The Hard Core

Squishiness has proven a persistently annoying aspect of life on earth. Sure it made sense when all of us were buoyed in that great wet womb of our genesis. And we have made considerable strides with shells, plates, and bones now that we dwell on desiccating and gravity-ruled terra firma. Still, poke or gash us with even a meagre stick and we bleed.

My vulnerabilities have been all too apparent in the five weeks since I ran the Mountain Masochist 50 mile trail run. Hurricane Sandy, itself a mere droplet cast off from Mother Nature's sneeze, had spawned a system of storms that spanned the entire East coast. The Blue Ridge Mountain range in Southwest Virginia was lightly brushed as if by a passing coat tail. It was still enough to cause considerable trevail. By the time of the race on November 3 several inches of snow remained on the parts of the course above 2400' and front runners would have to break trail through some knee-deep snow drifts.

My plans to prepare for the Hellgate 100K were foiled by the fallout. Inflammation of the peroneal tendon on my left ankle cast a shadow over any training I tried. The pain was significant and only manageable by staying on my toes and keeping that ankle rigid when climbing. This might explain the continuous soreness of my left achilles tendon -- not an injury to be toyed with. Finally, a sharp pain at the top of my hamstring was eerily reminiscent of the “deep butt” high hamstring tendon syndrome that can be a multi-year injury for distance runners. The pain plagued me for the last several weeks and prevented me from running at speeds faster than six miles per hour. I kept expecting the pain to pass and to be healed enough to run one of the toughest ultras around.

I considered withdrawing. As the race approached it became clear that if I did start, I was just as likely to have to quit due to injury as to finish, and even if I did manage to limp through I would not be performing at peak fitness -- not only because I was injured, but because injuries had prevented me from training as I would have when healthy. A plethora of personal and professional responsibilities vie for my attention all the time. I could spend the weekend grading final exams, working on the house, or playing with my kids. The scale was perched right on the line between “go” and “don’t go.” The slightest additional weight would have made all the difference.

And there the scale remained even as we rode to event headquarters in Staunton, VA on Friday evening. JJ Jessee drove my van with Micah McFaddin riding shotgun. They were coming to crew for Beth Minnick, who rode in the back with me. We had our feet propped up and our heads resting on our pillows. I dreamily imagined that we were driving through the night toward a distant destination. And then I wished it really was so. Had JJ said he changed plans and was going to drive us through the night to New York City I would have readily gone gone along.

Not even the race director’s public provocations at the pre-race briefing could snap my head back into it. He announced that I had the current course record [11:03] and taunted that I wouldn’t be able to break 11 hours. I didn’t want to say out loud that I had serious doubts about my ability to complete the course at all. That I was getting ready to start anyway seemed completely surreal.

Even a sense of dread would have been better than the escapist fantasies I was turning to. I was about to be abandoned 66 miles from the safety of the finish, in the mountains, at midnight, and I was starting lame.

About the only thing that registered true at the start was the prayer offered by Frank Gonzales for David Horton. Though Horton seemed himself in every respect this weekend, he will be undergoing major surgery today [He is likely registering at the hospital as I post this]. The normal commotion of the start line gave way to complete quiet. While running ultras may be something people do for recreation, it would be hard to overstate the impact that Horton has had on peoples’ lives. He started the “ultra scene” in the East, and Hellgate is perhaps most representative of what an ultra means to him: huge withering climbs, brilliant wide-open vistas, plenty of brutal technical terrain but also miles of free running. More than that, though, Hellgate is intimate. Entries are capped to keep the numbers low -- 140 runners this year. Horton knows you. And he wants you to face your demons, even if it takes Forever to do it.

Many times, including at Hellgate in 2005, I have started a race with grand plans that were gradually worn down until I had to surrender and accept that my fate is subject to forces beyond my control. Hellgate 2012 is the first time I have started a race already surrendered.  I had no pretense that I could control the outcome. Of course that didn’t relieve me of the need to prepare -- just the opposite. I outfitted myself with great gear from The Aid Station. I got an amazingly bright Princeton Tec Headlamp and carefully arranged to swap out batteries. And I also left my clothes in the van so that if I did drop on the course I’d be able to get them from JJ and Micah.

As it turns out my fears were well founded.

The ankle and the hamstring hurt enough that I wondered what the other runners would make out of my visible limp. I stayed well behind the front runners. Despite the very easy pace I almost immediately started having stomach trouble. My dinner had not digested and my stomach became painfully distended. I drank water at the first aid station but it just made me more bloated. I picked up my hydration pack and gels at the second aid station but didn’t touch either until 2:30 am when my stomach finally started to empty.

I broke the race into thirds. Two warmup marathons and then the race. The first marathon (OK, 22 miles) ends at Headforemost Mountain and I hoped to be there before 4 am. The second marathon ends at Bearwallow Gap and I hoped to be there before 8 am. The first marathon was nearly all miserable. I started to feel moderately better on the final climb to the Headforemost aid station. I had been able to eat and drink some. As long as I stayed on my toes and didn’t flex my ankle that pain was manageable. The hamstring only hurt when I opened up my stride. I was surprised to find myself in third place leaving the aid station. Jason Bryant had dropped and returned to Camping Gap. Frank Gonzales had apparently taken even longer than I at the aid station. That left Troy Shellhamer (my comrade on many recent adventures) and “some guy way out front” who turned out to be Alister Gardner. Despite my tutelage, which frequently includes sincerely offered tips on how to beat me, Troy was sporting a headlamp that included a blinking red light on the back. This is no doubt a great safety feature for road cycling but for a mountain ultra run through the night this better suited the purposes of his competitors. Unwittingly, Troy helped carry me through two critical periods of the race: the entire first third when I just wanted to shuffle past the miles in meditative oblivion (focused on the blinking red light), and the final third that I’ll detail below.




I fully recognize how bizarre this is going to sound and I myself am tempted to attribute to me some special strength of will or character but the truth is that we just don’t have the right model for how the human body works.

I was injured and feeling unwell. I started running at midnight by the light of my headlamp in the mountains. Four hours later I was being HEALED.  At 4 am I started the second marathon feeling the way I “should” have felt had I trained optimally, stayed healthy, and then tapered down to a complete rest and (of course) skipped the first marathon. One has to wonder -- would “go run in the mountains” be a better generic prescription for what ails you than “just take it easy”?

So I ran the second marathon with alacrity. After Jennings Creek (27 miles)  there are two long sustained climbs and descents on gravel and double track that allowed me to open up my stride and blow out the old carburetor barrels. I passed Troy and gapped him by what I thought would be an insurmountable distance. I had apparently suppressed the memory of all the technical single-track in the approach to Bearwallow Gap. I have an edge over Troy on open terrain, but he is very strong and, for a midwesterner, remarkably able to maintain his speed over rocks.

The race starts at Bearwallow Gap. I was about 16 minutes behind Alister and maybe two minutes in front of Troy. More importantly I was one minute ahead of my pace from 2006 when I set the course record. Considering that I had been as much as 23 minutes behind Alister, I thought both the course record and the win were still in play. It sure wasn’t going to be easy. After 44 miles through the night the running was work. Completely gone was the euphoria of the middle marathon. I gritted my teeth and almost felt myself pull at my legs to get them to keep running on the climb out of Bearwallow. Contouring around the mountain I caught occasional glimpses of Troy behind me.

On the technical descent before Bobblet’s Gap (about 50 miles) the wear of the run began to show. Cramps in my feet and calves made navigating rocks difficult. My knees hurt. I hadn’t refilled my hydration pack at Bearwallow and ran dry, which kept me from eating. My energy reached a low point just before the aid station. As I refilled and grabbed several chunks of boiled potato Troy arrived. He hooted at his sister who was crewing for him and I knew he’d be excited to be racing me once again so close to the end of an ultra. I overheard her say something about his “double espresso shot” and I figured he was getting ready to get even more amped up.

Sure enough he came cruising by me on the road descent after Bobblet’s Gap. I might have smiled to myself if I felt I had the luxury. This would be Troy’s first trip through the Forever section. It doesn’t help for someone to tell you about it -- you have to go through it. Taking it alone is tough. Leading someone may be tougher. Troy runs strong and steady -- I’ve learned that across the many miles we have now put in together. I was happy to once again tuck in behind him.

During a training run three weeks prior I had warned Troy that he shouldn’t wait until the last aid station to make his move on me. So I was just thinking “way to go!” after he had surged on the first downhill of the Forever section when I caught back up to him because he had tripped and fallen. He got right back up and shook it off but the surge was over. He led the full distance of that section with me right behind him. As my energy severely ebbed -- as it must -- so did his. Our pace ground down to a shuffle on those final climbs before the Day Creek aid station. When at last we emerged from the Forever section Troy looked like, well, Hell.

I had taken my caffeinated Clif Shot about 10 minutes before, and at the aid station I chugged a small cup of Mountain Dew. Alister had been through 10 minutes before so I knew he was no longer within reach. It was 10:10 and I knew exactly what I had to do to break 11 hours: run every step of the final three mile climb to the parkway. The last three downhill miles are a given -- I could run those fast regardless of what I had been through.

My body -- the squishy part -- did protest. Everything possible had been squeezed from it. “Nothing left here,” it said and just for proof my legs became leaden weights. “Good,” I replied, “then there is nothing left here to care.” And in fact I did feel that everything soft had been stripped away. All that was left was one simple commandment “run every step.”

No doubt we are fleshy beings held fast to the physical world. Our freedom waves in the breeze like a flag run up a tall pole. We mount ourselves to an infinitesimally thin yet absolutely liberating hard core. We must stake our claim, make our promise, and then hold fast no matter what. That is the essence of human freedom and the greatest joy of our longest runs.

Hellgate 2012 Results: http://www.extremeultrarunning.com/2012_hellgate/results.pdf

Why?

I spoke with Robin on the phone on Saturday. She had traveled to Bedford, VA, for a half-marathon trail race. She has run recreationally for the last couple years, with periodic trail races including one full marathon. She was down. The run hadn’t gone well. It was hot and the course was muddy. During the run she repeatedly asked herself: “why am I doing this?” The age group award was little consolation. Robin thinks she was the only woman in her age group. She didn’t feel good at the beginning, middle, or end of the run. She didn’t enjoy any special recognition for having run. Is there any reason left to explain her participation?

My friend Dave is breaking his promise to me. He’s traveling to California to pace me for the last 32 miles of Western States. The last time he paced me I made him promise never to let me run another 100 mile race. I went out at the Vermont 100 in 2006 with all guns blazing. I had decided the downhills of this runnable course were the key to a speedy race. So I blistered all of them, for the first 70 miles. It took about 7 ½ hours for me to run the first 50 miles. About the time Dave joined me, I was reduced to a walk. My quads were shot – every step I took sent a jolting pain from my knee to my hip. And we had 30 miles to go. During the death march Dave struggled with his role. Should he try to talk to me, fill the space, he asked. Should he leave me to my quiet despair? Doesn’t matter, I said. Just don’t let me do this again.

We say lots of things, and think a few more. These things are like the bugs around my house. The ants show up when even a trace of food is left on the counter. The rafters hum with carpenter bees every spring. The first year, when I saw the little piles of sawdust on the deck, I got to work. I fetched the ladder and went to plugging the holes. The ants were menacing to Robin, so we equipped a spray bottle with bleach and kept all the pheromone trails clear. We can’t win, of course. Bugs, like thoughts and words, can be distracting. The best we can do is manage them. They don’t constitute our real motivations.

We think and speak as if we have intentions, but for the most part we fool ourselves. All the real work is done under the surface. We imagine ourselves at the helm of a stalwart ship, charting a course, assessing the wind and waves, and making the necessary adjustments. The ship is actually a toy row boat, and the rudder and oars are dangling uselessly above the water. The bottom of the boat is buoyed not on the water, but on the back of a truly mighty whale. The whale starts to turn, and we move the rudder. The whale picks up speed, and we struggle with the oars, maybe splashing a little water. Depending upon the relationship of the man to the whale, he is pitiful, funny, or tragic. He cannot free himself from the whale. In the face of any real test, there is but one way: the whale’s way. In the quest for freedom there is only one condition: be the whale.

The whale is running Western States. What I think or say about it makes little difference. I will articulate reasons anyway, because that’s what we toy boat captains do. I appreciate most the messages that can’t be completely made up. Everything is made up except when we speak for the whale. We speak for the whale only when we know the whale. The whale reveals itself indirectly. Our intuition may be a conduit for understanding, or for deception. The best way to know the whale is by experiment. Test it. Feel it bump against things. Race it.

Knowing the whale is not the only reason to run long. It is not a static object whose properties exist to be discovered by something else. The introspection – for that is what it is – exerts its own effects. We know ourselves, and in so doing, become something different. More able-bodied. The test reveals our own efficacy. Our thinking can, if not distracted, serve a purpose. We have to work methodically, over time, but we can make a difference. The difference made is a reflection of our human autonomy.

Our friend Jim Harrison was at the finish line when Robin finished. When she expressed her angst, he said simply that he didn’t do things he didn’t WANT to do. Like most ultrarunners, I have a more complex relationship with my motivations. Running 100 miles is not a simple pleasure. Neither is it a perverse pursuit of pain. The challenges faced that day – only a pale reflection of the lifetime of challenges that preceded it – represent what is possible relative to human ambition. Because of the real and unavoidable difficulties, we reveal, by our performances, the human capacity to do better.

Shucking Selfiness

I drove to Knoxville by myself for the road half-marathon. The cool, breezy, threatening weather prompted me to fashion a headband out of a black and white checkered buff. I cut a circular section from it so that it was about two inches wide. When I put it on and tucked it above my ears, it curled around itself and looked like a string. I pulled on the Moeben arm sleeves given out at Western States in 2007. My hair curled around the headband. I still had a full beard. I ran out and back along the first mile of the course for a warm-up. A lot of other runners were around, none of whom I knew. I could feel their eyes follow me. I don’t compete in road races anymore. Running this event was part of my preparation to run Way Too Cool. It gave a benchmark to my training.

When the gun finally sounded, a group of young and fit looking runners shot to the front. I followed evenly behind, easing into the gap between the frontrunners and everyone else. Running on the road, and among others, made the quick tempo temptingly easy. I tried to gage my effort by the number of strides I took per breath of air. At three strides per breath, I figured I was running economically, and settled in to the fast pace.

As the front group began to string out, I passed one runner at a time. At three miles out, all the runners in front of me turned around to head back. Now I knew that they had all entered the 10K, run concurrently with the half-marathon. I would run the rest of the way by myself. No more ride, I thought, and no more distraction. I went into my legs, arms, and lungs to settle at the tempo that would carry me the distance. We were entering a river valley, and I noted the undulating rise and fall of the road into and out of the valley. I leaked into the countryside, the farms in the floodplain, the dog running into the road, the police cruiser at a distance in front of me. I played my part, like the baritone in a musical composition. I played at the rhythm that worked to coordinate us all.

The last part of the course was out and back. I was inbound, passing runners who were outbound. I was at about mile 10. As the runners cheered me on, I waved, said hello, or returned the “good job.” I wiped the dried spit from the corners of my mouth. My breathing became unsettled, maintaining my pace more effortful. I slowed somewhat, but maintained a strong pace to the finish.

I was generally shy as a kid, even painfully self-conscious at times. From an early age it was hard for me to just be somewhere, and just do something. I also had to see myself there, doing that. It’s an accursed capacity, self-consciousness, which puts a person at a remove from himself. Like the middle school kids with their backs on the wall at the Valentine’s Day dance. Everyone could have fun, mingle, move on, if only they could get over themselves. We know self-consciousness inhibits us. It keeps us from getting embarrassed, from committing social blunders. Maybe that can be a good thing. It also keeps us from fully engaging a situation. Self-consciousness keeps us from the flow that makes our best performances possible.

Self-consciousness develops into a more insidious adult condition I’m calling selfiness. I can get off the wall now. I can speak in front a group and not get completely muddle-headed. But I carry around a sense of who I am, and I fit the things I do into a story I can tell about myself. I take credit for the things I do well, and I (generally) take the blame for things I do poorly. Philosophers call this agency. There can be little doubt that personal agency is a central feature of accountability in social groups. In order to be rewarded, or punished, for our deeds we must presume the capacity to have chosen. The capacity to choose implies a chooser. There is a captain at the helm: a self.

Selfiness is epidemic. Individuality can be sliced in infinite ways, and we explore all the options. We identify with styles, trends, brands, vocations, religions, hobbies, groups, shows, movies, characters, activities, etc. We identify ourselves. For something as deeply important as self-definition, selfiness is pretty thin. We can change any of these associations, generally with little effort. We can say a few words, trade out for a different wardrobe, or find a new set of acquaintances. We can start a new sport… ah, not so fast.

Sport is another way that people identify themselves. I think sports features so prominently in our culture, though, because it is one of the few things we do that is hard to fake. Sports are set up to put an empirical test on every assertion. Individual endurance sports help to define real limits to human performance. When athletes run faster or farther than we thought possible, we learn something new, and assimilate the knowledge toward expanding our own capacities. We get to know what works, for us, as we strive to improve performance.

We find that selfiness doesn’t work. It is too sheer, too illusory. After several hours of running alone, drained of a ready supply of energy, we can’t just tell ourselves a story about what we are doing. We can’t fall back on the captain we imagine somewhere behind our eyes. When the narrative is stripped away we have an organized, buzzing, mass of tissue that has to propel the oversized orb on top that used to pretend it was calling the shots. What works is to embrace our bicameral nature. We our ourselves, and we aren’t ourselves. We are a coordinated and mechanized set of cells, and we are a lineage. We are a mind, and we are a body.

The selfiness will accumulate like rime on a ship. High level performance will require some means of stripping the selfiness away. My thru-hike on the AT gave me a good overhaul. Long runs in the woods feel like regular maintenance. Marriage and family put a check on selfiness. For some, religious experience helps shed the temptation of the transient. Spiritual enlightenment comes in many forms, but they seem to share a transcendent connection with something bigger than oneself.

It’s hard to imagine that we’d go to all the trouble we do without a reason. All of our reasons (that I can think of ) are ascribed to the self who provides them. This is a central, and to my mind, unresolved paradox. We work in service to a self who we must deny to work at our best.

Can Do

Dan Challener told us to run 20 minutes and meet him at the track. The Bruin stadium was a 10 minute jog from campus, so we looped through the affluent neighborhoods on the hill just north of downtown Providence. We knew the workout would be different. We were left wondering what we were in for.

Head coach Bob Rothenberg (Berg) was there, along with Dan. He told us we would run the measured two mile course on the road finishing at the stadium, without pausing we were to run a mile hard on the track. He told me, along with some teammates including our captain, Fergal Mullen, to run the two miles at 5:40 per mile and the mile at 4:40. We were to repeat this twice more, without pausing in between.

I told our coaches that I wasn’t sure we could do that. Berg looked at the ground and gave me a well-worn shake of the head. Dan stared at me, his agitation visible. I knew what they wanted, and Fergal was quick to give it to them. “Ah, we can do that! Come on, guys, let’s be positive!”

We hadn’t done a workout like that before. We’d certainly done mile repeats, though, and a 4:40 was a tough effort. We’d also done plenty of tempo runs, and 5:40 pace was right at threshold. We were getting pretty fit, but I was apprehensive. The guys were starting to bounce, stretch, or do strides. They may actually have thought that believing they could do it was enough. Or maybe they thought that whatever coach said they could do, they could do. Or maybe they just didn’t think deeply about it. Most likely, I suppose, they had learned that expressing a “can do” attitude worked in getting along with other people. I took the task at face value, and tried to get my head around it. It made my heart beat harder and my hands turn clammy.

I wanted to nail that tempo pace, and maximize my running economy. It would devastate our chances to finish if we got carried away from the beginning. When we started we stayed bunched together. When I stuck behind one of the guys I could lower my arm just a bit so that it would swing just under his. My gait was low and quiet. We hummed through the splits right on pace. When we transitioned to the track I kept in mind that the acceleration wouldn’t feel so abrupt coming off the 5:40 pace. Starting an interval from a standstill gives the body a jolt that takes a little while to accommodate. Shifting gears, as we were in this workout, actually made the first mile interval feel comparatively easy.

We were doing the work, though, and it started to show on the second two miles on the road. The guys were having some trouble keeping pace. I clocked off the splits like a metronome, barely deviating even for the slight inclines. By the time we were back on the track the guys were starting to string out behind me. I nailed the second one-mile interval on the track. I transitioned slowly to try and let the other guys catch up for the final two miles on the road. They were coming apart. I went on to complete the workout as prescribed.

Athletes are compelling because they “can do.” They can do things we find difficult to imagine. They respond to competition by striving to do even better. Great athletes, we feel, have the will to win. They emerge victorious, it seems, no matter what. It’s in their bearing. We want and expect our athletes to lower their heads and shake off any challenge. We mistakenly think that it is this self-confident spirit that propels the athlete forward. When in the course of competition he begins to tire, we think, his will to win kicks in and carries him over the threshold.

People may reward such optimism, but nature doesn’t care. I’m reminded of an encounter I had during a run from Damascus, VA. I started south on the Appalachian Trail. About 4 miles out I passed a hiker. He wore a full sized pack. He was also headed south from Damascus. He said he was thirsty, and asked if I had water to spare. I was carrying a hydration pack with enough water for my run. I told him so, but I said I would turn after another 6 miles and when I passed him again, I would give him what I had left.

When I passed the hiker on my way back, I asked him how he was doing. He said he was doing great. After our encounter he had begun to pray to God for water. And God answered his prayer. He sent a group of hikers along the side trail from Back Bone Rock. And they had water for him.

I recommended to him that he make provisions to collect his own water.

I suppose great athletes do carry themselves with a certain self-confidence. It isn’t the confidence which causes them to do well, though. There just isn’t the room inside us for a wild-eyed spiritual stoker. It is the well-advised application of effort over long periods of time, and the built-in wisdom that develops from that, fueling great athletes. That kind of self-knowledge runs deep. Virtuoso performance of any kind is too big to fit inside a person’s head. It extends through the body and out into space and back through time to encompass all the experience that contributed to one’s capacity to do this thing well.

Great athletic performances compel our admiration and respect because they embody the culmination of expansive, and real, effort. Athletes can do. We can talk about the will to win as long as this is what we mean. If we imagine strength of will to be a non-corporeal essence that some people just happen to have, we distance ourselves from what is possible.

Potential

I paced the hall, looking at my watch. My mother was upstairs. “Let’s go!” I yelled again. We finally got going on the drive from the Crescent Hill neighborhood in Louisville, where I had spent all my years, to Atherton High School in the Highlands. I was going to my first cross country practice. School would start in a couple weeks. At least my mother didn’t dawdle with the driving. She loved her new RX-7. The rotary engine was so smooth. We arrived at exactly 9:00 am in the school’s parking lot. I didn’t know the other kids, but one caught my eye. He rode up on a BMX-style bicycle and wore a white bicycle cap. He was little, but had some attitude. A minute later, a truck drove up with another, older kid. Coach Worful walked over to the truck, and then it turned and drove away.

Coach called us over to the sidewalk sternly. He said David and I had been a minute late. Since we were underclassmen, he would give us this one break. Jeff had also been late, but was an upperclassman, so he was sent home. I said by my watch I had actually gotten there right on time. He said we go by his watch.

We did some stretches for a warm-up, and then coach explained the 5 mile loop we were to run. We started off together. Not all of us knew the neighborhood. It was about 5 miles from my house to the school. I had some friends who lived in the Highlands. I rode my bike back and forth occasionally, but still needed to get my bearings.

About halfway through the run, as we were starting back toward the school, Dave picked up the pace noticeably. He and I had ended up at the front, and the rest of the group was strung out behind us. He bounced along, his heels popping up to his shorts with every stride. I picked it up along with him. It took some effort, but it felt good. It reminded me of the pace lines we learned doing rides with the Youth Bikers of Louisville (YBOL). Joe Ward, an experienced cyclist, sponsored the group, and I participated during middle school. We did several long two-day trips. A group of us would fall into line and take turns leading so that the rest of us could draft. The leader would always push to either keep or pick-up the pace. It felt like we were flying. It was a great way to knock off a bunch of miles in a hurry.

Similarly I followed Dave. I stayed on him, even as the pace started to burn my lungs and legs. We had completely broken away from the rest of the group. I wasn’t sure of the last turns, so I wanted to stay close. When we made the last turn on to Emerson, I relented a let Dave get a few steps ahead of me. This was my first run, ever, aside from some short jogs with a neighbor around the Crescent Hill reservoir. We strode toward the school. David looked back, then signaled me to close the gap. He said we’d finish together. Coach was waiting with the clipboard at the front of the school. He wrote in his book, but he didn’t let on what he was thinking. Neither did Dave. I would find out later.

David was the second man on the team, behind Jeff. He was a sophomore, and had started running in middle school. He was taken aback by this tall lanky new kid, who couldn’t be shaken during a hard run. He wanted us to finish together because he was completely whipped and didn’t want to risk that I would pass him. I found that out much later, after David and I became best friends. Beginning with that first practice, we ran together almost every day for the next four years. David and I still run together, though much less frequently. He has paced me at two of my 100 mile runs: Mohican and Vermont. He will join me for the final 38 miles of Western States this year.

Though coach Worful didn’t let on with me, he did have a talk with my parents. I found out years later, after high school, that Coach had arranged a secret meeting with my parents at a restaurant near the school. He wanted them to know about my potential.

What do we mean by potential? I ran faster than the other kids. But that was true right off the bat, without training. Potential is about what can happen given a methodical intervention. If we cared about improvement, the greatest potential would be with our slowest athletes, because they have the most room to improve. I started out fit and active, so my improvement was gradual. While improvement certainly has value, we care more about kids’ ability to stand out in a chosen endeavor. When Coach alerted my parents to my potential, he meant my potential to stand out among high school runners in Kentucky and beyond.

It is uncontroversial to say that there are wide variations between individual people. Idiosyncratic differences between people allow us to be individuals, and to develop our own talents. Our parents were constantly trying to show each of us how we had something we were good at, whether it was music, art, or science. There are indexes of human performance, though, that are general enough you’d think everyone would wish to “have more” of it. Take intelligence, for example. It’s a good thing for everyone to be able think about and remember things, right, so why should it be that some have more intelligence than others? The capacity to develop aerobic fitness seems that way to me as well. Wouldn’t it be nice for everyone to have more of it? You should feel ripped off if you aren’t able to develop your capacity to use oxygen just about as quickly as everybody else. All of our ancestors, at one time or another must have been tested in just such a capacity. It would have benefitted anyone to be able to work more quickly to find something of value or to avoid danger.

For all our uniqueness, we have strikingly similar morphologies. Surgeons do not have to wait until they have cut into a patient to know what organs they will find in which positions, or how each does its job. They learned by studying a cadaver. Any cadaver. Coaches do not have to figure out the unique physiology of every athlete. Runners respond to training in predictable ways.

Yet, some runners have potential to stand out; potential that compels its own fulfillment. I can tell you that I didn’t wait for my mother to take me to any more practices that summer. I rode my bike.