The original Olympic footrace distances were not ultramarathons, or even marathons for that matter, but relatively short sprints. The first of these running races was called a stade, and it consisted of a roughly 200-meter dash around the perimeter of the arena. Spectators who came to watch these athletic competitions sat in stadiums (from which the modern word is derived). The stade was the most prestigious of all Olympic sporting disciplines and was traditionally held as the concluding event of the Games.
As the games progressed over the years, a second footrace distance was introduced, the diaulos, or double stade. The diaulos consisted of two laps around the perimeter of the stadium. Eventually more and more athletic disciplines were added to the roster, such as boxing, discus throwing, a pentathlon, and various forms of wrestling. But all sporting events were held within the confines of the stadium, and footrace distances never approached anything close to a present-day marathon or ultramarathon. These prodigious distances remained the domain of the hemerodromoi.
In 560 BCE there was a minor movement to hold a footrace of 800 meters, known as the hippios (meaning: there and back and there and back, or quadruple stade). Hippios was athletic jargon for horsey, meaning it was a longer than middle-distance race and thus probably best suited for horses. One of the first known US trail races is a particularly grueling endeavor held in Northern California called the Dipsea Trail Run. Later, an offshoot of this event emerged and was aptly named the Double Dipsea. Finally, for those who just don’t know when to stop, a Quad Dipsea was founded (i.e., there and back and there and back, essentially a hippios). Having run this Quad Dipsea, I can attest firsthand that it is a race better suited for horses!
As the ancient Olympic Games gained momentum, a contest called the hoplitodromos was eventually introduced. This event consisted of a diaulos (double stade) but was run in helmet, breastplate, and greaves while carrying a heavy battle shield. This was the armor of the hoplites, the foot soldiers of ancient Greece, and sprinting a double stade in weighty battle gear, of approximately 60 or 70 pounds, was incredibly taxing and physically grueling. Due to its armored nature, the athletes this contest attracted were typically bulkier and built more sturdily than their svelte, stade-running counterparts. Speed was the most valued asset of a great stade runner, while strength and endurance counted most in the hoplitodromos competition.
The Greeks began to realize that having their infantry possess great power and stamina could be a strategic battle advantage. Over time the hoplitodromos competition became more of an Olympic sideshow than a dedicated event itself. These hoplitodromos events were held after the conclusion of the Games and allowed a broader range of competitors the opportunity to compete in an athletic contest (not unlike participants in the modern-day Warrior Dash or Spartan Race, which, legitimate as they may be, are still considered somewhat of a fringe event rather than a mainstream athletic contest). Great numbers of citizen-soldiers were drawn to these types of contests, and progressively they seceded from the Olympics altogether and evolved into something of a parallel venue, becoming more of a general training ground for the mass citizenry hoplite brigade on an ongoing basis rather than being held only once every 4 years.
Simultaneously, Athens began emerging as the cultural center of Greece and much of Eurasia. Large training complexes were established for men to develop their physical skills, stamina, and strength. Inside each of these towering arenas was typically an expansive courtyard filled with sporting equipment to accommodate athletes of all sizes and varieties, the bulk of those being everyday civilians. Hoplites, as they became known—common citizens trained in military ways—worked with a variety of exercise equipment and weaponry, most of which was designed and functioned very similarly, such as the piercing javelin or the sharp-edged discus. Seasoned hoplites and newcomers trained together, by design. The Athenians saw that having everyday people train alongside military elite created a citizenry that was supremely capable of defending itself, if need be, in the advent of war. Conditioning for war in times of peace is one function these training centers fulfilled.
Beyond being expansive sports and warfare training centers, these complexes evolved into places of learning, as well. It was in these centers that young male residents were educated and indoctrinated into the Athenian way. The Greek ideal was that sport should be preparation for life. Athenians viewed intellectual education and physical education as inseparable equals, both necessary preparation for a citizen to develop into a contributing member of the growing demokrateia (democracy, or self-rule by the people). In early Greek society there was no separation between the government and the people, because the people were the government. Over time, these facilities advanced into a combination of liberal arts colleges and sports training centers, known as gymnasia, from which the modern word gymnasium is derived (think 24 Hour Fitness, only staffed by Harvard professors). Preeminent among these centers was the Academia, where we get our modern word, academy. Students spent their time practicing running, jumping, throwing, and wrestling, while philosophy and mathematics professors sauntered about in the nearby alcoves—which were adorned with great statues and awe-inspiring works of art—always ready to engage in an enlightened conversation during periods of rest, or while working out together. Later, Aristotle would move outside the walls of the gymnasium and conduct his classes while walking around. His pupils became known as the Peripatetics (wanderers).1
Intellectual curiosity was encouraged, as was vigorous physical exercise and movement. The development of both mind and body was central to the Greek way of life. The Athenians came to believe that only when mind, body, and spirit were aligned in perfect harmony could true human potential be realized and arête (excellence and virtue) be achieved. These sanctified epicenters of sport and learning (i.e., gyms) were a place where the advancement of such principles could burgeon and thrive.
It was this quest for knowledge, not conflict, this insatiable passion for deeper understanding and cerebral expansion that pervaded Athens during the 5th century BCE. Philosophia krateito photon—Phi Kappa Phi—as the early Greeks advocated, “May love of wisdom rule humanity.” A cultural renaissance was emerging in Athens, and the arts, sciences, and humanities were beginning to blossom.
Meanwhile, in the Greek city-state of Sparta, society was progressing in a radically different direction. Spartan boys were plucked from their families at the age of 7 and inducted into the agōgē, where they were raised in crude barracks. Their training started early in life and was often harsh and unrelenting, the weak being thrust into a brutal fight for survival from the very onset of existence. Black broth and diluted wine were the dietary staples, and the occasional bath was cold. Spartan boys were taught two indispensable life lessons: Never retreat and never surrender. For a Spartan in battle the only two options were victory or death, nothing else.
Sparta was a hard land, rocky and unforgiving. This was a good thing. Soft lands, they reasoned, bred soft people, and by contrast, so too did the opposite hold true. The Spartans believed the rugged nature of their homeland helped harden them into tough and conquering people. For it wasn’t the advancement of the arts and humanities that drove the Spartans; it was the development of the most dominant military regime in all the land, one capable of defending the city and annihilating trespassers. At this they were quite adept. Spartans were fearless in battle and showed no trepidation or mercy when engaged with an enemy. It was part of their ethos. As Spartan mothers used to tell their sons before sending them into battle, “Return with your shield or on your shield.”
Spartan lavishes were few, and their meals were notoriously sparse and unrefined. A wealthy Athenian landowner had once visited Sparta and was asked to stay for dinner. He courteously obliged and politely ate his meal. Afterward, the Spartans asked him what he thought. “Now I know why a Spartan is not afraid to die,” he answered. Apparently death wasn’t a bad alternative compared with having to eat food like that again.
As brutish and unsophistic
ated as Spartan life could be, the principles of democracy were no less advanced in Sparta than they were in Athens. In fact, some might argue just the opposite was true. Spartans made all citizens homoioi (equals). In this landlocked Greek city-state, displays of public boastfulness were disdained, and flaunting one’s athleticism was considered vulgar. Individual expressions of creativity or intellectual ascendancy—indeed anything that might convey a sense of superiority over another—were looked down upon. Duty and honor mattered most.
Even more progressive, Sparta was a place of great equality between the sexes, and women were every bit as valued, respected, and empowered as men. And this wasn’t just lip service, either. Women served in important civic roles, helped develop public policy, and played a central part in shaping Spartan culture and societal mores. As well, Spartan women worked out and exercised with men, unlike in Athens where sports were confined entirely to the male citizenry. Spartan women were of tough body and tough mind. For all its loutish militaristic machismo, ancient Sparta was a place that would make Gloria Steinem proud. Sheryl Sandberg would be equally pleased. Spartan women didn’t just “lean in,” they came thundering in with both intellect and brawn. Later, Socrates himself made no distinction between men and women, saying, “We must pick suitable women to share the life and duties of guardians with men, since they are capable of it and the natures of both are alike.”
Still, as progressive as it was in some ways, the mighty Greek city-state of Sparta remained dichotomously fusty and outmoded in other ways. For instance, it wasn’t until the age of 30 that a Spartan male was allowed to venture from the barracks and marry. Even then, he wasn’t permitted to leave the army and settle into a house of his own until the age of 60. A life of devoted service was what defined a Spartan—strength and honor—and during this period of history no other society had a more developed and sophisticated infrastructure for cultivating military supremacy than the Spartans did. They feared nothing and no one. When told of an approaching enemy, the Spartans did not ask how many are they, but where are they.
Such was the state of the Hellenic union in 494 BCE, the year Persian warships set out for the shorelines of Greece.
* * *
1 Millennia later Nietzsche would expound, “Only those thoughts that come by walking have any value.”
8
LET’S ROCK
Mick Jagger’s throaty voice belted out another refrain as I worked my way into the tightly packed corral, The Rolling Stones blaring over the loudspeakers as the mass of anxious, excited, and scantily clad individuals stood restlessly awaiting the starting gun to go off at the 2007 San Diego Rock ‘n’ Roll Marathon. Twenty-six point two heart-pounding, music-pulsing, sweat-drenching miles later, I arrived at the finish line. It took 3:16 to complete the race.
Decent, considering I’d run 700 miles to get there.
One of the other runners spotted me jogging inward toward the starting line. He’d taken a shuttle from his downtown hotel, as had most race participants.
“How did you get here?” he asked, seeing me striding in.
“I ran.”
“From the hotel?”
“From San Francisco.”
That was the end of our conversation. I think he thought there was a hotel in downtown San Diego called The San Francisco or something.
The places I’d run through on my jaunt to join the day’s starting line were a bit more remote and serene than the place where I was now standing. Rock ‘n’ Roll San Diego was the final marathon in a long ultramarathon that had begun 12 days earlier in the bucolic little village of Sonoma, located near my home in San Francisco. Nestled in what’s known as the Valley of the Moon, Mission San Francisco Solano is the northernmost of the California Missions. From this starting point in Sonoma, a string of 21 missions stretches southward along the backbone of California, forming an interwoven network of sanctity en route to San Diego.
My career as an ultramarathoner had progressively morphed, fractionating off from a sport that was already on the margins. While I enjoyed competing in traditional ultramarathon races and had enjoyed some success in such, what I loved most was embarking upon these less-structured running expeditions that ventured far outside the confines of a set racecourse boundary. An extreme introvert by nature, I found these types of excursions more consistent with my inner persona. There was nothing I enjoyed more than stuffing a few dollars in my backpack and heading out the door, destination unknown. Sometimes I’d be gone for 2 hours, sometimes 2 days.
At first I found this practice a bit unnerving, as did my family. Why did this peculiar wanderlust keep manifesting in me since boyhood? I started to think there was perhaps some deeper mental dissonance at the root of these eccentric yearnings. What was I running from, or to? We’ve all heard the adage about the loneliness of the long-distance runner, but I wasn’t lonely at all. In fact, it was when I was out running that I felt most complete. Only when I was running could I feel truly liberated from the excruciating heaviness of existence. Oftentimes running would hurt, though nowhere close to the insufferable pain of not running. Not running was death—slow, insipid death. A day or two of not running was tolerable, but a permanent state of not running was some lesser form of existence.
Some might have discounted my behavior as flaky, a coping mechanism for escaping the realities and pressures of everyday living. But I thought there might be more to it than this, a deeper meaning. Doing the things I did was my way of being true to myself. I wasn’t the brightest of men. Along with the introversion, I was dyslexic. I didn’t have great people skills, nor was I necessarily a good team player. But running great distances was something I could do, and something I loved to do.
So I did.
My inner Greekness had once again surfaced, and like a peripatetic disciple of Aristotle, I wandered. After starting my trek at Mission San Francisco Solano in Sonoma, I’d worked my way southward down the California coastline using this succession of missions as outposts and places of refuge along the route to San Diego, much in the same fashion the early settlers had done during their extended migrations, or, for that matter, the ancient hemerodromoi had done during their lengthy foot travels throughout the countryside of Greece.
Since the beginning of time, mankind has sought to communicate with one another to protect, to grow, and to develop as a race. Those societies and cultures that were able to disseminate and gather information most effectively tended to thrive and proliferate, while those that did a poor job of communicating got gobbled up or faded away. As humanity progressed and advanced, certain milestones in the development of communications literally altered the course of history.
Today we take for granted that in a single keystroke we can dispatch an e-mail across the globe, but it hasn’t always been this way. Dialing back the clock to our humble beginnings, people used cave paintings and the beat of a drum to communicate and exchange ideas and relay critical information. Moving up the historical time line, the advent of telecommunications, fiber optics, and digital technology has had a major impact on the outcome of world wars and has influenced global events ever since their development in the 1970s.
But somewhere in between the use of smoke signals and instant messaging is a long and important period of our evolution where people relied primarily on, well, their own two feet to transfer and receive information. The Greeks realized that if they could build a more efficient infrastructure for communicating between city-states, they would be able to develop and thrive in comparison to other societies where less proficient means of information transfer were in place. Thus, the role of the hemerodromoi was a critical one. These esteemed foot heralds were the Greek equivalent of a faster Internet, and the distances they covered went far beyond those of modern-day marathons.
Given the importance of their duties, hemerodromoi were chosen carefully based not only on their physical abilities, but also their lineage and upbringing. Not only did hemerodromoi need to be extraordinary athletes, they also need
ed to be highly trustworthy and reliable. The reputation of one’s family was critically important, as many times the messages being delivered or the intelligence being gathered was top-secret proprietary government information of great importance. In ancient Greece a family’s standing in the community symbolized a tremendous amount. Traitors were not uncommon, and oftentimes such perpetrators came from lesser-known families of ill repute. Pheidippides, it bears mentioning, hailed from an established and highly regarded Athenian family.
The incredibly strenuous and exhausting work hemerodromoi performed tended to extract and expose the core of a man’s essence. During such physical duress it is impossible to hide behind the façade of goodness if a darker side lurks within. Hemerodromoi were men of upstanding character, incorruptible and dedicated to the service of their fellow countrymen.
Watching the sunset and the moonrise night after night on my mission-to-mission ultra, I thought about what life must have been like as an ancient Greek foot herald. Running down the California coast covering 60 miles a day wasn’t easy, but the hemerodromoi would have had a much rougher go of it. For one, most of the terrain I covered was along paved roadways. Sure, there were some steep ascents and descents, especially near the Santa Lucia mountain range east of Big Sur and along the steep passes crossing into and out of the Central Coast region, but it was all on tarmac. I didn’t have to contend with rocky and rooted dirt trails like the hemerodromoi did. My foot always landed on a relatively smooth and even surface.
The Road to Sparta Page 5