by Daryl Sneath
The images of Max and Rayn and I continued on screen. I learned later that they had contacted Stephen and Serra who sent them an album’s worth. The producers were going for the tearful story. They were trying to make me a character the audience could feel sympathy for, empathy even. Create a fake sort of love: forced and forged. It doesn’t take much for a stranger to feel familiar.
When I didn’t say anything he glanced at his phone. When he looked at me again he was smiling. ‘Tell me, Vector—are you going to bring home the gold?’
‘I suppose the good Canadian answer would go something like, win or lose I can plan only to do my best. Or, you know it’s really not about the winning, Michael—it’s about being here, being part of the Olympic experience.’
‘But that’s not your answer.’
‘No.’
‘You’re hopeful, then.’
‘There is no hope in running, Michael. It’s not religion. You don’t press your palms together and glance subserviently skyward begging for some invisible puppeteer to propel you to victory. Running is pure action. You either do or you don’t. That’s it.’
‘So it’s just a matter of deciding?’
‘When the three other variables are even—natural ability, training, and an intelligently designed, tested-for-effectiveness taper—all difficult to measure, I know—then yes, it’s a matter of deciding. The Finnish call it sisu. Desire, belief, and a willingness to push are at least as powerful as the body that performs them.’
‘You do consider a race a performance then.’
‘Ah, you got me, Michael. But no, let me clarify. By perform I mean accomplish, an act which is achieved. Not a play, not a show, not entertainment.’
‘Prefontaine said a race was a work of art.’
‘He was being metaphorical.’
‘You don’t agree then.’
‘There are similarities. Both are difficult. Both embody beauty. Both resist simplification.’
‘How do they differ?’
‘Art is hung on a wall, Michael.’
He grinned. So did I.
‘When you’re finished with the running you should go into politics. You have a way of steering a conversation. You still haven’t answered the question and by now I’m sure the audience has forgotten what it was.’
‘Am I going to win?’
‘Yes.’
‘I have not one single doubt.’
‘You believe in yourself.’
‘To be honest, Michael, I believe in very little.’
‘But you are going to win.’
‘Yes.’
‘How can you be so sure? How do you know?’
‘I don’t know.’
I grinned. He waited.
‘In all seriousness, I can’t say I know I will win. That sort of knowledge doesn’t exist. It doesn’t make any sense. But in the way that I have already explained it I do believe I’m going to win which is stronger than knowing I will.’
‘Didn’t you just say you believe in very little?’
‘Yes. Very little. Not nothing.’
‘I see.’
‘And it’s important to note, too, the difference between believe in and believe.’
‘Interesting.’
‘Let me explain what I mean by the difference between know and believe.’
‘Okay.’
‘Take two simple uninflected sentences. You tell me which is more impactful, more powerful, more affective. In fact don’t worry about telling me. You won’t have to answer. Your reaction will be enough.’
‘Can I know what the context is?’
‘Usually context is everything. Here it doesn’t matter. Two statements. In and of themselves. That’s it.’
He adjusted himself in his chair and rubbed his hands together. ‘Okay. Shoot.’
I waited, then spoke. ‘I know you.’
He nodded. I paused.
‘I believe you.’
He nodded some more. ‘I see.’ And it seemed as though he did. He glanced at his watch. ‘We’re just about out of time, Vector, but I do have one more question.’
‘Okay. Shoot.’
He grinned. ‘What is it you love about running?’
‘The assumption in your question is that I love running. The truth is I don’t.’
‘Really.’
‘Really.’
‘So why do it then? Why do something you don’t love?’
‘That’s a much better question, Michael. Let me try to answer it.’ I looked slightly above his head at the lights and the wires in the ceiling of the studio. I was being filmed, which I hadn’t forgotten exactly but hadn’t really thought about until now. ‘I run for the silence. For the communication in the silence, for what’s said without being said. Running is a kind of speaking where nothing has to be explained. If you’re part of the run you’re part of the conversation. To know it you have to be in it.’
Michael Miller glanced at his watch and nodded. He looked at the camera. ‘And there you have it folks. Vector Sorn. Novice tweeter. Expert linguist. Middle distance phenom. Self-certain gold medalist. And philosopher to the stars. To know it, he says, you have to be in it.’
THE OLYMPIC STADIUM
Pressing the wireless earbud into his head Michael Miller stood trackside awaiting instruction. He nodded as the backwards count came, raised the hand with the microphone to his chin, and smiled at the camera.
‘Hello Canada and Olympic fans around the world. We are moments away now from the start of the men’s fifteen hundred metre final. The athletes are across the track making their final preparations.’
The camera panned across the track and zoomed in on the twelve of us who strode out in turn, doing fifty-metre accelerations in a seemingly predetermined pattern.
Michael Miller continued offscreen.
‘This is it. This is the moment. The three and half minutes Vector Sorn has been training for his whole life. And here we are with him, right here at his side, ready as a nation to be thrust into the spotlight of greatness. Anyone who knows anything about middle distance running says that this race is Vector Sorn’s—indeed Canada’s—to lose.’
Onscreen were clips from the CBC produced bio-bit which was by now as recognizable to online and TV viewers as a commercial or subway ad: the Vector Sorn brand had become indistinguishable from the man himself.
The images from the bio-bit faded and the camera picked up the present moment across the track. The stadium announcer was introducing the twelve finalists: so and so from Kenya, Ireland, Ethiopia, the United States, Spain, Morocco, another from Kenya, New Zealand, another from Ethiopia, younger brother to the first, the two surprise finalists from Germany and Greece, and me.
The stadium was awash in flashing lights and a rolling spectatorial roar.
The starter called us to the line in a language none of us spoke and a hushed stillness followed almost instantly. A steady white noise of anticipation hovered in the dusk-hot air.
‘Runners, take your mark.’
Though we didn’t understand the words we understood the command. We responded in unison: one foot forward, toes to the line, knees bent, bodies bowed slightly forward, arms in a mid-stride pose.
When the gun sounded it was like an adrenalin-dripping needle straight to the heart. The stadium erupted. We ripped down the track like an angry swarm. Twelve distinct bodies as one. A band of brothers in arms taking the hill. A pack of den-defending wolves. A skein of sunbound gloryseekers on the wings of Icarus. The catch—the rent in the fraternal fabric—was that only one would forestall falling to the sea. Only one would win. Only one would become Olympic champion. Only one would become part of the myth.
. . .
I’ll be honest. I thought about stopping here. Partly because none of the end-options I could think of
were satisfying (it didn’t matter which one was true—I could make any of them true—making something true is not the difficult part—so often all you have to do is say it), partly because I didn’t see the point in adhering to convention for the sake of convention, and partly because I remembered hearing and liking this idea: ‘The end is apparent. It doesn’t need to be revealed.’
But the desire to see it through was too strong. No one has the strength or ability to refrain from revealing the secret if he has it. No one can resist lifting the stage curtains if he finds himself the one holding the rope. Really, there’s no point to having a rabbit in your hat if you never reach in, grab him by the ears, and yank him out for everyone to see. It would be selfish and counterintuitive.
Oh, and if it matters, what follows is indeed what really happened. God’s honest truth.
‘And they’re off. Ripping down the back straight they look like an entity sent forth by the gods, one beautiful beast of burden bursting with determined and directed speed.’
Michael Miller finger-pressed the earbud into his head and nodded.
‘Forgive me, ladies and gentlemen. I’m excited and when I’m excited I tend to my detriment to be a little verbose. Brevity is the soul of wit, as they say, and so, if you’ll allow me the aphorism, brief I shall be. Three-and-a-half-minutes brief to be exact.’
By now we were through the first two hundred and coming down the home straight for the first of four times. I was out front by two clear strides.
‘Coming to the line now and Vector Sorn has separated himself from the field. He looks easy in his gait and full of running.’
I had decided at the sound of the gun that there would be no tactics. No sitting and waiting. No pedestrian first half. If this were to be a show, it would be a show from the gun. If it were to be a work of art then every stroke would be purposeful. There would be effort from the beginning. Earned meaning in every stride.
‘With one lap in the books, ladies and gentlemen, Vector Sorn is the clear leader, as expected, widening the gap between the field and himself, it seems, with every on-world-record-setting-pace stride.’
I imagined Rayn in the stands. And Max. I pictured them. Not their ghosts, but them. Rayn standing, hands like a megaphone, yelling something like, ‘Come on, Herman,’ oblivious to and unconcerned with those around her, unembarrassed, genuinely excited and nervous and proud. ‘That’s our son. Our son.’ And Max reclined, legs crossed at the ankles, smiling behind his aviators, a program rolled in one hand, the other free to touch her arm. His way of letting her know he was proud and excited too. His way of saying, ‘Just so everyone knows, she’s with me. She’s with me.’
Most coaches would say such thoughts are distracting, pointless, amateurish, evidence of a lack of focus, a great way to become a tourist and forget the purpose at hand, a great way to lose momentum. These are the Olympic Games. Pay attention. Relax and drive. Zero in.
But I didn’t have a coach. I was the one to say what I did and how I did it. Why I did it. Me and only me. I was in charge. And for this runner, images—even the sentimental ones, even the emotionally charged and potentially distracting ones, even the unreal and could-never-be-true ones—were fuel for the fire that drove me. Most coaches wouldn’t understand. Baron certainly wouldn’t.
His voice intruded. ‘I’ve got it on good word I’m in the running for the Olympics, Vec. Get it? In the running?. . . No joke, kid. I’m going to be the distance coach . . . Olympic gold, kid. Ours to lose. Like I always said.’
I attended the mandatory team meetings and the few minor workouts that led up to the opening rounds. I sat and listened to what he had to say. I ran what he said to run. None of it mattered. The few intervals he had us do did nothing for or against us and he knew it. At least three years of thoughtfully planned, personalized training had led every national team member to this point. Everyone played along but we all knew that two weeks under the direction of a figurehead would change nothing. The hay was in the barn.
Twice during workouts he came towards me, grinning like an idiot, finger in the air like he’d forgotten to tell me something really important, like no time or distance had passed between us at all, like he hadn’t said what he said about Rayn, like I didn’t know what he had done to her, sickeningly spurious sonofabitch that he was. Both times I looked at him, turned, and walked the other way.
They were kids according to her journal. Eighteen at most. What is past is past. Nothing can be done. The focus should be on the present. What’s happening now. Unless there is no now, like with Max and Rayn. But really, for me, their now is solidified in a then which is as palpable and affective as any present I’ve ever been a part of. I can see them there in the stands watching me. In a sense they are alive whenever I want them to be. My heart reacts as if they were tangibly there. My mind treats them as though they were real. I can see them and hear them. I can even feel them if I think hard enough. In some ways it’s better. There are none of the dull moments which actual life is full of. No arguments. No misunderstandings. Only a quiet, undisturbed presence in distinct and focal relief to everyone around them who blend together in a faceless collection of forgettable background lives. As though together they are a work of art and I am given free reign to paint them however I see fit. To have such control. To be able to see the endless incarnations of time as one. This is what lets me shelve the inconsequential. This is what gives me certainty. This is what lets me know what I know and do what I do.
‘We are coming to the end of the second lap now and Vector Sorn still holds a commanding lead and is right on track—pardon the pun, ladies and gentlemen—for a new world record. A good fifteen metres separate him from the rest of this world class field. He runs as though there is no pressure upon him, as though no one is watching. And it is truly a thing of beauty.’
I split the second lap in 1:48 and felt relatively comfortable doing it.
The third lap is always the toughest. If a miler can get through this section, if he can get to the sounding of the bell, then the end, though still some distance away, becomes, as Val says, inevitable. And what more can anyone ask of an end?
During my third lap, the producers dubbed in an audio voiceover from the Vector Sorn bio-bit, Vector Velocity. (I’ve watched the footage a hundred times. It never seems real.) There’s a closeup of me. It looks like I’m running alone, the pack separate and away. The loneliness of the long-distance runner. You can hear me (or a dubbed-in version of me) breathing and there is a dramatic background heartbeat. My voice has been put through a filter which gives it a manufactured solemnity.
‘We’ve been engineered to do this,’ the voiceover begins. ‘Not by choice or by happenstance but by evolution. Every anatomically equipped human being can run—opposite arm, opposite leg, one foot after the next—but we are among the few whose muscles fire at a greater rate over time, whose hearts pump more blood more efficiently, whose bodies can withstand more pain because of a brain more willing to push. We are the rats in some god’s science lab.’
At the sound of the bell, the camera zoomed out to capture the distance I’d put between myself and the other eleven runners. The bio-bit soundbite was finished and the sound of the stadium resumed. The crowd came to its collective feet. I was the clear and uncatchable leader and I knew it.
With four hundred to go I was ahead by twenty-five metres and I felt my body—muscularly ablaze, gloriously bursting with ecstasy and pain. At the line the clock read 2:30. Olympic gold was mine to lose and the world record was there for me to seize, like the sword from the stone. As though time were something real and touchable, like a rock or a ring or a beating heart.
When I watch the footage now I feel detached from the man on the screen. How effortless his running seems. How automatic. How scripted. Like he could have gone even faster if the director had told him to.
By the time I came round the final bend the noise in the sta
dium had reached a fevered pitch and Michael Miller’s voice matched it. ‘One. Hundred. Metres. To go. Vector Sorn is staking his claim on Olympic history, ladies and gentlemen, with every driving, definitive stride. No one can catch him now. Eighty to go and he looks as comfortable here as he did at the gun. The pain he must be feeling. Sixty to go and Canada is on her feet. A hero to the nation. Forty. There is no question. God himself is on his feet, hands in the air in awe of this mortal creation below. Twenty. You’re home, Mr. Sorn. Victory is yours. Ten. Come on, Vector—’
The clock stopped at 3:23.23. A new Olympic record by more than eight seconds. A new world record by nearly three. Ten of twelve men broke the former Olympic mark and five were faster than the previous world standard of 3:26 flat. Imagine breaking the world record and coming fifth.
In every post-race interview, the last being with Michael Miller, the gist of the first and final questions was the same: ‘How does it feel to be Olympic Champion?’ and ‘What’s next for Vector Sorn?’
I can only imagine people want to know how someone feels in such a moment because they want to feel it too, which is understandable but impossible. Despite the best intentions, despite the best efforts of the person who does the describing, the transfer of how something actually feels, like winning an Olympic gold medal, is approximate at best and more likely superficial and virtually meaningless. All we really have at our disposal is analogy, which is a flawed way to understand anything, particularly the way something feels. What is there to compare the experience of becoming Olympic Champion to? Summiting Everest, battling and overcoming a storm at sea, having an Atlas-like burden lifted from your shoulders, exaltation, ecstasy, euphoria, celestial ascension, rapture as experienced by an atheist, paradoxical indescribability of the highest order.
I told the audience what they wanted to hear. I tried to describe the feeling. Anything else, however true, would have come across as esoteric and arrogant, like a writer being asked what his intentions were with his latest book—‘What were you getting at? What does it all mean?’—who answers with, ‘If you really want to know, read the book. If you’ve read the book but the purpose still eludes you, then perhaps it always will. To be sure, read the book again.’