Just when I thought I was out they pull me back in. – Michael Corleone
My Narrative About Boston ’73
By Jeff Galloway
Unexpectedly qualifying for the Munich Olympic team in 1972, I went directly into full-time teaching. This also meant few opportunities for travel to races. I continued my twenty miles a day, which required running ten miles in the dark every morning. After a day of trying to keep my class energized about learning, I was so tired I would lay down on the bed, wanting to take a nap. But there were lesson plans, papers to grade, etc. I would put on my Nikes and shuffle out the door for my second ten-miler.
My running goals that kept me trying to push the track workouts and long runs on the weekend were 1) Boston and 2) racing in the National Track Championships in Bakersfield in June. But during the first four months of ’73 none of my key 10K workouts on the track had been successful. In each case, I would reach a point where I couldn’t maintain the pace that was standard during the last two years. So, I would run into the nearby parks and neighborhoods and run “speed play” or fartlek.
So, I bought the Boston ticket to give myself a sense of commitment. For a week, I looked at each workout as a stepping stone to a great race in Boston. I visualized being on the Boston course, segment by segment. At the end of each workout I selected an uphill similar to Heartbreak hill, picking up the pace without excessive breathing and then I glided rapidly downhill, focusing on running smooth – and strong.
After having experienced an amazing year in 1972, this “year after” was not coming together—and expectations seemed to slip away. My chosen career of teaching was not working out. I missed having a female friend to do things together. Because I had no vacation days, I couldn’t go to races and hang out with my running friends.
During previous emotional downturns, running and the test of competition had given me an emotional re-set as it turned on the personal empowerment circuit in my brain to confront life’s other challenges. But my “go to” workouts were not working out. So I called up my best friend, Geoff Hollister, who always helped me to focus with a supportive yet real-world perspective. We’d had several talks about my general unhappiness about teaching. When I told him I was thinking about bailing out of Boston, he told me my friend and Olympic 10K teammate Jon Anderson, was going through an emotional low, also.
Jon did not support the USA’s war in Viet Nam. But due to the Selective Service Law, all young men were obligated to be ready to serve in the Armed Services or alternative service. Jon signed up as a “conscientious objector” and chose alternative community service. He was assigned to a menial labor job at a hospital. During Boston Marathon weekend, Jon admitted that he, like me, had gone back and forth between travelling from the west coast to Boston—and was even thinking about retiring from competitive running, but his father bought him a plane ticket.
So many times during my competitive career, it seemed I was heading for a downturn in performance that could mean the end of my career. But at the low point, when I doubted my ability, I would launch myself into a workout or race and receive a rewarding surprise. There was one benchmark workout left on my schedule I knew would be really tough, but would tell me if I was ready: 40 x quarter mile, jogging 110 yards between each. As I left the house to go to the track, I told myself I would cash in the Boston ticket if the workout did not go well.
It was Sunday morning, twenty-two days before Boston – a perfect day for a hard distance workout. I began running 73 seconds for three laps. My custom was to let the pace get a bit faster as the workout progressed, usually settling into 67 to 68 for a pace of about 4:30 per mile. On this day I was into a comfortable groove at 67 to 68 seconds per lap through the 20th lap and, surprisingly, my times began to improve to 65, 64 and 63. I was not pushing, gliding through, feeling the accumulated fatigue but no increase in effort.
A few of my friends on the North Carolina State track team came to do their workout and couldn’t believe I was running before they arrived, and was still doing the workout when they were in the showers. Fitness runners would complete their run and then cheer me on. I had my own fan club during that workout and had never run as well. I glowed for a week knowing that I was in fact, ready for Boston.
My last workout was on Sunday, eight days before the race. It was another perfect weather day for running during the Springtime in Raleigh. I did not intend to run hard and didn’t even bring my watch. First few miles were not smooth but then I found my groove with my feet lightly touching—even on the hills similar to Heartbreak Hill. I felt so good as I approached home that I added a two- mile loop to make the distance about sixteen miles. It was only during the last mile that I felt fatigue—which did not seem significant at the time.
I had looked at the kitchen clock before I left and checked it as I entered the house. I couldn’t believe what I saw: my fastest training run of the year: I had averaged five minutes per mile for sixteen miles.
At first I took this as a sign that I was ready for a great race. But two days later, on an easy morning run I was sluggish. On each successive run, I was more tired.
BOSTON
As I took the long ride to Hopkinton for the start of the 1973 Boston Marathon I knew it would be a tough day—but my kind of day. It was already warm with significant humidity. As I warmed up and chatted with friends, such as Olympic teammate Jon Anderson, I noted my legs were not bouncy. I started to dwell on my “too fast” Sunday run, eight days before and then turned the focus to this as a demonstration of my fitness: five minutes per mile for sixteen miles. I kept telling myself I was ready.
“Mr. New Jersey” Tom Fleming had easily beaten myself, Jon Anderson and Olympic 5K and 10K champion Lasse Viren in the San Blas (Puerto Rico) road race in February, showing he was fit and could handle the heat. I thought my 140 miles a week average would surpass that of my competitors but I was wrong—Tom told me in his out-front-New-Jersey-way his average mileage was fifteen percent higher. This was impressive because, like me, Tom was a teacher and had to rise at “0 dark 30” every morning to get in his first run. And then run into the evening hours for his second workout.
The race was staged out of a high school basketball gym, as all of the participants could gather there. When the announcer made his warning to get to the start line, I told Jon Anderson I was going to “wet down” and he followed me to the water fountain. We soaked our heads and our singlets and looked like drowned rats going to the start.
The competitiveness of the Boston field varies each year. In my two previous races here I had finished eleventh and seventh and had not felt confident about winning. Knowing most of the top runners in this race, and having tested myself against the best in the Olympics, I felt I had a chance to win. I knew what to do: run my “come from behind” race.
After the fast first mile, I let the lead pack move ahead and burn up some of their resources. The thermometer had already risen to 77 degrees Fahrenheit (reported by Tom Derderian in his excellent account of the race in Boston Marathon).
Jon and I ran together and he seemed to be following my lead. We let the leaders, Phillip (Germany), Fleming, and Suomalainen (Finland) move away. Several others followed the trio but we did not think they would be able to stay there. We felt vindicated as we passed each one leading to Wellesley and the halfway point.
My legs did not feel bouncy or strong from the beginning, but I have had some of my best races feeling in a similar way during the early stages. Both of us chatted about the heat, which had to be more of a challenge for Jon than myself.
I was waiting to catch the leaders as we started up the Newton hills toward Heartbreak and felt confident I could do this, even though they had a lead on us of over two minutes. I felt a lot stronger than Jon looked, but when we started up the first of four hills, he moved away from me. I knew how we ran the hills on this day would determine the outcome of the race. Jon was on his way to victory and was/is a good friend. I wished him well.
Jon did exactly what I had planned to do. We had passed Phillip and sighted the Finn and Fleming. I believed running competitively up and down the four Newton hills when our competitors were hot and tired would make the champion. The race was on.
Less than a year before, I used this tactic in the Olympic trials marathon and it worked. I paced my Florida Track Club teammate Jack Bacheler from about 100th place at the one-mile mark to about 60th at five miles, and into third place at twenty-one miles and to the finish together. I dropped back at the finish line, so Jack could be the official qualifier for the Olympic team.
But in April of ’73, my legs did not respond. My willpower was there but the muscle power was not. My exuberant sixteen-miler the week before had taken its toll.
Tom Derderian’s book Boston Marathon has several great details about Jon’s victory.
As Jon approached Fleming, going up Heartbreak Hill, he caught up with the press truck and recognized Dave Prokop and asked how Fleming looked. Prokop said “OK” and Jon took off after him.
Fleming did not think Jon could hold that pace and let Jon have a lead of over two minutes. I was frustrated watching this race develop and not being able to get in it. Fleming “woke up” his competitive drive coming off the hills about four miles from the finish and made up some of that lead—but it was too late. Jon won by a full minute.
The BAA did not control the crowds at the finish line and as Jon approached the banner, he saw a mass of people. No path through. Jon mentioned later he remembered how I had jumped in the steeplechase pit after the Olympic Marathon trials the previous year and looked for something similar: the reflecting pool at Prudential Center. The press corps gathered for this photo moment.
The press officials led Jon to the media room on one of the top floors of the “Pru”. After the last interview, he asked race organizer Jock Semple for a phone to call his father and his new wife. Jock found one and instructed him to call collect.
The next morning Jon walked alone from the Sheraton to the Blue Line station, down flight after flight of stairs—and to the airport. He was back at the hospital the next day, washing dishes.
During my fifteen years of competitive running to that point, I rarely second-guessed my performances. But as I de-briefed myself over the two weeks after Boston, I came to believe I had missed a prime opportunity to win. The most upsetting aspect, I did this to myself by running too hard on the sixteen miler, eight days before the race.
I had made a rookie mistake in my last “race pace” workout, eight days before Boston.
When I had experienced similar setbacks, my usual reaction was to find another goal to boost the spirits and get my competitive juices going. During my two week low mileage recovery period after Boston, an opportunity arrived in the mail. As a 1972 Olympian, I received an invitation to the National Track and Field championships in Bakersfield CA, two months away. The Olympic Committee was paying for my travel and hotel.
This was the boost I needed to reconnect with my Olympic friends, and hopefully get back my national ranking.
But my speed workouts and races left me wondering whether I could still compete on the track at the top level.
I had another tough race in Bakersfield but qualified to race against the Russians in the USSR, the Africans in Africa and other races in Italy and Germany.
It was an amazing summer.