Chapter 25 "Running Life" - 24 ultra-long marathon

24 Some other questions just running 26.2 miles is not enough What would it feel like to run not just twenty-six miles but fifty?When I interviewed Bob Glover, he had just completed a fifty-mile run.He ran two hundred laps of the quarter-mile course for the simple reason that he was one of those long-distance runners who were not satisfied with the usual distances he ran. He's sitting in his office now ruminating on the experience, and as we talk, he makes a few nicks with a pencil sharpener on the toes of a pair of his blue running shoes — trying to take the pressure off his toenails , suffering from several blood blisters on his toenails.

Glover was tall, with deep-set doubles and a well-proportioned build.The day after he ran fifty miles he ran five miles.Now, two days later, he plans to run twenty miles, and he doesn't look tired. He said: "If you have a good base of cardiovascular fitness, if your legs are strong after long-term running, the main problem with running fifty miles is just the thoughts in your head. About thirty miles to three Between the eighteen miles, my mind was fighting. After running forty miles, I felt like I had a new source of energy. First, the emotions were high. I made up my mind before the race , if I can run forty miles, I'll do it anyway."

Glover's plans have changed slightly due to the hot weather in August.He said: "The temperature was in the mid-nineties, so my goal was not so much to run as to just survive. How can I explain that when I ran between thirty miles and thirty-eight miles? How did it feel? My bad knee was throbbing and I guess I couldn't run. I was so tired I wanted to lie down and sleep. My back was aching. But the run was starting to work on me The physical impact is greater than the physical impact. I must have the mental preparation to keep running before I start the race." When Glover runs, he chews gum hard, drinks tomato juice and water, and tries some baby food—carrots, custard, and beef with vegetables.He said: "I thought the food was good because it was easy to digest. The trouble was the food was so hot from the sun. I had to force it down. I almost threw up."

Glover finished fifth at the finish with a score of 7 hours, 45 minutes and 30 seconds.It was seven forty-five in the evening.He said: "The first thing I did was drink a beer. The beer was delicious. Then I went home and soaked in the bathtub for half an hour, and finally took a shower. My hands and feet felt better for about fifteen to twenty minutes. Just eat. After eating I took another shower to relax again.Then I put my feet up, watch TV for a while, and when I start to nap, I go to bed. What motivates someone like Glover, a healthy, hardworking, productive citizen of a world like ours, to go through the grind?Not for health, because he is already very healthy.Perhaps one can only say that Glover ran fifty miles because there was a fifty-mile race.He'd run a couple of marathons and a 50K—it was a little over thirty-one miles—so it was somewhat logical to do so.As a next step, this might be a way to take the boredom out of normal play.

Whatever the reason, races like this show that there is always something else that can be done with running.If you're content to keep up your customary pace and run your customary races, you could test yourself by running or running five to ten miles in a park all your life, maybe trying a marathon once in a while.But if you want to go further, the possibility exists. In fact, there is no reason to limit yourself to fifty miles.Ted Corbett likes to run a hundred-mile race. "For someone like me who has been running for years, running a hundred miles is a natural extension," he said. "What drives you to do it is what drives you to run a marathon. Many marathon runners still have more energy after they finish the distance." A lot of energy, so they were all guessing how far they could have gone."

Corbett, who knows more about distance running -- what runners call ultramarathons -- than anyone else today, talks about its nuances as a horticulturist talks about precious roses.He said: "When you get to a hundred miles, you get to a different level. There are stages where you get tired. Around mile 18 you enter the stage where you feel your first fatigue.You have to break through this phase to get your spirits up.If you keep running, you will also enter several stages of fatigue.You never know that until you run a fifty or a hundred mile race.For example, it is very difficult to cross the eighty-five mile barrier.You must have the determination to persevere; otherwise, you will not pass this level.Looks like you'll have to break through this stage eventually before you can run the ninety miles.This is different from the fatigue phase of a marathon run because your energy levels have changed several times. "

I asked Corbett if he ever lost the will to keep running.He replied, "Oh, yes." "Think about it, why don't I stay at home? What am I doing here?" Still, for people like Corbett and Glover, exploring the limits of endurance remains a huge allure.And it wasn't just the two of them who had such an idea; to study some of the rarer -- and in some ways, exotic -- aspects of the running experience. Tony Rafferty of Belfast, Ireland, for example, once ran for fifty hours just to prove that it could be done.A runner named Parker Barna ran fifty miles in Central Park one day in 1976, then traveled to Pennsylvania, and the next day he ran a full marathon of twenty-six miles .

In order to draw people's attention to the issue of black people in the United States, comedian Dick Gregory spent two and a half months running from Los Angeles to New York, consuming only fruit juice, sunflower seeds and various healthy foods along the way. Twenty-seven-year-old auditor Richard Innamorato traveled 2,400 miles from Fort Kent, Maine to Key West, Florida, starting in October 1976. (Anyone who tries, he says, with irrefutable logic, "must be someone who takes pleasure in it, or is a queer fool.") Dick Traum, a personnel consultant, lost his right leg in a car accident, but with a prosthetic leg, he still ran races, including marathons.

Joe Pardo, of Flushing, NY, is often seen running the NY and Connecticut races.Actually he is blind.So did San Francisco's Harry Codelos, who ran the marathon in two hours and fifty-nine minutes. In Death Valley — where, oddly enough, people love to run — two runners named Pax Bill and Ken Crutchlow were accompanied by a doctor who was keen to see what would happen to them , ran 145 miles in two days, ending at Mount Whitney at an altitude of 14,495 feet.The temperature in Death Valley is as high as one hundred and thirty-five degrees.Bill lost fifty-five pounds in two days, but regained almost eleven pounds thanks to a special fluid.

In London, about a hundred runners gather each year in the shadow of the great clock of the Tower of England's Houses of Parliament to start the 52.5-mile race from London to Brighton.Rod McNichol, who recently competed, told members of the New York Road Runners Club about his experience: "By the end of the race, I had both nipples, feet, legs and a few other places. There was blood all over the place and I was in excruciating pain in both my legs. Especially my thighs. Besides that I had a horrible feeling." At least two women also ran the London to Brighton distance . A New Zealander named Don Cameron traveled all over the north and south of his country at a speed of nearly sixty miles a day, from Stirling on the south coast of New Zealand to the northernmost Lunga Point Lighthouse. It ran for twenty-three days in all, and at the end he had a beer with the lighthouse keeper to celebrate.

An organization called the Torch of Liberty (which combines religion and running) recently held a run of 8,800 miles in all fifty states to demonstrate "faith in America." An annual ascent race is held in New Hampshire, which starts at the foot of Mount Washington and winds its way up the hill for eight miles to its 6,288-foot peak.A friend of mine named Al Meehan has run this climb several times and has come out on top every time.Meehan said: "I felt pain all the way. Marathon running can't be compared with this kind of race. Some people think that they have climbed a few mountains and they can participate in this kind of climbing race. As a result, they encountered some unexpected situations. .” I run for fun myself, so I don't participate in the aforementioned sports.My favorite ten-mile run is in the cool fall, when the leaves are thick and the air is fresh; only occasionally do I ask for it.But who is to say that I am right in doing so, and those whom I have just introduced are wrong?Endless possibilities await you.