This has been a very difficult post for me to create. I never thought it would be, but I have been thinking about it for almost two weeks now. College was a very disappointing, frustrating and confusing time for me. I didn’t become a national class runner. I didn’t make it to the Olympics. I didn’t improve any of my times from high school. I graduated from Seton Hall with a degree in social sciences, a minor in English and the required minor in theology/ philosophy. I’m very thankful to Seton Hall University and Coach John Gibson for the opportunity to attend the college for four years with no payments. I actually enjoyed the academic classes in college. Philosophy, history, government, politics and classical literature were all interesting to me. I learned how to write. I learned how to think logically. And I graduated with a teaching certificate that allowed me to get a job thanks to a wise counselor who transferred me into Department of Education as I ended my junior year. All athletes were required to have their schedule approved by a counselor for each semester. I think that is a very wise policy.
But running was a totally different matter. Let’s just say that in for years of college I never beat a single workout. My muscles were constantly sore and I was frequently too seriously injured to train. As an 18 year old I never figured out why this was so. Strangely, I haven’t thought much about it for over 50 years. That may have been just acceptance of defeat, or possibly just repression . So, when I started writing this blog and decided to talk about my history as a runner, I had to go back and think about what happened in college. I now have about 40 years of experience as a coach to draw upon to try to help explain this turn of events. So here goes.
This may be a bit long so you may choose to completely avoid reading it. But I want to put it on paper for myself.
In the two recruiting classes of 1960 & 61 Coach Gibson had brought in 9 half milers who had run 1:58 or better in high school and myself at 1:59 flat. I was a classic cross-country runner. I never broke :53.5 for a 440. That was running from start to finish full out. I spent four years running incredibly difficult workouts designed for middle distance runners who run 1:53 for the 880. My conclusion is today that those workouts did nothing but shred my long fiber, slow twitch, distance running muscles. Five of the guys recruited in those two classes did run 1:53 or better before graduation . The other five of us never improved one second. I would run the first few intervals of these workouts with those very fast guys and then my calf muscles would seize and I had to quit the workout. Coach Gibson came to the conclusion that I was not trying very hard. He told me that I should appreciate more the opportunity that the university was giving me to get a free college education. He also told me that my brother, John, threw up on the track every day during his workout for 4 years while he was at Seton Hall , every day! That, I am sure he concluded, was a demonstration of someone who appreciateed his scholarship. So, I tried harder and continued to fail, constsntly exhausted. It is truly a sad story. I’m not sure if I realized how sad at the time, but I know I was very depressed. I even trained on my own down at Lincoln Park on days off hoping maybe I could catch up. But it wasn’t to be.
This brings us to the title of the post today. I never beat a single workout in 4 years of college. Every day I left practice defeated, exhausted and discouraged. Unlike in High School, I dreaded going out to practice each day. I have to say the guys on the team were great to me. Every time I nearly completed a full practice they would encourage me and tell me I was getting better and things ware going to get better. They were all very nice young men. I left college still loving track but disappointed in my own career.
There is a happy ending though. Eight years later I became a running coach. I vowed that my athletes would never be ‘beaten’ by a workout. It is a policy I have followed for 40 years, and I believe the results speak for themselves.
During my coaching career I have had the pleasure and honor of coaching some of the most outstanding High School distance runners in the state of New Jersey. Four of them Andy Martin, Brad Hudson, Brendan Heffernan and Chris Robinson won the New Jersey Meet of Champions. Brendan was also National Champion . One thing all of these guys had in common was they could not break 53 seconds for 400 meters and ran 800 metres just under two minutes. They were classic distance runners like me. Now I am self- coaching my 70+ slow twitch muscles and having a blast.
Further details of my coaching career will follow in the next history post.
Monday, March 28, sunny , 84, humidity 70% , Nice day.