August 26, 1979 (Sunday)

From running log:
Ran 4.2 miles easy at 7:30 pace in muggy but cooler weather. Both knees are sore on the outside. How long has it been since I ran pain free? I feel tired. Total weekly miles = 35.8

30 years later:

One of the "discoveries" I've made while putting this blog and story together is that my memory (through rose-colored glasses) and fact just don't match up. In my memories of the 1979 cross country season, probably strongly influenced by remembering only the peak experiences, the whole season was a positive progression, from summer training through season-long sharpening until reaching prime condition at the conference meet. If anyone had asked me about injuries or problems, I'd have said that I couldn't recall any. I would have said that it was the one season in which I ran strong without injury throughout the campaign. And I would have been wrong!

We runners are expert complainers, of course. Stand at any starting line with the very runners who will finish in the top 10 of that race, and you will hear nothing but a litany of complaints and excuses: I'm tired, I'm injured, I'm under-trained, I'm not sleeping well, I've got shin splints, my knees are sore, I'm way out of shape ... this list goes on and on. You'd think none of those runners had a chance of even finishing the race! Of course, they all go on to run at or near their personal bests and destroy everyone else in the field. How odd. I don't know if it's part of the ethos of running (should I say pathos, instead?), or if it's a characterological trait of the type of person who becomes a distance runner. George Sheehan liked the old model, created by William Sheldon, of dividing the world of people up into three categories.

1. Endomorph: round and soft, big belly, enjoys laughter and gastronomic delights, a follower
2. Mesomorph: brawny, muscular, thick-skinned, not a thinker but typically a strong leader
3. Ectomorph: thin, fragile, introspective, smart, loner, an obsessive personality

Of course, Sheehan argued that all serious runners were ectomorphs, and thus fragile, prone to injury, and a likely to whine (although, ironically, the whining isn't really meant to seek sympathy, it's more like self-talk, and if anything it's used to push people away, because ectomorphs prefer to be left alone).

I'm not one to buy into any system that rigidly categorizes people. I suppose there are some examples that fit neatly into each of these three types, but I'm fairly certain that (a) all of us have some sprinkling of all three types, and (2) learning + situational variables play a larger role in determining behavior, certainly a much larger role than outward body type.

All of that is a long-winded way to say that I have been mildly surprised that my running log entries from 1979 are actually rife with complaints, worries, anxieties, and injuries (both minor and major, both real and imagined), between which there are moments of success and happiness. When I decided to undertake this little project, I thought it would be a sort of celebration of a flawless season of high school running. Of course, it's turned out to be not quite that simple. It's an honest look back at the events, emotions, worries, complexities, and imperfections of a runner (me), a team, a school, a coach, perhaps even the late 70s in America. The 1979 season wasn't perfect, and most certainly neither was I. But, in a way, perhaps that makes the experiences gained throughout that time all the more special.