken. In that initial fight-or-flight response fueled by adrenaline, I bounded up and resumed running. Everything in me was programmed for that finish line. But at two miles I realized my race was

ruined. I calculated that the adrenaline surge would catch up to me at around 18 miles and the run would then become grim—road rigor mortis.

I attempted to drop out, but each crossroad we passed allowing access to the course was under water. Finally, just beyond 11 miles, access opened, and my wife was able to scoop me up. Still on pace for a 2:49, I dropped out, dripping blood and discouraged. My focus had been shattered. My kneecaps took three weeks to work their way back to where they belonged.

After that, I avoided marathons for a while, then began running two a year for fun and fitness. For the next decade I found myself grinding through ultras and adventure runs, where speed was not of the essence.

DEATH VALLEY DAYS

My focus turned to Death Valley where, in 1989, Tom Crawford and I, after a year’s worth of course-specific training, became the first crazies to run from the depths of Death Valley to the peak of Mt. Whitney and back in the middle of summer, a mere 300 miles. Dissatisfied with my time, I went back into training and challenged the course again in 1991 and 1992. The 1992 effort sucked me dry, draining the psychological and spiritual reserves that runners typically dip into to complete a particularly arduous event. But I had a new book being published in the fall (Making the Marathon Your Event), and my editor wanted me to travel to New York to run the marathon in conjunction with the book’s release. I shuffled dispiritedly through a sub-4:00; then, with a pulled Achilles tendon, I returned home to recuperate.

The Achilles tendon healed in a year, but alas, nothing else seemed to. My running was lackluster. Even though I wanted to return to the challenge of the marathon, I couldn’t get going again. Ultras had been satisfying in their way, but they lacked something the marathon offered: a fear of failure and the lust for success at the intersection of a set time goal and 26.2 miles in which the potential for screwing up 16 perfectly good weeks of hard training was everpresent in a smorgasbord of ways.

During my annual trips to the Vancouver International Marathon in early May, I would enter the half-marathon. Typically, I’drun the first nine miles with my wife at a nine-minute pace. At that point, she would continue on with the marathoners across the Lion’s Gate Bridge. The half-marathon field would turn back toward the finish line. It was at that point that I would drop the hammer and pass two or three hundred people by running six-minute miles to average the race out to eights.

But I could not seem to sustain training for a marathon. When I tried to run the Royal Victoria Marathon, I blistered badly around the halfway point and limped back to the start. Two weeks later, at home, I ran a hilly 10-mile course

in a credible 77 minutes. But most runs were an effort, not a joy. I ran the Okanagan Marathon in British Columbia in 1996 and halfway through began to fall apart as though I had merely jumped into it without training. I couldn’t sustain even a 10-minute pace. I ran/walked to the finish in what became my worst-ever marathon, a 4:13.

Perhaps, I thought, I was still not psychologically and spiritually recovered from the too-hard effort of Death Valley in 1992. Jeff Galloway and I sat down when we ran into each other in Edmonton, Alberta, and discussed my situation. After encouraging me to not beat myself up, he recommended that I stop, rest, then restart my running program as though I were a new runner. He made a lot of sense. I tried it. It didn’t work. I began to think I’d just turned yellow, couldn’t face the challenge of regular training anymore. Running had converted from something that I eagerly anticipated to something I dreaded.

THE WONDER YEARS

Certainly, I had to acknowledge that I wasn’t getting any younger, but my diminished performance was more dramatic than that. I had actually considered the idea of training for another sub-3:00 when I turned 50. Now, sometimes completing two miles without walking was a problem! When yourun and race for many years, you come to know your body. I could no longer attribute my horrendous running to the dregs of Death Valley.

I visited my internist, a runner himself, and requested a thorough examination. Because he trusted my judgment as an athlete who knows his body, he thought my concerns were reasonable and appropriate. He honored my request, and ordered me a stress test and an echocardiogram. Procedures were performed where radioactive substances were injected into my body in order to video my heart activity to determine if arterial blockage was present. Upon completion of the tests, I realized that in addition to an internist, I now also had acardiologist, a former runner who had developed a knee injury that sidelined him. His diagnosis was that I had developed a viral cardiomyopathy, a breakdown of the heart muscle caused by a viral invasion of the body. The weakened heart muscle rendered my heart less able to pump efficiently in order to meet the needs of my body. My running only aggravated the problem by increasing the demands being placed on an already compromised organ. Major bummer.

The cardiologist explained that the condition is much more common than people realize and that its incidence is growing in the general population. The reasons are unknown. In most Americans it is not diagnosed until much later in life. My previous level of fitness gave me a distinct advantage over the general population, for I had enjoyed a high level of fitness that served as a barometer for detecting changes in my well-being. My unrelenting lassitude

and fatigue served as a red flag early on. Most Americans, with no healthier frame of reference from which to compare their current condition, grow complacent and accepting of increasing fatigue and weight gain as they age. By the time they are diagnosed, their hearts are failing.

The cardiologist explained that in the normal, healthy heart, each pumping action (heartbeat) ejects 65 percent of the blood within the heart, sending it to body parts to meet their needs. My heart was ejecting only 15 percent! At the time, his concerns were twofold: first, I needed to markedly reduce my aerobic exercise to prevent a heart attack as a consequence of overtaxing an already compromised pump; second, my blood needed to be thinned so that the 85 percent left inside my heart at the end of each beat did not clot, escape into the coronary circulation (supplying the heart muscle with oxygen), and cause a heart attack.

PUT ON THE BRAKES

I was immediately warned to stop racing, reduce the pace at which I ran (now jogged), and limit my mileage. Medications were prescribed to slow down my heart and thin the blood so it wouldn’t clot. My cardiologist also prescribed a drug that in some instances had reportedly reversed damage to heart muscle and not just merely slowed the process of future damage. Overnight, I went from someone who took an occasional aspirin for a headache to popping seven pills a day.

I found myself wondering what had caused a fit, healthy guy who several times had broken three hours to become a semi-invalid. Had the extreme effort in Death Valley during 1992 suppressed my immune system so badly that it left me vulnerable to viral invasion? Had the gum surgery I’d undergone years ago released viruses from my mouth that then searched for a new organ in which to lodge? Had I stood too close to the wrong person at the wrong time? Had Mideastern terrorists loosed heart-seeking viruses into our beer supply? I didn’t know what to think.

Now that some time has elapsed, there are three things I do know:

1, The medications have helped. My heart isn’t yet ejecting 65 percent of the blood inside it with each beat, but it’s ejecting a lot more than 15 percent. 2. Every once ina while when I’m ona jog and I’m warmed up and my heart is ticking along at a comfortable rpm, I throw in a faster-than-10-minute-permile pace for a hundred yards just to remember what it feels like to really run. 3. Often I feel guilty about editing a magazine on marathoning when chances are I might never run another one. On one hand, my work here seems borderline hypocritical in that I can no longer practice what I preach. On the other hand,

Richard Benyo RUNNING’S BEEN GOOD ® 37

I feel that when you’re denied something, you’ ll likely understand and value it even more—which is one reason I don’t take the marathon lightly (and don’t take well to people who do!).

Life has changed for me. No more solitary runs through pristine woods. I make sure to jog on well-traveled roads; this way, if I drop, someone is nearby to get help quickly enough so that my working organs can be harvested and recycled before they go sour.

I sometimes reflect on that period from my first marathon to my attempt at what was supposed to be my 2:49. The six-year period of striving to reach as perfect a place in the marathon as I could while working 60+ hour weeks and having a semblance of a life outside running was an invigorating experience and very satisfying—an experience that was translatable to other aspects of life.

It was also an experience that was rationalized by an interview I conducted in 1977 with an actor and lifetime runner, Bruce Dern. Dern explained that running, especially running well, is a creative endeavor that is undermined when you have other creative endeavors going on in your life. He maintained that when he began doing films that demanded an excess of creative energy,

, his running suffered. He lacked the creative energy to fuel everything simultaneously, so he backed off from his racing.

Today I suffer from a literally broken heart that very much misses running marathons. At the same time, I’m incredibly grateful for all the sport continues to give me freely, especially all the wonderful people in my life. Imay never run another marathon, but my chase for perfection continues today as vigorously and enthusiastically as ever. My current pursuit is to help create the perfect magazine for my fellow marathoners.

– Let me know how Rich Benyo and M&B publisher Jan Seeley at we’re doing so far. sy the Las Vegas Marathon Expo. ; ,

rd & 23″ Annual FS cee?” SutterHome ‘0

Napa Valley Marathon

March 4, 2001 7:00 am RRCA National Championships

FO. Box 4307, Napa, CA 94558-0430 Call: (707) 255-2609; Fax: (707) 257-6515 Online: http:\\www.napa-marathon.com

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