The Logic of Long Distance

"Lewis, give me words."   --Ashton Eaton to NBC announcer Lewis Johnson, shortly after breaking the decathlon world record The Olympics is on everyone's mind in the running world. Though I wasn't able to watch the 10,000m trials, I did manage to follow it pretty well by refreshing on the letsrun.com message board. I'm psyched to see that Ritz and Teg made the team along with Rupp (who of course was the favorite) as I count those guys as part of my generation. (1) Though I never approached the elite levels of the sport, I guess I got close enough to understand just how extraordinary these runners are. When I watch swimming or gymnastics or the NBA finals, I am impressed by the athletes, inspired by their efforts, and I can see the spark of athletic genius. But when I watch the distance runners, that genius comes through in a way that is simultaneously more intimate and less understandable, if that makes any sense at all. As David Foster Wallace ex...

Schiller was the only handsome philosopher. "We know that man is neither exclusively matter nor exclusively spirit. Accordingly, beauty, as the consummation of humanity, can be neither exclusively mere life, as has been asserted by sharp-sighted observers, who kept too close to the testimony of experience, and to which the taste of time would gladly degrade it; Nor can beauty be merely form, as has been judged by speculative sophists, who departed too far from experience, and by philosophic artists, who were led too much by the necessity of art explaining beauty; it is rather the common object of both impulses, that is, of the play instinct." --Schiller, "Letters Upon the Aesthetic Education of Man" "As in Puritan New England, grace was not blithely attained. A believer--a runner--earned it by losing toenails and training down to bone and muscle, just as the Puritans formed calluses on their knees from praying. No one made a cent from their strenuous effo...

Bridge across Richland Creek I run the same five miles pretty much every morning. The beginning of the loop takes me through my neighborhood in West Nashville. Our part of town is half-industrial, half residential. Colonial-style houses from the 1920s mix with warehouses and rebuilt ranches from the late 70s. I start south on the road just west of the busiest street, 52nd Ave. It is straight, and though there are a few stop signs the traffic is light enough for me to keep my rhythm through the intersections. A half mile ahead, 52nd Ave is cross cut somewhat violently by the mad and throbbing whirl of concrete overpasses that is I-40. I duck left one block, then head under a pigeon shit encrusted overpass. Usually I can cross the next couple of streets without breaking stride, and a quarter mile later I am at the intersection with Charlotte Ave. Here, I stop and wait for the cross lights. By this point the creakiness of early morning has worn off, and I've adjusted to the ear...

ESPN recently published its body issue, which has some  pretty amazing photos of athletes in the nude . The pictures are a reminder of how the activities that we do form and shape our bodies--and how our bodies also move us to certain activities. Runners are pretty body-conscious folks. This can be positive and negative. Being more attuned to our bodies means that we are more reflective about what we put into them, how they are resting, whether they are gaining or losing weight, how they look in a mirror, etc. This attentiveness to the body can be healthy. It can also be unhealthy, as the high incidence of eating disorders among competitive runners sadly attests. One way to frame this attention to the body is through the concept of control. Distance runners are, in a certain sense, making an effort to control their bodies. Through training we sculpt and shape the body around a very particular purpose: running fast over a long distance. As every runner knows, the body is not a...