by Bill Rodgers
Moving past Wellesley campus, I headed deeper into the center of town. I sailed past the quaint brick-and-stucco–faced shops and rowdy masses, cruising over some nice subtle downgrades. Nobody called out my name. Nobody held up a sign that read GO, BILL. But it didn’t matter that I wasn’t a well-known runner. It didn’t matter that I wasn’t Frank Shorter. Once they spotted the Boston insignia on my chest—alerting them to the fact that a hometown kid was leading the Boston Marathon—they went crazy. I savored the sounds of their ecstatic cheers, the sense that they were on my side. Collectively, they were telling me, “You’ve got this.” Fats and carbohydrates were fueling my body, but it was the people lining the road that powered me forward. Emboldened by my newfound fans, my legs glided along the road, with long, quick, fluid strides. I was tearing up the miles, hurtling them behind me, putting as much distance between myself and the other runners as I could. At this stage in the race, it was all or nothing.
I didn’t know it at the time—I was moving too fast, too focused—but one of the spectators I passed here was “the Rookie,” Alberto Salazar. He was standing along the road with his father, Ricardo, waiting for the lead pack to arrive.
This is how Alberto would recall in his memoir that moment. I rocketed past him: “There was skinny, spacey Bill, with his long hair flowing in back of him, the guy I’d eaten BLTs with at Friendly’s ice-cream restaurants. He’s wearing white tube socks that stretch up to midcalf and a pair of shoes sent out from Blue Ribbon Sports in Oregon, the forerunner of Nike. He’s wearing a ratty T-shirt on which he’s crayoned the letters ‘GBTC.’ Despite this motley getup, Bill is wailing. He’s opened a four hundred-yard lead in the most prestigious marathon on earth, and I can see very clearly that nobody’s going to catch him. ‘I know that guy!’ I shouted to my dad and brother. ‘I run with that guy!’ But mostly I’m shouting this amazing fact to myself, and at that moment, like a bolt, it comes to me: This is the marathon; this is what Coach Squires promises is waiting for me. At that moment, I resolved—at that moment, I knew—that I was going to grab that destiny with both hands. I knew with every fiber of my being that I was going to become the greatest marathon runner in the world.”
All things are related in this sport, as they are in life. I didn’t understand the allure of the Boston Marathon until the day I stood along the side of the famed course with Jason and witnessed the intensity and magnitude and beauty of the spectacle. I was struck with amazement seeing Jeff Galloway, my teammate from Wesleyan, and John Vitale, whom I ran against at the University of Connecticut, competing with the top runners for victory. I thought, Wait a minute, if they can do it, so can I. The same way Amby had heard the powerful calling as he watched his hero, Johnny Kelley, race by him, I had heard the powerful calling as I watched the familiar faces sweep past me. And now Alberto had heard the same calling watching me. Maybe the next great American marathon runner to hear the call, to grab that destiny with both hands, to embrace the challenge of the human spirit, is reading this story. Maybe it’s you.
TWO YEARS EARLIER
SILVER LAKE DODGE 30K ROAD RACE, HOPKINTON, MASSACHUSETTS
It was a cold February morning. I stretched my legs beside the small town green. Standing guard over me and the other runners warming up in the center of town was a bronze World War I soldier statue, a monument to the one hundred and fifteen locals who fought in that war. The dominating presence of the statue let anybody entering Hopkinton know the high regard in which the townspeople held military service. On second thought, maybe I wouldn’t tout my conscientious objector status at the general store.
Downtown Hopkinton was a postcard of tranquil winter in rural New England. Hard to believe that here, in this one-horse town, the Boston Marathon, the most famous footrace in history, kicked off every April. As I scanned the center of town, I tried to picture the sudden transformation on the big day—the downtown teeming with activity, food and craft vendors spread out across the grass, runners from all over the world unloading from buses until they numbered in the thousands, then assembling themselves on the starting line. I allowed myself a moment to imagine that I was one of those runners, crouched like a tiger, ready to take off on the 26.2-mile race to Boston. A 26.2-mile quest for running immortality. Thinking about it was enough to give me goose bumps.
I watched the other racers on the green, jogging back and forth to stay warm, making last-minute preparations. Almost all of them were from New England. Guys with regular jobs. Teachers, carpenters, real-estate brokers. Lots of former college track and cross-country athletes. They would train months on end to the bewilderment, perhaps even frustration, of friends and families. They would suffer the dirty looks of motorists passing by them as they ran alone at dawn. And all week, at work, at home, doing the mundane routine of life, their minds would be consumed with the next grueling battle on the road. To be honest, they were a little on the crazy side. How else to describe guys who spent every weekend driving up to 150 miles of bad road to run a road race against a bunch of other adrenaline-junkie running mercenaries? How else to describe guys who chose to put their bodies and minds through the agony of a twenty-mile duel in below-freezing weather, no less in pursuit of some prize like a color TV or a mattress set?
As for me, I was a neophyte. I had no idea if I could survive such a daunting competition. I was winging it, even though racing twenty miles on foot in the brutal cold of winter was not something to wing. Same goes for any tough physical test—nobody says, “Everest? Yeah, I’m winging it.” I knew the incredible physical effort and mental focus it took to cover fourteen miles in a training run—and now I was going to be fighting it out with these amped-up mooses at a distance of twenty miles. Seriously, was I crazy? But I had to race Silver Lake; it was my last and only hope of gauging whether or not I was prepared to run the Boston Marathon, only two months away.
I knew what Amby would tell me: Before trying to compete in my first marathon, I needed to run at least five shorter tune-up races to get my body back into the attitude of running that hard and fast. And he’d be right. Racing is the best simulation for racing.
The men I’d be going up against were experienced road runners who’d run several tune-up races to test their mental and physical fitness. They’d done lots of hard speed work to build up their endurance. I’d done almost no hard speed work around Jamaica Pond. For one, it wasn’t my nature. Secondly, it was winter. Exertion in the snow and cold is not fun. I was stupid—naïve, if you’re being kind—to think I was ready to compete in a marathon, let alone a twenty-mile race in the middle of winter. I just hoped all those laps on the pond had paid off.
The race I was about to run would cover the first twenty miles of the Boston Marathon course, but that would be where the similarities ended. The roads would not be lined with thousands of people cheering, clapping, and passing out cups of water. The only spectators gathered at the kickoff of the race were a few bored townspeople, and the friends of runners who’d come to lend moral support.
The scene at the Silver Lake Dodge was typical for a local road race. This was strictly for hardcore runners. No bells. No whistles. No officials. No fans. It was as close to pure competition as you could get. And, believe me, the racers relished these bare-bones, do-or-die affairs.
I was still warming up near the start line when I spotted a tall, lanky figure coming toward me. That stiff, almost robotic gait was unmistakable. It was my old roommate Amby Burfoot. I hadn’t seen him since he graduated Wesleyan in ’68. I was excited to see him.
“Bill, I hardly recognized you,” said Amby.
“It’s been a while,” I said. “How have you been?”
“I’ve been good. Got a job teaching little rugrats down in Connecticut.”
“That sounds like a good job.”
“I also got married.”
“Wow,” I said. “That’s great news!”
“I heard you were up in Boston,” Amby said. “Doing your service.” I was sure Amby’d heard stori
es of me riding around town on my motorcycle, smoking a lot of cigarettes, hitting bars, but he was far too polite to bring up my wastrel activities. Besides, I knew Amby’s position when it came to telling other people what they should do: It’s not up to him to get people to change, it’s up to them. I hoped that he would see from the fact that I was racing in the Silver Lake that I was at least trying to change. Then again, from the slightly quizzical look on his face, he might have just been wondering about my running attire: ragged blue jeans and a tattered sweatshirt full of holes.
“You look…” Amby started. He paused a moment, as if trying to find the right word and then continued: “Kind of homeless.”
We both burst out laughing.
“Bill, this is great! It’s so wonderful to see you! I’m glad you’ve decided to do some jogging,” said Amby in a gentle fashion. “I think I heard you had started smoking.”
“I was,” I said. “But I’m done with that now.”
“You’re trying to get back into shape. That’s a good thing, Bill.”
Amby had always encouraged me to stay fit in college—I can still hear him telling me to run five miles every day in the summer. Ha!—so I wasn’t surprised that he’d expressed his support of my attempt to return to running. It was a bit odd, however, that he was talking to me like some overweight, middle-age guy who was new to the concept of exercise.
“Do you have a team to run for?” asked Amby.
“No,” I said, surprised. “Do I need one?”
“Don’t worry,” Amby said. “Just put ‘BAA’ down on your entry form.”
As I lined up beside the one hundred runners, I felt a rush of excitement. To be back at the start line of an actual race got the juices flowing. And to be going up against Amby Burfoot. My roommate, my teammate, my friend, my mentor. I hadn’t expected that. Amby Burfoot. Boston Marathon champion. Undefeated for four years at Wesleyan. Fifth in the Fukuoka Marathon, missing the American marathon record by one second. He would be the highest-level runner I had ever raced against.
As I stood there waiting for the gun to sound, my raggedy sweatshirt and jeans offered little protection against the cold. I kept thinking about the distance I was about to run. Twenty miles. That was a long haul. Road races are almost never that long anymore.
The race was under way. I saw Amby vault to the front of the pack. Instinctually, I did what I’d done so many times before on training runs in college—I followed him.
In Ashland, a clear lead group emerged—Amby, myself, and two guys I didn’t know. After we broke free from the rest of the field, we settled into a fast but steady pace. Although we were covering the same course used in the Boston Marathon, this had a very different feel to it. For one, it was February, not April. The cold was brutal. Also, there were no spectators, no ropes, no cops on motorcycles, no media trucks, no water stations.
Cars and trucks drove past us and they had no idea a race was going on. We were just a bunch of wackos running down the street in the damn cold.
It was a four-man race as we ran through Ashland and into Framingham. The pace was quick. Maybe too quick. But racing was different back then. Nobody was too concerned with his splits. Nobody was checking his digital watch. Most of us didn’t even wear watches. Beating the competition was the be-all, end-all. Everybody wanted to win those tires, and we were willing to thrash one another on the roads to get them.
I knew from my training that I was in good shape, but I had no idea that I’d be able to do what I was doing now, running neck and neck with Amby in the lead. It gave me a powerful psychological boost, and the energy to stay with him mile after mile.
It was an advantage to be in a two-man duel at the front because all I had to do was concentrate on staying with Amby. I didn’t have to think about the other runners. Whatever extended a few feet beyond us and a few feet behind us didn’t exist to me. Sometimes a training run evolves into a race, and other times a race evolves into a personal battle of wills. That’s what was happening here. I respected Amby. I respected what he’d accomplished. But in the heat of battle, all I could think about was trying to outlast him.
I was in my first high-mileage road race and loved that it demanded an intense, rough-and-tumble style of running. I wasn’t like some of the runners today. They run solely for time. I could care less about my time. For me, it was always about the competition. It was about being in the hunt. Racing in the lead pack. That’s tremendously exciting. Any runner who races will experience an incredible surge of adrenaline and exhilaration, but to be in the hunt for the win is a different deal. It’s a totally different deal.
In the cold weather my feet froze, my face froze, and nothing worked at full capacity—my heart, my lungs, my muscles, my joints—and yet never in my life had I felt a high like I had at that very moment. My whole being was engaged in the task before me. Matching Amby stride for stride. I had been catapulted through a portal. In this new universe, all my senses were fully engaged in the here and now. I was connected to the road and to my breath and to my adversary—he was no longer my friend Amby—moving in perfect harmony beside me. An electrical current flowed from my mind to my heart to my fingers. This feeling was different than the running high I got from training hours in the park; it was more than a release of endorphins. I had tapped into a primeval fight-or-flight impulse. I was energized as hell.
Ten miles into the race and I was still attached to Amby’s hip pocket. Amby glanced over at me in disbelief. He had not expected to see me bouncing alongside him with what he called my “goofy stride.”
Here’s what you need to understand: To all of a sudden be holding my own against Amby was an epiphany. I had never duked it out with him like this before. I could never stay with him back in college. We ran the two mile back then. I could have trained day and night and I’d never have been able to beat him at that distance. Even when I got my time under nine minutes in my senior year, I still would have been no match for Amby. I didn’t have his speed. I didn’t have his finishing kick. I didn’t have the psychological wiring to run short distances. It wasn’t what I was born to do. I knew I’d never be anything but ordinary at short distances. It’s a big reason I quit running. It was like my mom always said: If the point isn’t to be the best, why do it?
By now, I was relying on adrenaline—or whatever you want to call it—to maintain my position up at the front with Amby. I glanced over at him. He was running exactly like he had fifteen miles back—steady and methodical.
That’s when things got weird. With each step I took, the gap between us steadily grew larger. First Amby was only a couple of yards ahead of me. I told myself, Stay in striking distance. But no matter how hard I ran, I kept falling farther and farther behind. Before I knew it, he was twenty yards ahead of me. Then thirty yards ahead. All at once, the invisible rope that connected us snapped and Amby took off into the distance.
What had just happened?
I’ll tell you what: Amby had increased his pace, but in such a subtle fashion that I hadn’t picked up on it at first. Didn’t matter. There was nothing I could do at that point to save myself. I couldn’t go any faster. I was maxed out. Amby still had another gear. He had marathon strength. He was fitter than I was. He had the edge and he knew it. I was done for.
It suddenly became clear to me. From the very start, Amby had been analyzing his progress, keeping close tabs on his exertion level, making sure he was maintaining the correct pace. I should have been doing the same, but instead my entire focus was on keeping stride for stride with Amby. Not the most sophisticated strategy in the world.
Meanwhile, Amby had been patiently watching me all those miles. Judging me. Measuring how he was feeling against how I was feeling. Assessing how long he could keep this pace up versus how long I could. Waiting for the right time to make his move. How had he gotten it so right? Could he tell by how hard I was breathing? Could he perceive the muscles in my neck straining slightly more? Could he have sensed a minuscule change in my gai
t?
Once I had dropped a couple of yards behind him, he knew he had me. I couldn’t see what was happening as clearly. I thought I could hang on. But it didn’t matter how hard I ran, he kept opening the gap farther and farther. There’s something about being overtaken by a physically superior runner that can only be understood by experiencing it—the sense of inexorable doom, the overwhelming helplessness, the dreamlike state where you can’t move any faster, you’re doing your best, but it’s not enough. I had simply run out of bullets. The worst part was Amby knew it before I did. He knew I was toast. I was his good friend, but he did what he was supposed to do. He left me behind. He went for the win.
Luckily, after losing sight of Amby, I had another runner come up on me, so we commenced to race. What was I going to do, walk off the course? My legs cramped over the last few miles. I gritted my teeth and fought on. Having somebody to race against helped me get to the finish. One of the weird dualities of the sport is that sometimes your fellow runner is a competitor, other times he’s your helper.
In the end, the unknown runner beat me by seconds. The moment I crossed the finish line, we shook hands. The code of conduct among runners is powerful; it’s what makes it a true gentlemen’s sport.
Once inside the warm confines of the dealership showroom, I began to thaw out. My body was freezing cold and tired from running so hard. I was also cramping badly. I looked around for bagels, bananas, and hot chocolate. All I found was a small pitcher of water. I would’ve loved to slip off my iced-over blue jeans and throw on a pair of warm Gore-Tex pants. Unfortunately, the fabric wouldn’t be invented for another three years. In my ratty jeans and sneakers, I was not exactly ready for my Nike ad.