Katie Clary
Staff Writer
Ben Young / Photo Editor
The women’s cross country team runs on the
track during practice. In addition to running
with the team, many members
also run marathons.
The pink, foggy dawn silhouettes a group of runners along Old Malibu Road. Any given Wednesday morning, sometimes at an unforgiving 5:30, nearly 60 students train for the quintessential test of human endurance: a marathon.
This is physical education professor Mike Anderson’s PE 101 course, designed to help students complete a half marathon in December and the Los Angeles Marathon next spring.
In 2001, Anderson created the class after realizing typically 10 to 15 Pepperdine students and faculty train for the L.A. Marathon each year. Why not train together, he thought? Better yet, why not get class credit?
Anderson said the past three years, 20 or 30 people, mostly women, have trained together under his guidance. This year enrollment doubled, despite the fact Anderson did not as actively advertise the course as he did in previous years.
Senior sports medicine major Kentaro Onishi runs with the class every year after his cross country racing season ends. He plans to run his fourth L.A. Marathon before graduation.
In fact, Onishi said he likes long distance racing so much, he recently ran and won an eight-hour race in his home country Japan. He said of the 50 competitors, only about 17 finished. Despite, or perhaps because of these experiences, Onishi concedes that marathons always hurt.
“The last mile is crazy,” he said. “You just don’t go anywhere; your legs don’t move. [But] when you cross the line it pays off.”
Elite athletes finish the classic long distance event in just more than two hours. Last year Great Britain’s Paula Radcliffe set the women’s world record at 2 hours 15 minutes 25 seconds. Her speed clocked at nearly 12 mph, slightly faster than a blazing 5:10 minute mile. In 2003, Kenyan Paul Tergat broke the men’s record at an even faster 2:04:55.
But for Average Joe and Jane, the marathon more closely resembles a 26.2 mile hike across asphalt, peppered with a slower perseverance of trials and joys.
Like many students in the marathon class, junior psychology major Meredith Rodriguez never ran competitively in high school, but she stepped up to the challenge.
“I want to be able to say I’ve done it,” she said. “And people will say, ‘Wow, you’re hardcore.’ I want to show I can do it.”
The L.A. Marathon is a perfect illustration of the diversity of participants: picture a smattering of the West Coast’s finest distance runners tucked in front of tens of thousands of weekend warriors and fresh-faced first-timers.
Marathons appeal to all kinds of people: moms, wiry gray-bearded gents and middle schoolers in matching T-shirts. (In 2002, a man even ran the L.A. Marathon in a “Fuzzy the Bear” mascot costume.)
Avid marathoner and math professor Dr. Kendra Killpatrick said she has witnessed “huge change in demographics” since her first race nine years ago. Far more women run and more people race-walk, she said.
“You don’t have to look like a runner; there’s every body type and fitness level,” she said. “Average people do it.”
This is the marathon’s draw to everyman.
“A lot of people put it on my ‘10 Things to Do Before I Die’ list,” she said, explaining that for most, a marathon seems just enough out of reach to be enticing, difficult, yet attainable.
That’s what drew Killpatrick to the Twin Cities Marathon nearly a decade ago. This Sunday she will return to Minnesota to run the course that traverses from Minneapolis to St. Paul — her 16th marathon to date.
Kilpatrick said marathons taught her about strength.
“When I turned 30, I realized I’m in so much better shape than when I turned 20,” she said. “Running is so empowering.”
Anderson said, from what he’s witnessed and from his experiences running and training for marathons, the hardest part is just waking up for Wednesday’s long runs. But then the camaraderie of training with a group takes over and becomes fun. He recalled a group of Hawaiian students who ran with music, laughing and talking the whole way.
“That’s what the program is all about,” he said.
Facts:
– Fastest Women’s Time: Paula Radcliffe, Great Britain, 2 hours 15 minutes 25 seconds
– Fastest Men’s Time: Paul Tergat, Kenya, 2 hours 4 minutes 55 seconds
– Both records set in 2003.
– What does that mean? Radcliffe ran a speed nearly 12 mph slightly faster than 5:10 minute miles.
History of the Marathon:
Why is a marathon 26.2 miles long? Here’s a little history lesson:
The early Olympics Games brought together Greece’s fastest and fiercest competitors every four years to celebrate Zeus through their athletic prowess. Back then, their idea of a foot race included running around the Olympic stadium 24 times (a distance of about three miles).
The ancient Greeks were familiar with long distance running, but as their postal service, not their prime arena for competition.
Then, in 490 B.C. the massive Persian army attacked the city of Marathon, Greece. Though the odds were against them, the feisty Greeks routed the invaders and dispatched a messenger to the capital city-state to proclaim victory.
Legend says when the messenger reached Athens, he had enough breath to proclaim, “Rejoice, we conquer,” and then fell to the ground from exhaustion.
The Olympics had a hiatus of nearly 1500 years after Roman emperor Theodosius banned all non-Christian celebrations in 394 A.D., including the pesky Olympics.
The marathon race finally appeared thanks to the imagination of two Frenchmen.
When aristocrat Pierre de Coubertin revived the Olympics in the late 19th century, another French man named Michel BrŽal suggested including a race modeled after the legendary run from Marathon to Athens. Ever since the first Games in 1896, the marathon has been the final track and field event.
Excited observers brought the race back to New England, establishing the annual Boston Marathon in 1897, which became arguably the most prestigious marathon competition in the world.
So why the 26.2 miles? The actual distance from Marathon to Athens was closer to 25 miles. But at the 1908 London Olympics, officials tweaked the 25 mile distance, enabling the race to start at Windsor Castle and end in front of the Royal Box. This slightly longer 26.2 mile distance was officially adopted in 1921 and marathoners have suffered the extra 1.2 miles ever since.
Sources: Olympic Marathon, by Charlie Lovett, Microsoft Encarta Encyclopedia and www.marathonguide.com.
09-30-2004
