The Running Evolution

By Tom Bernard

Turning twenty-nine was not catastrophic for me. I had heard about people having midlife crises, even known some people who were either having one or just using it as an excuse for their behavior. But for me, I had only one concern: a good set of orders.

Graduating from the Coast Guard Academy had obligated me to serve five years in the Coast Guard. My first four years were served in vessels: Two on a high-endurance cutter mostly in a training or learning mode and two as commanding officer of a small patrol vessel stationed on North Carolinas southern coast. Despite being prone to seasickness, I loved the lure of the sea. While I did miss my wife (and now two children), getting under way has always been a wonderful experience, where anything could happen and often did.

Following those four years afloat, I was assigned to be chief of recruitment for Northern California, Nevada, and Utah and was now nearing the end of a three-year assignment ashore. Three years ashore was about three years too many, and I was eager to get back to sea. It had been a good and challenging three years, living in fairly typical urban style: carpooling into the big city during the week and catching up on home duties during the weekend. Somehow, riding a desk, even a nice desk, did not compare to life on a ship.

The Coast Guard did provide us some input to the assignment process, so after some thought, I decided to be bold on my assignment request and ask for a buoy tender in Hawaii as executive officer. I had no buoy tender or overseas experience, but our assignment card was commonly referred to as a wish sheet, so I figured Id wish. Executive officers were second in command on the ship, generally managing all the administrative aspects and running the day-to-day routine of the ship. Once under way, the commanding officer became the man, often referred to as the Old Man. On a small patrol vessel such as I had previously commanded, there was only one officer, so I had handled all the administrative aspects as well as the operational aspects. I would only need to learn the art of tending buoys if I was fortunate enough to get the assignment.

I dont think it influenced my choice, but one of my long-distance childhood memories was a postcard my father received one day from a friend. I was only about eight or nine, but I remember the words and the picture, which is what really caught my attention: palm trees, white-sand beaches, and crystal-blue water. Keep in mind that there were no high-definition big-screen TVs in that day and few color TVs (none in our house), so a color postcard made quite an impression. The words also made an impression and burned themselves into my memory: Sell the boat! Sell the house! Quit your job! Move to paradise, Hawaii! If it had mentioned leaving the eight kids behind, my father might have jumped at the idea, but he was afraid to fly, so we were not moving to Hawaiiat least not then.

Lo and behold, twenty years later, I receive my first choice, and I was going to Hawaii! I didnt need to sell anything and was perfectly happy to bring my wife and young children.

For some reason, the Coast Guard thought that after three years ashore, I might have forgotten all those semesters of navigation plus the subsequent four years I spent on ships practicing. So they sent me to a refresher course for two weeks in San Diego. Turns out I hadnt forgotten, and even if I had, it didnt matter. The only two things an executive officer needed to know in that era were how to balance the budget and how to catch the young seamen smoking pot. They didnt have courses for those things, and I didnt need them anyway; I was pretty good at both. But who can complain about two weeks in San Diego? Most of my classmates were naval officers of various ranks and levels of experience. As a Coastie, I was never much impressed but enjoyed listening to the break discussions.

One particular discussion during t

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Dec 13, 2013
• ISBN: 9781493124527

Book preview

Copyright © 2013 by Tom Bernard.

Cover Illustration by: Kenn Yapsangco

Library of Congress Control Number:         2013920473

ISBN:                     Hardcover                          978-1-4931-2451-0

                               Softcover                             978-1-4931-2450-3

                               eBook                                  978-1-4931-2452-7

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Rev. date: 12/11/2013

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1   Not a Runner!

Chapter 2   Getting off the Couch

Chapter 3   Becoming a Runner

Chapter 4   Racing and Competitive Racing

Chapter 5   Racing as a Master

Chapter 6   Racing and Running (Again)

Chapter 7   Just Running (What? No Pressure?)

Chapter 8   Can You Ever Bo Back?

Chapter 9   Not a Runner!

Epilogue   

CHAPTER 1

Not a Runner!

I    SWEAR I was not a runner. I was twenty-nine and overweight—185 pounds on a good day and occasionally higher due to cyclical bloating. Of course, my cycle was weekly, like every weekend, just sitting around watching sporting events on the TV. I was a couch potato before they even coined the phrase. I was also a smoker, about a pack or so a day. No one in those days would have accused me of being a runner or even being capable of running, except maybe from the car to the house when it was raining. And that alone was enough to get me winded.

Now, I did have two earlier experiences with running. In high school, I ran track. But I swear I never inhaled, so it doesn’t count. Besides, I didn’t even like it, so it really doesn’t count. I only went out for track because of basketball. Not that I thought running track would make me a better basketball player; my motives were not so pure. In small schools like mine, every head coach of any sport was an assistant in other sports. In this case, the head basketball coach was the assistant football and track coach. I tried football for one afternoon in spring training as the quarterback. Though I could throw the ball, I quickly learned that there were eleven guys on the other side of the line who didn’t like me and several on my side if I didn’t throw the ball to them or execute every aspect of the play just right. So I quickly modified my desired position from quarterback to armchair quarterback and have successfully completed about fifty seasons in that position.

Track was a different story. Who couldn’t run track? As it turned out, I almost couldn’t. On the first practice day, the coach lined up all the fast short sprinters with me for a one-hundred-yard dash. I lost—badly. Then after a rest, he lined up all the mid-distance wannabe sprinters and me. I lost—badly. Then he put me in with the field event people for a one-hundred-yard dash. Most of these were the football linemen whom I remembered from my one afternoon on the gridiron. All the better for me that I didn’t play football because they too could beat me in the one-hundred-yard dash, which meant I would have gotten killed in the backfield. There was no one left to compete against, so by default, I became the school’s first distance runner, running the mile! I didn’t even know how far a mile was, but I couldn’t really say no. What would the basketball coach think? After all, impressing the basketball coach (sucking up, if you will) was the objective—the only objective. Not that my running would impress him positively, but I thought my quitting would impress him negatively, so I stuck it out.

I had no idea how to train, and since this was a secondary coaching position for all the coaches, they had no advice to offer. I was on my own. One thing I tried was running down the railroad tracks. Trying to step only on the cross ties and not sprain an ankle kept my mind occupied to where I could actually run a mile and occasionally a little more without going mad. Unfortunately, a close encounter with a large train forced me back to the track, where I would at least try to run a mile when I thought the coaches were paying attention, which wasn’t often.

My first track meet is still easily recalled. All the milers lined up, the gun went off, and we started running—four times around the track. After the first lap, I was in seventh place. I thought this was good! There were about fifteen runners, so I was in the first half. After the second lap, I was in fifth place. Even better! I was thinking that they might give out ribbons down to five places. After three laps, I was in third place. Wow! This was going to earn points for the team. Then going through the first turn in the final lap, the second place runner came back to me. Not that he was running backwards, he just wasn’t running forward very fast. Then in the final turn of the final lap, the same thing happened with the first runner. Not that I ever increased speed—I had no speed—but suddenly, I was in first place, and there I would finish my first race as a high school miler. A school record! Remember, they never had a miler before, so this really was the school record, in the blistering pace of 5:20.

So went my first season. I won some and lost some but, overall, scored enough competition points to earn a varsity letter and scored enough brownie points to be the leading contender for point guard on next year’s varsity basketball squad. I did manage to break the five-minute mile but not by much. The only downside was that regardless of how the basketball season went, I was now on the track team, like it or not.

I still really didn’t like it, but I was committed regardless.

The next year, we actually got a guidance counselor who seemed to know something about distance running. He coached me personally and had me running quarter-mile repeats for training instead of trying to run a mile or so. He also told me to run hard at the beginning of each race, to take the lead through the turn, and then to slow down to a more comfortable pace and only speed up when someone tried to pass me. This technique, he said, would help me improve my times through the course of the season. He was right. At the district championships, I finished first with a time of 4:40! Not that that’s a great time, but for a small school like mine, it was at least a legitimate record, one that would stand for about twenty years in my high school. It also qualified me for the state championships. That did not go so well, but I was still the first from my school to go to a state championship in any sport.

I doubt that the guidance counselor’s technique of going out fast and then trying to hold off any and all comers is what we teach today’s young runners. But it was at least a strategy, and I think it is important that strategy be part of both training and racing. Strategies go hand in hand with goals. Can’t have one without the other. Can’t just say you are going to win. How are you going to win? Can’t just say you are going to train. How are you going to train? Since I liked winning just about better than anything, having a strategy that focused on winning was good for me even if it’s not the best for most people.

My senior year was really all about basketball. We were good that year; we went to postseason play for the first time, and I led the team in most categories except rebounding—besides not being able to run fast, I couldn’t jump. I think there’s something related between the two. By season’s end, I was wiped out and not particularly healthy. I also had two scholarship offers for basketball, one from Florida Presbyterian College and the other from Florida Southern College, so the motivation wasn’t there for track.

Unfortunately, the guidance counselor died of a heart attack. It seems he knew about running but didn’t practice it himself. His guidance for me personally and on the track was missed. Not that he taught me many things or even the right things, but he showed an interest in me and my progress in life and in running. I was one of eight children, and my parents had done all they could to keep track of us and monitor the important things. Supporting athletic activities never rose that high on the list, though there’s no question on the important things: they were always there and did very well by all of eight children.

While the track season wasn’t a complete washout, I was never able to match my previous year’s results. (Seven months later, limping my way through basketball practice in college, I discovered through X-rays that I had broken a bone in my foot months earlier that never fully healed. I would speculate that it happened at the end of my high school basketball season and hampered me throughout the spring track season and stayed with me throughout an active summer and fall. It probably didn’t bother me too much during track since I was always running straight. Once back into basketball with the jumping and turning, the pain became noticeable, as did my reaction to it.)

As it turned out, I passed on the two basketball offers and accepted instead an appointment to the Coast Guard Academy. I’m not sure why, but I think it was a sense of obligation I felt. The basketball offers were always contingent on basketball, staying healthy, and developing at the college level. The Coast Guard Academy made no such conditions. Also, the academy scholarship covered everything, including some spending money. If I was fortunate enough to get accepted, I would feel obligated to go. Besides, the Coast Guard Academy had something at that time that no other college had: it was the 1966 National Collegiate Sailing Champions! While I wasn’t a runner, I was a sailor and soon would be again.

One of the unique things about my academy application was that it contained more information about my athletic accomplishments than my academic accomplishments. Still, academics made up the bulk of the selection criteria, so there must have been something in there. My athletic accomplishments were noteworthy at that point—at least I thought so. I held my high school record for the one-mile and half-mile runs; I was high scorer and most valuable player on our winning basketball team; and at age twelve and thirteen, I was one of the best sailors in the country in that age-group. I had even won awards in tennis, swimming, bicycling, and horseback riding—not that I was a true star in any of those sports.

Interestingly, after arriving at the academy, I was not approached by the basketball coach, the sailing coach, or the track coach. Instead, it was the baseball coach who noted that I had played some second base in the Babe Ruth League one summer, and he needed a second baseman. If I had to rank my sports on the basis of my ability, sailing would no doubt be first and baseball would be at the bottom of a very long list. I was able to convince the baseball coach to look elsewhere for a second baseman.

The Coast Guard Academy at the time (and hopefully still) believed that sailing proficiency added value to an officer’s professional credentials. All cadets were almost immediately sent to the waterfront, given some minor instructions, and then sent out to the river in small sailboats to see how they handled themselves. It was partly about sailing and partly about learning new concepts and then dealing with those concepts in a new situation that most cadets were unfamiliar with.

The academy was going to have to wait until my first calculus course to see how I handled new concepts because sailing was familiar and I was good at it. The sailing coach may not have reviewed application packages, but he did monitor these sailing classes and noticed right away that my boat was moving much faster than the others. I was quick to accept his invitation to show up at the first day of sailing practice still several weeks away.

Since I started racing sailboats at age nine and continued off and on throughout my life, (and still today) sailing could consume several books, and I want to stay on the subject of running—or not running as the case may be. Suffice it to say, for years to come, running would only serve as a means of getting to sailing practice faster if I was late and getting back to the barracks faster if I had practiced too long. Even basketball faded from my screen. Though I would play in several men’s leagues after college, when the academy basketball coach asked me to quit sailing to concentrate on basketball, I refused.

Sailing had two big advantages. First, it got me away from the academy environment for weekends at a time, when I could actually dress in civilian clothes and pretend to be normal, though my haircut was an easy giveaway. Second, I was a much better sailor than basketball player. Our team, or at least I individually, went to the national championships each year, and I was named to the all-American team my final two years. At the college level, I would never have been all-anything in basketball.

There was one other good thing about sailing. You can do it forever. This is especially true when you are in the Coast Guard and get transferred around from one sailing mecca to another: Chesapeake Bay; Newport, Rhode Island; San Francisco Bay; Honolulu, Hawaii; Juneau, Alaska. OK, I didn’t do much sailing in Juneau—I didn’t do any sailing in Juneau. So the Coast Guard Academy and my early years as an officer in the Coast Guard were mostly absent of running, and anyone who knew me in those days would never describe me as a runner.

As fate would have it (fate, or luck, played a big role throughout my life), choosing sailing over basketball had one unexpected result. Near the end of my sophomore year at a regatta in Boston on the Charles River hosted by MIT, I met a young woman. A close friend of hers happened to be seriously dating a member of our team, and this friend had invited her to come and watch. I fell instantly in love. While it took her a while to get a mutual feeling, at least the result took, and she has remained by my side since that April in 1968.

My second running experience came six years after graduating from the academy. By this time, I was as I described myself at the beginning of this chapter. It’s too painful to repeat again, so if you don’t remember, go back and read it again. I can’t write it again. Despite my weight and other bad habits, I did consider myself in reasonable shape. I played some golf, some tennis, and some evening men’s league basketball but, for some reason, felt guilty about my condition and thought maybe I should try running again. What I couldn’t do, wouldn’t do, is run slow. Not that I ever ran that fast, but I had my pride. I was an athlete and just couldn’t accept slogging around the neighborhood at a slightly faster than walking pace as others of my generation were just beginning to do. If I was going to run, it would have to be at a pace that resembled running. So I put together a plan. Remember, have a goal: lose weight, have a strategy, run.

Periodically, I would sneak down to the track and run at a pace of one lap in one hundred seconds. Why one hundred? It’s a nice round number! More importantly, it’s a pace that looks like running and feels like running. Unfortunately, it wasn’t a pace I could keep up for long. At first, I could only run one lap, one-fourth mile. But I felt that if I kept working at it, sort of like push-ups, I would gradually be able to do two laps, then three, etc. I gradually worked up to three but could never get beyond that. Each time I would go for four, I would pull a muscle or just collapse from the lack of oxygen, and I would end up limping home and have to make up stories as to the cause. I didn’t want anyone to know I was trying to get in shape—after all, I was in shape. I just wasn’t a runner. And I was perfectly happy not being a runner. I loved that old couch! On those opportunities that I could, I still sailed, and on occasion, without the benefit of practice, I could still win. I made a decision: I wasn’t even going to run in from the car when it was raining. I wasn’t a runner!