I WAS SLATED TO DOUBLE in the 800 and 1600 in the first meet of the track season on Saturday at the Webster Groves Dan Sebben Invitational. Curtis would run the 3200, the next-to-last event of the day. We left early from school, and athletes segregated themselves on the bus by events. Sprinters, hurdlers, and jumpers occupied the back of the bus, and throwers spanned the middle. Most guys used the journey to catch a few more winks or to zone out to music on their headphones.
Curtis and I got wedged into the front of the bus, sandwiched between Stuper and Rosenthal in the seat ahead of us and Koprovika and Isenberg behind us. I sipped from a thermos of coffee as Curtis lectured me on the nuances of track.
“Track is a completely different animal, Leo,” he told me. “Guys who couldn’t catch me on the cross-country course last fall can kick my ass on the oval. And I can accept that, knowing that I can still look in the mirror each night and remind myself that I am the reigning state cross-country champion,” he said sagely.
I lifted my thermos to him. “Long live the king,” I toasted. “You sound a little melodramatic. Shouldn’t you be a little more confident?”
“Young Leo, my mission during my time on this planet was completed in November,” he told me.
I laughed.
“Oh, don’t you worry, Leo. Alas, I, too, will have brief, fleeting moments of glory this track season,” he told me. “But my finely tuned machine was designed to conquer distances longer than the mere thirty-two hundred meters offered by a track competition. And much more challenging terrain than the flat four-hundred-meter oval.”
“Is that right?”
“That I know for sure,” he said. “However, young Leo, you might just have a shot at excelling at track’s glory event. So I do bequeath the oval kingdom to you.”
I humored him. “Tell me more, o wise one.”
“The 1600. The metric mile. The marquee event for track aficionados the world over. Sprint enthusiasts might beg to differ, but runners of our ilk believe the mile is the true demarcation of athletic supremacy on the track oval, for it requires both speed and stamina.”
“Qualities you think I now possess?”
“Mind you, I can certainly kick your ass in any longer distance, Leo.”
“You never fail to remind me.”
“But you have the tools to dominate this race. You’re strong enough, and you’ve got raw speed.”
“So why not the 800? It seems a whole lot easier to run two laps versus four.”
“Don’t flatter yourself,” he said, laughing. “You’re fast, but you’re not that fast.”
“Seriously, what’s your real advice for today?” I asked him.
“When the gun goes off, run as fast as you can.”
“That simple?”
“Yep. It’s your first track race, Leo. Just run and learn.”
Things were looking up in Curtis’s world. The previous week he’d finally made a commitment to run at Haverford College in Pennsylvania. Although he was tempted by an offer from a small college in the Rocky Mountains, he told me he’d decided to consider his life beyond running. Haverford had a top-notch Division III cross-country program and excellent academics, a perfect match for him. The school had a pretty hefty price tag, but they managed to assemble a package for him that he couldn’t turn down.
The bus dumped us out beside the track. We schlepped our bags to a section of bleachers, then ran a few slow laps to shake out the cobwebs from the bus ride.
The track oval felt like a three-ring circus. High jumpers were at one end of the tarmac, marking their steps with white medical tape, and the long jumpers did the same on a slice of runway adjacent to the homestretch. On the opposite side, pole-vaulters were gauging the precise location for their takeoffs. And on the far corners, the throwers stood around concrete rings heaving shots and discs. While some sprinters executed drills over a compressed sequence of hurdles set up on the backstretch, others just hung out in the bleachers listening to headphones and tightening spikes. Some guys did nothing at all but lie on benches with closed eyes, trying to absorb a little warmth from a sun still making its way up the sky on a chilly April morning.
“Nervous?” Curtis asked.
I surveyed the scene again. “I am now. There are a hell of a lot more people here than at your typical cross-country meet.”
“The track oval is an athletic stage,” Curtis noted grandly. “Unlike cross-country, you’re on display for everyone, my friend.” He swept one hand across the entire venue. “Consider this your grand debut.”
The 1600 was the fourth event, following a relay and a couple of sprints. I was a mess. The butterflies were beating against the walls in my stomach, and by the time they announced the first call for the 1600, I tasted the orange juice I drank three hours ago snaking its way up into my throat.
I was going nearly out of my mind before my race when I spotted Mary across the track. She was looking supercool but relaxed in her old faded jeans, black Chucks, and a gray hoodie. I waved and jogged over to her. “What are you doing here?”
She rolled her eyes at me. “I came to watch those big thugs over there whip heavy objects,” she said, nodding toward the shot ring. “What do you think I’m doing here, Leo? I came to watch you run.”
“You didn’t have to come all the way out here to see me run a mile.”
She stepped forward, put her arms around me, and pressed her nose to mine. “I wanted to come, Leo. Why can’t you just be okay with that? I don’t care if you’re running for only five minutes. I like to watch you.”
“Hopefully it will be less than five minutes,” I told her with a grin.
She kissed me quickly. “Good luck,” she whispered in my ear.
“I’ve got to get ready,” I finally said to her before starting my last warm-up, one that included a quick pit stop behind an equipment shed to puke up what was left of my breakfast.
The meet director kept the order and the tempo of the day with clarity and precision. The announcements for first, second, and final calls for track and field events were constant. When I heard the last call for the 1600, I did one last stride on the backstretch, then jogged over to the starting line and checked in with the marshal. The morning air was still crisp and cold, so I kept my sweats on until the last minute.
They crammed twenty-four of us onto the curved line, three to a lane for a waterfall start. I looked up into the bleachers and spotted Dad sitting alone two rows in front of Mom6. My heart was pounding and my gut was churning. I reminded myself to get out quick and not get boxed in by the pack, but when the pistol cracked and the race started, it was clear that every other guy in the race had a plan just as urgent as mine. We ran as a herd, flailing knees and elbows, stretching hands, tapping and shoving shoulders and fists, in order to keep balance and hold position. After two hundred meters the pack thinned out a bit, and I was able to thread my way to the front with five other guys. A space opened and I lengthened my stride and focused on breathing. The butterflies were gone. Now I was locked in and just running.
We passed through the first lap, and the counter on the inside posted a large number three, a reminder of how many laps remained. A timer inside the rail showed the seconds that had elapsed so far: 67…68…69…70.
I saw Curtis at the turn, standing beside Koprovika and Isenberg, who was gripping his discus in one hand and a hot dog in the other.
“It’s slow, Leo!” Curtis screamed. “Pick it up.”
I thought the pace felt a hell of a lot faster than any cross-country race, so I hung with the pack another lap, only to be yelled at again by Curtis as we passed through the half in 2:16. “You’ve got to be kidding me, Coughlin,” he wailed.
Part of me was tempted to tell Isenberg to smack Curtis in the head with the discus, but instead I decided to find some guts and take the lead. I waited until we completed the first curve, surged to the outside until I had a couple of strides on the pack, then slipped back in along the rail. Since no one went with me, I held my position and didn’t press the pace. I stayed strong and calm as we ran the back turn, then accelerated as I strode into the homestretch. The lap counter on the infield signaled just one more to go. As we approached the final lap, the clanging bell pierced my ears. I didn’t hear a split, Curtis’s voice…anything. But some of the other runners must have gotten juiced on adrenaline from the sound of the bell, because suddenly three of them swallowed me. It was like the race was starting all over again.
Before I knew it, I had slipped back into fourth. I was looking at the backs of three guys who couldn’t touch me during the cross-country season. I wondered what the hell was going on, but I didn’t hesitate to react. I slowed a bit to give the pack some room and then veered to the outside so I could pass again on the first turn. When I heard Curtis yell, I second-guessed myself but continued to accelerate. By the time we hit the backstretch I had a five-meter gap on the pack, but I also got slapped by a nasty headwind that came out of nowhere. I held my lead until the turn and then heard the rumble of the pack closing in. My shoulders tightened, and my legs felt like the blood inside was turning into sludge.
The pack caught me on the curb, and three runners eased by me. I could see the finish line now, just a hundred meters ahead, and I was able to dig deep enough to hang tight to the back of the bunch. But with fifty meters left, two runners dropped an extra gear and pulled away. I managed to pass one guy and finished third in 4:32.
I staggered ten meters past the finish line, bent over, grabbed my knees for support, and gasped for oxygen. “Not bad, Leo,” Curtis said, lifting my arms from behind so I could stand upright.
“That didn’t look like too much fun,” Isenberg commented, taking a bite from his hot dog.
“It wasn’t,” I said, wheezing. “It totally sucked.”
“Switch to discus,” he told me. “Just three throws—I didn’t even break a sweat.”
“And you didn’t make the finals, where you’d have the grueling task of throwing three more times,” Curtis informed him. “Maybe you would have broken a sweat then.”
Isenberg gnawed some more on his hot dog and considered Curtis’s insult. “I’m content with my debut,” he finally answered.
“Keep walking, buddy,” Curtis encouraged me.
“I’ll see you guys later,” Isenberg said. “I’ve walked far enough today.”
“I don’t get it,” I whined to Curtis. “I killed those guys in cross-country. Today they’re right with me. And we trained all winter.”
“What you learned just now is that you ran a respectable 4:32 1600. And hopefully what you’ll remember is that there are plenty of other guys who can do that, too.” He laughed. “Start wrapping your head around that.”
I looked up into the stands and spotted Mom and Dad and gave them a simple thumbs-up that I was okay.
“How come your parents don’t sit next to each other?” he asked me.
“I don’t know,” I told him. “How come your parents don’t even show up?”
“Touché.”
I gathered up my sweats, and Curtis joined me for a slow jog to shake out the lactic acid in my legs. “If you run this race twenty seconds faster, nobody will touch you,” he told me.
It took a moment to process. My legs began to come back to life, but my lungs still felt roasted. “How am I going to do that?”
“Your first lap was pathetic, Leo,” he reminded me. “As a matter of fact, so were the second and third.” He was now laughing again. “You’ve just got to run faster. Go from the gun. It’s as simple as that.”
We jogged in silence for a few minutes. “I don’t know, Curtis,” I finally told him. “That really hurt.”
“It’s always going to hurt. How much pain are you willing to take?”
Curtis put in a far more impressive performance than I did in his season debut. Despite his sad soliloquy earlier that morning, he won the 3200 easily. Granted, the competition wasn’t as stiff as in the 1600, but he still outpaced the rest of the field easily by nearly twenty-five seconds.
Track was a completely different animal. I got my ass handed to me that day in the 1600, and again in the 800. It didn’t help at all that Mary had shown up to witness it.
She hung out until after the meet, wanting to give me a ride home. Curtis took our bags and tossed them in her car. “We’re running back to school,” he told her. “Lover boy won’t be available for another hour.”
I looked at Curtis, and I looked at Mary sitting comfortably in her car. “Sorry, Curtis,” I told him. “You’re running this one alone. I got beat up enough today.”
“You’re getting soft, Coughlin,” he chided.
“I promise extra miles tomorrow,” I said as I slammed the door.
“Leo Coughlin standing up for himself!” Mary laughed as we left Curtis in the parking lot. “Never thought I’d see the day.”
“I probably should be running, but I’m trashed,” I admitted.
“Let’s do something,” she said.
“I’m sorry, Mary, but I promised my parents I’d pick up Caleb from swimming. He’s at the Mid-County Y.”
She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. By now I knew that meant that her mind was at work. “Let’s pick him up now, then pick your car up at school,” she offered. “I’ll follow you to your house. That way we gain at least an hour.”
“There’s one slight glitch in that plan.”
“What’s that?” she asked.
“Caleb might have an issue if we arrive early and cut into his swimming time.”
She dismissed my concern. “No worries. I’ll handle it.”
I spotted Caleb launching off the high dive, doing his signature corkscrew, when we arrived. From the balcony waiting area, I let Mary observe Caleb’s routine for a few minutes. Of course, the window provided a noise barrier, so Mary missed the sound element of Caleb’s performance. Still, she looked pretty bewildered. “That’s quite an impressive display,” she remarked.
“My father describes it as a unique combination of athleticism and performance art.”
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything like it.”
“You’re not alone, Mary. He has perfected this high-dive routine over the years, and he’s made it truly one of a kind.” “What is he yelling?”
“You don’t want to know.” Caleb tended to scream his deepest, darkest confessions while in midflight, but I figured Mary didn’t need that information.
We watched him jump a few more times.
“I’ll go get him,” she finally said.
“Good luck with that.”
Caleb spotted Mary on the deck as he climbed out of the deep end. He ran over to her and said something while pointing to the diving board. Then he scrambled up the ladder and thundered off the board, this time without screaming. She applauded when he surfaced, encouraging him to continue.
I watched as he plunged into the water and lingered below the surface. I wondered why he loved swimming so much. Was it the moment of impact and splash? Did he simply love moving in a liquid medium? Or maybe it was because water provided him with a nearly noiseless world, where vision blurred and there were few distractions?
After Caleb’s fifth jump, Mary met him at the ladder and said a few words to him. He calmly collected his towel and disappeared into the locker room. Somehow she had convinced him to cut his pool time by twenty minutes. Astonishing.
“What did you say to him?” I asked her when she returned.
“I just asked him if he wouldn’t mind if we left a little early.”
“That’s it?”
She put her arms around me and smiled. “Leo, I don’t think what I said had anything to do with it. I think it’s how I said it.”
“You need to teach me how to do that.”
“No,” she answered, wrinkling her nose. “I need for you to take a shower.”
“That seems like a fair deal.”