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This is a tale of two runs in two cities. It was 1993. I had just moved to Boulder, Colorado, to
work at Inside Triathlon as its founding editor.
I was not in the greatest physical shape—15 pounds overweight, running several miles a
week with my golden retriever Rockee, the occasional 20-mile bike ride. I sacrificed working out
to the siren’s call of being a workaholic. So to test my level of fitness, I signed up to run
in the Bolder Boulder 10K, a race that regularly attracts more than 30,000 runners. I had never
run a 10K before, so I was interested in just how far and how fast I could go.
Amid the throng of runners, I started out slow, about nine-minute miles. But at around mile four,
which snaked through the north side of town, I started to feel tired and sluggish. I even began to
walk through the aid stations. I grunted out the last mile and finished in the university stadium
with the rest of the sweating, panting hordes of runners. My time was 56 minutes.
I was disappointed in my performance, but there was a summer ahead of training and running. In
October, I was planning to compete in the Hawaii Ironman triathlon for the second time. I
would have to run 26.2 miles by then, after swimming 2.4 miles and cycling 112 miles.
Hawaii-bound
And so began my summer of inching toward fitness as I commenced a semi-regular routine of running,
cycling, and swimming. By October, I was fit and ready to enter the Hawaii Ironman. I had averaged
about 150 miles of cycling per week; two miles of swimming, 25 miles of running. It took me a
little more than four months to get in shape.
Race day finally arrived. The swim and bike legs went fine. I lumbered at my usual pace as a
back-of-the-packer. I was saving myself up for the run. Or so I thought.
Like most Hawaii Ironman competitors, I was determined not to walk. It is a sign of weakness, no
matter what others say or how you feel. You just don’t want to succumb to that temptation of
walking; otherwise, the 26 miles goes by awfully slowly.
But at the 10-mile mark, after an uphill stretch that led out of Kailua Kona, I felt the tendons
behind my left knee tighten. The pain became intense. I began to run with a limp. Then I began to
walk, a gait that was awkward and stiff-legged. I became a gimp with 16 miles to go. I
hobbled along at about 15 minutes per mile. Dusk had colored the sky with its soft orange and
purple hues. Then it got dark.
Obsession for closure
And so it went for another 10 miles—a walk in the dark. At about mile 20, I’d had enough
of this walking. I needed a change of plan. I flagged down a medical van and asked for an elastic
bandage and tape. I then proceeded to mummify my left leg. “Leg,” I said, “I am
going to test you now, and I will probably damage you, but I have six miles to go, a 10K, a
distance I know I can run.”
And that is what I did. I ran those last six miles. My own private 10K race to the finish
line. I made the cutoff by two hours. I finished the Ironman in 15 hours flat.
The next two days, I could not bend my leg. I could not walk up or down stairs. When I returned to
Boulder I visited a sports doctor. He advised me not to run for several months. He said that I had
“a functional or overuse injury” to my peronis tendon. It will take time to heal, he
counseled. I paid him $70 and thanked him for the diagnosis. At least I wasn’t going to end up
permanently disabled. Because that had been my supreme fear when I ran that final 10K at the Hawaii
Ironman.
When I ran that first 10K in Boulder I was only one runner among tens of thousands. Out on the
Hawaii lava fields, I was running alone, in the darkness, thinking back to that run in Boulder,
four months before. It was the reference point that allowed me to finish. A tale of two races,
connected by time, desire, and the obsession for closure.
What connects you standing at the starting line to crossing the finish line is a distance that is
not always measured in miles or kilometers. The distance covered is often calibrated in something
that resists time or measurement. It’s called willpower. Can we quantify willpower? No, but we
sure can live by its powerful guiding hand.
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