The Black Toenail: The pain of running long

My friend looked at me. There was fear in his eyes.
“Does it hurt?” he asked.
“Does what hurt?” I replied.
“Does it hurt to run a marathon?”
—-
An old friend came to visit last weekend. By “old” I mean that we’ve known each other since he was a teenager, and I was in my early twenties. We trained judo together, and he never fails to mention a beating I administered, which I honestly can’t recall, but there’s no reason to doubt his memory. It is odd how we remember the beating we received and forget the ones we delivered.

It was a fine evening in a fine restaurant with fine red wine. Memories were flowing freely, helped by the drinks. It has been five years since we’ve seen each other last time, and a lot happened in both our lives. He got married, they are expecting a baby. Life sped up in many ways, business-wise and family-wise, and it slowed him down physically. He gained weight, though I tried not to mention it.

On my side, running has become a huge part of life; I shed some 20 lbs (10 kg) since he last saw me, and ran four marathons. Inevitably, the conversation turned to running. I tried a few proven tricks to get him to try, but he just looked at me with glassy eyes. Too much wine, I thought. But, no—it was fear taking hold of him.

Back in our judo days, we subjected our bodies to various kinds of torture for training sake. Running far, with obstacles and speedwork was a part of it. And so my friend removed the glass from his lips after a long pause and said: “I hate running.”

He also developed distaste for gym. So I tried the safe approach: running is easy, it’s natural, it only hurts at the beginning.

It didn’t work.
“I can’t,” he said.
“You can’t…what?” I asked.
“I can’t run. At all. Not even a hundred yards.”

And so I finally understood. Once he was an athlete, a champion in his sport. It must have been horrifying to realize that running to a bus became too tasking.

Then he asked me: “Does it hurt?”
“Does what hurt?” I replied.
“Does it hurt to run a marathon?”

I also understood his fear of pain. In competitors’ sports pain is a part of life. But, once he was removed from such life, he was doing everything possible to avoid pain. And we both knew that one can’t start training without going through the pain of muscles adjusting to the new regimen. There was no point in trying to deceive him.

“I ran marathons that hurt,” I said, “and I ran a few that didn’t. There’s a way to run without pain.”

To start running some people need a nudge, some need a push, and some need a kick in the butt. Some you only need to encourage, some you need to entice, pull by example. My friend is in the last category. It would work if I show up on his door with his running shoes in hands and literally kick him out the door. The problem is of a geographical nature - my foot from Toronto can’t reach his butt in London.

So, I did the only thing I could think of.
“Can I send you a book?” I asked. “But, you must promise you’ll read it.”
He promised.

I’m sending him “Running: Getting Started” by Jeff Galloway. Hopefully, Jeff’s run-walk-run method will ease my friend into once-again active lifestyle. He’ll need it, if nothing else, to chase his toddler around.