Saturday, May 08, 1999
Marathon and I make odd couple
BY GEOFF HOBSON
The Cincinnati Enquirer
There are first-time marathoners. Elite marathoners. Boston marathoners yearning to qualify for the Patriots' Day spectacle. There are rabbits, bandits and Clydesdales. But what about us?
What about the Oscar Madison runners?
You don't get a category when your daily diet includes several bowls of Cocoa Krispies and your weekly fluid intake equals the soda fountain at the corner UDF.
You don't get a category when your running shoes are older than your first-grader, and mothers and strollers pass you on the trail.
And you don't get a category when your mile pace is slightly higher than Mark McGwire's homers per at-bat numbers.
Hey, you don't get a category if you're just a guy trying to shoehorn 40 miles of running into a week filled with the potholes of real living.
Only 24 hours before you try to run 26 miles for a fifth time, and there's no category for another Flog Festival.
Why?
On April 7, you do a 19-mile run in your old shoes and then discover your right baby toe has blown up twice its size into a black blister.
You go to the doctor. He notices the infection creeping like the Reds in the NL Central. From the toe, across the foot, to the ankle.
The doctor makes a mark with a pen and says, “If the red goes past this line, go to the hospital.”
Why?
So you buy new shoes, take five days off and try to do it again while everyone in your family shakes their heads.
The fact you turn 40 four days after the marathon has absolutely no literal, biological or psychological significance. It just means that as the oldest person in the house, you're the last one still growing up.
Why?
You know the invisible voodoo doctor will get you. Somewhere at Mile 18. He pokes you in the left quad. At 20, he jabs you in the right knee. At 21 and 22, he cackles while drilling you in both calves, then slicing your toes.
But Miles 24 to 26 are what make it. Marathons are like fingerprints and waves. No two are alike. How do you beat the voodoo doctor this time? Do you break five hours? Do you break your spirit? Or do you just break a sweat?
You don't run 26.2 miles to belong in a category. You do it because there aren't many people in the marathon category, period.
Even if you are in the Oscar Madison Division.
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