THREE MARATHONS

Does realizing the summer is winding down cause you to pick up the pace in your schedule, trying to get in as much fun as possible before the school bells ring and the autumn leaves fall? Fun for me is running marathons, so I found myself signed up to run three in the fifteen days between August 19th and September 2nd. Most people who run marathons run them a bit more spaced out than that. I often run with a group of people who will sometimes run that many in a weekend, hence the name “Marathon Maniacs.” [e.g., there is an annual fall event at Lake Tahoe, the “Tahoe Triple,” wherein participants circle the lake in three days. Each leg is 26.2 miles; the last one being the Lake Tahoe Marathon, set for September 29th this year. ]

Since I have never run more than two marathons in a single weekend, and have never, ever run an ultra, my relative sanity is thus established. An ultra is a race over 26.2 miles long. Some common ultra distances are 50K, about 32 miles, 50 miles, and 100 miles. I’m always quite content, elated even, to stop running at 26.2.

These three recent marathons provided some most excellent company that I want to tell you about. While each was in a different state, I placed in each, and the courses were each in their own way distinctive, the most striking feature for me were my running companions. They included a host of women from across the country, horses, one remarkable dog, and Elvis.

#1: Running with the Leading Ladies
August 19th dawned…well no, strike that. I had to get up well before dawn that Sunday in order to be at the start line of the Leading Ladies Marathon in Spearfish. August is toasty so the race starts at 6, allowing us to beat the heat. This is the third year of the LLM, originated and directed by the extraordinary Elaine Doll-Dunn. Almost every woman who participates in this event raves about the organization, the friendly and capable men who volunteer at the aid stations, and all the extra touches (e.g., a truffle with your race packet, a rose and a lemon-scented towelette for you as you cross the finish line).

Then there’s Elaine. Runner, educator, mother, race director, wife of a race director, writer….she is so many things, and she does it all with style, class, and wit, in really cool shoes or boots. In fact, she could do stand-up if the other gigs fall through. As one of the ’07 participants wrote in her evaluation: “What a dynamo—I want to be her when I grow up!”

A celebration of women’s running, the LLM takes off at the Lead Country Club and finishes at City Park in Spearfish; in between are 26 miles of some of most spectacularly scenic roads in South Dakota. Sharing those roads with women who bring not only their grit and determination, but also their support and concern for one another, is inspirational and always a very emotional experience for me.

Some readers may find it hard to believe, but the women’s Olympic Marathon is just over 20 years old. Joan Benoit (Samuelson) won that first event in 1984. You may have seen Joanie pacing Lance Armstrong last November at his first marathon in NYC. She’s qualified for the 2008 Olympic Trials, so look for her again this spring.

Even harder to fathom is the fact that in 1967, Kathrine Switzer, having registered as K.V. Switzer on her Boston Marathon registration, was nearly forced out of the race once officials discovered she was a woman. The rules forbade women from running with men and from running the marathon distance.

Heading back to my hotel room with another woman just after finishing Boston a few years ago, we were approached by a young journalism student who asked if she could interview us. She was covering the event and her angle was women in the marathon. As we chatted, we referred to the K Switzer incident, and drew a blank look from our interrogator. Her eyes grew wide, then wider still, as we recounted the story of Kathrine’s being chased by B.A.A. official Jock Semple, who tried to grab and rip her number from her shirt. She managed to evade him and finish the race, the first officially registered woman to do so. (Others had finished it, but without having entered.) Officially, women were not allowed to enter the Boston Marathon until 1972, a mere 35 years ago.

Against that backdrop, the Leading Ladies Marathon shines with the success and the sweat of each and every woman who finishes, no matter what her time or place. It’s a privilege to run with and learn something about many of the participants. Seeing the little girls awaiting their moms, sisters, aunts and grandmas at the finish always gives me an extra burst of energy over that last .2 miles. Their vistas are wider and richer than were mine at their age, thanks to Kathrine, Joan, Elaine, and many other women who just kept on---and are still keeping on—running.

#2: Running with Murphy
The next weekend we headed west to Wyoming to the “Run with the Horses” Marathon in Green River. While I’d passed this area on the Interstate a number of times, this was my first visit. The name of this race is literal; the starting point is next to the Wild Horse Kiosk located at the east entrance of the Wild Horse Loop Tour on County Road 14. Wild horses run and frolic along the high desert countryside. Almost all of the course is on unpaved roads, which we shared with some tame horses and their riders.

Reviews from runners in past years call this course “challenging.” While there are rolling hills, most of the difficulty is due to altitude. Elevation is 6800’ at the start, and then you run mostly uphill for the first five miles. The course continues across the top of White Mountain along the Pilot Butte Wild Horse Loop Tour at between 7300 and 7500'.

The horses made it a unique race; seeing them galloping along against a backdrop of wide-open blue-sky and undeveloped desert was thrilling. My mind expanded as my lungs tried to do the same in the thin air. Still, this year the horses were secondary to Murphy. Del Acker is a 50-something runner from Sheridan, Wyoming who adopted Murphy as a puppy in 2002 from the local animal shelter. He’s a handsome, reddish shorthaired dog with a curlicue tail and ears that stand up but flop over at the tips. Weighing 35 pounds, he stands about 19 inches….but he rarely just stands.

Del first ran with Murphy in a 2 miler to benefit the shelter when Murphy was 7 months. From that experience, Del determined that Murphy was “hooked” on running, so started to train with him. I learned a lot of this in an article Del wrote for the magazine Marathon & Beyond last year, and more when I found myself running with him at Boston in April. I kept hearing people cheer on “Wyoming” and so looked around thinking I must have a neighbor here (when you’re in Boston, someone from Wyoming feels like practically a relative); sure enough, it was Del, attired in a shirt proudly proclaiming his home state. We chatted about our dogs, as we had to leave them home and were missing them. He told me he’d gotten clearance from the Race Director at the “Run with the Horses Marathon” to run with Murphy, another reason I was interested in this race.

Murphy is now a marathon finisher—not only did he finish, but he was in under 4 hours. I ran at about the same pace as Del, Murphy, and their friend Curt, so had the opportunity to experience the race with them, and what a treat! Whenever my energy flagged in this race, I had only to look toward Murphy’s happy tail and dogged determination to reconnect with the joy of running.

Now, experienced marathoners know that it is best to take the initial miles slowly. Murphy’s first timer energy was apparent as he leaped off at the sound of the start, but Del wisely reined him in to a brisk but settled pace. Clearly in his element, Murphy maintained a forward focus for the entire distance. Eschewing Gatorade, he stopped at each aid station, drank some water then tugged on his leash to indicate he wanted to hit the road again. Even when the aid station volunteer had a companion dog, Murphy kept his socializing at a minimum. He was there to run.

While you won’t find him listed in the official results, Murphy finished just after I did, putting him at 11th overall in a very respectable 3:52. Del and Curt followed just behind. After Del made sure Murphy got a cooling dip in the Green River, we four compared notes post race. We all agreed it was a grand run but just three of us voiced relief at crossing the finish line. As for Murphy, well, remember my reference to ultra runners at the start of this piece? I’m guessing that Murphy has his sights set on a longer distance.

#3: Running with Elvis

The third of my little summer triple crown is the Mississippi Marathon, run on September 2. We flew into Memphis and drove to Tupelo for it. Elvis was born and spent his early years in Tupelo, where you can visit his very small boyhood home and the hardware store from which came his first guitar. Of course, Graceland, his final home (mansion), is in Memphis. Even now, 30 years after his death, the wall in front of Graceland is a sort of chalkboard where the faithful are allowed to paint notes to Elvis. Every square inch is covered and overlapped. I’m not a devotee and was stunned at the level of adulation evidenced there.

The marathon was on a Sunday, beginning at the outskirts of town. Starting out at 5 a.m. in the dark (a concession to the heat), we wound through quiet Tupelo streets and roads amidst the sounds of summer insects, an occasional rooster or dog and our own rhythmic footfalls. Race organizers had passed out small handheld flashlights, resulting in an array of twinkling lights as we began to spread out according to our respective paces. The ethereal atmosphere made it easy to believe the spirit of Elvis may have been present. Or maybe that’s what happens to your mind when you run three marathons in fifteen days.