I learned a long time ago that one of the silliest ways you can spend your day is running 26.2 miles just to see how fast you can do it. Whenever I try it myself, at some point I always think about the monk who trained and fasted for 40 years so he could master the art of levitation sufficiently to cross a river near his home without getting his feet wet. When he finally made it to the other side, a far wiser monk told him it would have been much less work if he had just paid the nickel and taken the ferry. There are much more sensible ways of traveling 26.2 miles than trying to do it fast on your feet. That said, I plan to race 26.2 miles for a thirty-sixth time next spring.
There was a time I used to make my marathons a fairly big deal. Once I paid big bucks for my mother to go to the finish line banquet and have a grandstand seat to watch me finish. Of course she completely missed me finishing and never saw me run. A few times I had friends gather afterwards for a small party, where I expected them at least figuratively to wash my black-nailed toes and swollen feet. I did it because I had once starred in the high school play, and I craved being the center of attention again.
You don’t feel like you’re starring in anything if you are running marathons close to an hour slower than you used to. Once I beat Lance Armstrong. Once I ran through the loud canyons of Fifth Avenue with the runners still so spaced I knew the resounding cheers were for me. It was deeply moving, and a high point. Now I run with people who actually stop to pick up the cups at the water stations, lest they spill a precious drop. It drives me nuts. It’s not hard to drink a cup of water on the fly.
Despite my flagging speed and resulting compromised race experience, I have plotted out the marathons I plan to run for next several years. I will dread each and every one of them, the way I do an invasive medical procedure. I will experience enormous discomfort during all, but probably less real pain than I do visiting the dentist. Probably at the end of most of them, instead of the cliché euphoria, I’ll just feel discouraged and old.
I will be running them precisely because they and all the many hours of training they require are empty. Running wears its emptiness on its sleeve. But empty time is precious time – no phone, no distractions, only feelings and thoughts. I pay attention to the world. I especially pay attention to its sounds, and I feel a little sorry for each and every runner I pass wearing headphones who does not listen to them.
For me, marathons are an excuse to run a lot. I’m fairly lithe, speedy, and would have been really good if only I had been born a couple of inches shorter. Running suits me. I haven’t been injured in many years. Nor have I done much in the way stretching, lifting weights, or anything athletic except run.
It is also the tine I just listen to myself. I almost always come back from a run with at least one or two really good thoughts going on in my head. Now I worry I’ll never remember them by the time I get back to my desk.
Running is also probably the way I avoid Prozac. I come back from a run with my mood elevated, pushed several notches up from its curmudgeonly misanthropic baseline.
In my book at least, in the months leading up to them marathons require numerous training runs that can take three or four hours. Fine with me. I run marathons because I must run countless hours to get to them.
I have developed my marathon routines. I will spend as little time as possible at the “Pre Race Sports Expo”, where I must go to pick up my racing bib (although I’ll break this rule for a sample of free beer). I will never go to the pre-race pasta supper, and wouldn’t be caught dead at the post-race dance party (although you can be sure I’ll stick around after a race to pick up any award that may be coming my way). It is always nice if my wife watches, friends in the cities in which I am running, have the children call me to congratulate me when it’s over. But I will be doing it because I know this empty achievement gives an important structure to my life.