By Will Mason
Great thing about our sport: you can go
right up to the champ and converse on equal footing. Great distance runners I have met are just like you and me—the
differentiating factor being speed. Here
are some examples.
You live near Boston, you have seen and
probably talked to Bill Rodgers.
He is in real life just about what you see in print, perhaps shorter
(not Frank Shorter), and perhaps less focused than he is on the roads (okay, a
lot less focused!). Once I saw Boston
Billy in really bad running shape, but in the best personable shape I have ever
seen in a star. It was at the 1979
Montreal Marathon. Billy got in trouble
in the heat and his finish was, well let’s just say I could have whipped him
over the last five miles. Most stars
after a rough performance would have headed away from any human, but what did
the expected winner, but lagging finisher do after the race? He plopped himself down at the end of a row
of smelly porta-potties and signed autographs.
It was hot and he was tired, but he signed for a very long time and did
so with a smiling face (okay, sort of smiling—maybe it was a grimace). Billy congratulated hundreds of marathon
finishers from the muckers’ race of the previous day. All those runners knew about heat and bad runs and appreciated
Bill’s plight. To chop up a phrase from
Billy’s sound alike name and folk character Will Rodgers: “I never met a man
that didn’t like Bill Rodgers.”
Another New England local just like you,
no doubt a bit more withdrawn, is Joan Samuelson. Talk about modesty. After the Falmouth Road Race in, I think
1978, my wife and I lounged on a blanket next to a female runner who sat there
alone in her thoughts. The female
runner broke the spell by asking me about my race, so I gave the unknown female
a very detailed account of my 7.1 miles.
A bit later Joan Benoit walked from the blanket to collect her first
place trophy. Hey, this is
understandable: at that time she couldn’t have known me. My wife described Joan’s racing strategy
perfectly: get in front and stay there.
Since then I have discovered that Joan has, like you and me, real fears
about racing. Her biggest fear is not
the competition; it is whether she will get back to her beloved Maine soon
enough after the race. You enter a race
against this homebody, alls you got to do is phone her the night before and
whisper: “Hey, I heard the bridges back to Maine are going to close.” Joan will not show.
Frank Shorter, Olympic gold and silver medalist at Munich
and Montreal, and legally not qualified to run for President because he was
born in Munich (how many runners have won a gold medal in the town in which
they were born?), needs little introduction.
So when I was introduced to him at a Greater Lowell weekend racing
extravaganza (something that happens only 52 weeks a year), I simply said: “How
are you.” Now you know that that a real
runner decodes that kind message as something like “How’s your hammy?” And sure enough Frank launched into a long
explanation about his back problem. I
could not follow the talk exactly (runners mimic both science and medicine when
discussing their own injuries), but the gist of it was this: Frank had his
spine extracted, spot-welded, reinserted, and sealed. So, guess what Mr. Bad Back Olympic Gold and Silver did that
Sunday. He ran the race. Sound familiar?
Frank Shorter is convinced that he
suffers from the Rodney Dangerfield “I don’t get no respect” syndrome. He believes—I am not making this up—that he
will be more famous when he is dead, like Pre.
Course, he won’t be able to star in that movie, but what the hell, you
can’t have everything. Can’t say I am
looking forward to that Frank, but the lack of respect, or acknowledgement,
reminds me of another world-class runner, Grete Waitz. In 1990 Grete was the guest speaker at the
dinner before the marathon in Greenville, South Carolina. A more engaging, affectionate person in the
running world is not to be found, but there was something that really irked Grete
and it came out in her talk. Grete was
still miffed (and probably is even today) about her press after her first New
York victory, when the media had her as a surprise winner, but worse, an
unknown. Said Grete, whose statue
stands outside Oslo’s famed Bislett Stadium: “Unknown vas not troo. I vas alretty goot.” “Goot” was an understatement. Grete had been a champion cross country runner
long before her New York triumph. This
was a fact that the media should have known.
Would you want to be listed as a nobody after a great race?
But we can identify even with the
by-everybody-well-known. The organizers
of the 1982 Frankfurt (Germany) Marathon talked Emil Zatopek into
being part of the starting ceremonies.
Now here was (Emil passed away recently) a guy who won the 5K, 10K, and
marathon at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics (something that will never be
duplicated), so you would think he could be a little aloof about all those
runners getting ready to run just one race and not too fast. Nope, you couldn’t cache that Czech. He pumped as many hands as he could and
seemed happy to be amongst the runners.
We all understood his personal sadness on that day, when he sighed and
said simply: “Gee, I wish I could run.”
Wouldn’t that be your wish too?
And then there is Johnny Kelley. Johnny is a national pride, a Boston hero,
and a Cape Cod treasure. Like to meet
him? Just bop on down to Cape Cod at
many a road race. Perhaps even a race
named after him. Be careful, however:
Johnny is very outgoing and you must be cautious about hitting the start
button. This guy can talk! And he has a lot to talk about, so you must
be prepared to listen for a very long time.
And when you listen you will be surprised to understand that, in
addition to his legendary running, he has other talents. An all around artist in his 90s, Johnny Kelley paints and sings too. You going to do that when you are 90? No, me neither! So, here is the exception.
Johnny is not like you and me.
Nobody is like Johnny Kelley.
Happy
New Year.