Posted on 10/12/2004 6:53:56 PM PDT by Land_of_Lincoln_John
Before I take up the amusing little matter of whether John Kerry’s claim of having run the Boston Marathon is true, let me share some relevant personal background:
I am married to a long-distance runner. As any similarly situated spouse or significant other will tell you, runners are statistics freaks. Over the course of our 11-year-marriage (and nearly three years of courtship beforehand), I have had to listen to the stories behind every race and notable run my hubby has undertaken--from the fun runs he ran as a kid to every college steeplechase race to every community 5k and 10k race he has run in Los Angeles, Seattle, and the D.C. area. I have had to hear time and again about the training regimens before the races, the weather conditions on the day of each race, what was eaten before each run, and, of course, the times of each run.
But that’s not all. Runners aren’t only obsessed with their own times and performances. They’re obsessed with everyone else’s times and performances, too. My hubby, like most serious runners, is a font of running trivia. Want to know what the splits were for the winner of the Chicago Marathon in 1985? Or who the most recent American distance runner to win an Olympic medal was? Or the name of the first female finisher in the Boston Marathon in 1980? You get the idea.
So, anyway, the b.s. detector of my husband and many other runners went crazy when Kerry told sports reporters that he had run the Boston Marathon. This is a significant athletic achievement, if true. There is no official record of him having run, however, and the November issue of Runner's World reports that "he doesn't recall his time...”
No record of him having run? That means that if Kerry ran, he did so unofficially. In the running community, this is considered a major no-no. Unofficial runners do not pay to run (the costs involved in hosting a marathon are not trivial); they have a tendency to line up at the starting line ahead of registered runners; and they increase the likelihood of error in the recording of finishing times of registered runners. Running unofficially at Boston in the 1970s or 1980s would have been an especially egregious breach of runners’ etiquette because it was the nation’s most prestigious race and entry was limited to those who had met a tough qualifying time.
Doesn’t recall the year he ran? It’s possible, but the year of the race could easily be inferred from details Kerry should be able to remember. If he ran in 1977, he would remember the heat (nearly 80 degrees). If he ran in 1978, he would probably remember hearing about the close finish (two seconds between first and second places). If he ran in 1979, he would remember the cold, drizzly weather (40 degrees) and the American Records set by the winning man and woman. If he ran in 1980, he would definitely remember the Rosie Ruiz scandal.
Doesn’t recall his time? As I say, runners remember everything. And they never let you forget it either.
Football Fans for Truth has more here. Blue States for Bush weighs in here. And Eric Zorn, Chicago Tribune columnist, had these thoughts on his blog:
My nose began to twitch at Kerry's apparent inability to recall the year of his first marathon--a very unlikely memory lapse given the intensity of the training experience.
If Kerry really ran this race, then Hillary Clinton is telling the truth about being named about Sir Edmund Hillary. The claims are equally incredible.
Meanwhile, President Bush’s impressive running record is here. 3:44:52 for the Houston Marathon. Whew! How do you like them apples, John?
Update: Reader Blaine Alvarez-Backus, who is himself an accomplished marathoner, writes:
[Y]ou're spot-on about runners. I've done Boston, New York, Chicago, LA, Vermont, Twin Cities, Houston, and a bunch of smaller marathons to small to even mention, and I can remember the weather, what I wore, how I felt and what my times were. Kerry might have run the first 5 or 10k of Boston, but he sure as hell didn't run it, or even run a qualifying time in either a half-marathon of a full marathon for it!
Most of my readers agree that running the Boston Marathon as a bandit would be improper. Dr. David Shimm disagrees:
While I share your opinion that Kerry is a serial liar and I think he is a sociopath, I should point out that running in the Boston Marathon as an unregistered "bandit" was hardly a "major no-no," at least in the 70's thru early 80's (when I lived there). In fact, I even had a friend who ran a qualifying time fast enough to be an official entrant, but chose to run as a bandit to protest what he felt were exclusionary qualifying rules.
For more commentary on politics and running, check out this piece on the great miler Jim Ryun, which I wrote a few years ago after ESPN neglected to include Ryun among its "Congressional Athletes of the Century."
2 weeks ago a caller to the Howie Carr Show said he saw Kerry barely finish a 5k road race in 1979.
name in title requires photos
The Bush 1993 link doesn't seem to work within the post, so try to cut and paste this: http://www.runnersworld.com/footnotes/gwbush/racingrecord.html
"...they have a tendency to line up at the starting line ahead of registered runners;"
Hmmm, sounds a lot like something Kerry would do, it's the "little people" vs the "don't you know who I am?" people.
Kidding aside, I totally agree with Ms. Malkin on this one, having a brother who is a marathon runner.
Doesn’t recall the year he ran?
You would think that memory would be seared -- SEARED -- into him.
 Hollywood, CA - October 12, 2004 -- Woody Allen - actor, director and producer - stands beside presidential candidate John Kerry to announce the formation of new Hollywood group, "$¢UM for John F'in Kerry". When questioned on the need for yet another organization of entertainment celebrities supporting this candidacy, Woody replied, "I think the efforts of those groups may have been premature. We intent to mount our effort for a late surge." F'in Kerry rose to occasion and reponded "Reporting For Duty!" |
"Doesn’t recall the year he ran?
You would think that memory would be seared -- SEARED -- into him."
Yeah, yeah, that's the ticket. . . .
eeeewwwwww
John Kerry in the "Martha's Vineyard Jellyfish Scare Marathon"...
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That is impressive. What's more impressive is that I don't recall him bragging about it.
first, MM is cute.
Kerry may invented the Marathon. He was also in the first Superbowl(ice bowl)and pitched a no hitter in the 1974 World Series.
Who are any of you or me to question such an outstanding jackas#?
Baby Edwards knows Kerry ran the marathon in Boston, he still has his jock strap.
Kerry not knowing his time in the marathon is like not remembering where you spent the first night of your honeymoon.
Anyone out there checking on Kerry's altar boy story? Bet that one is a lie, too.
No kidding. Still, you have some good people(and dumb) in mass numbers voting for this jackrabbit.
Ahhh, it wasn't Kerry running the Marathon, it was his family's run.
When asked what the biggest deer was that he had claimed to have killed, he replied:
"Oh, I don't know, an 8 pointer, maybe?"
Everybody that has ever killed a deer remembers his biggest.
I've killed over 200 (I spent three years as an MP Game Warden with a 92 day season with a buck a day bag limit.) in 36 years of hunting and I will never forget the biggest deer I killed.
It was a 9 point, was 3 and a half years old, weighed 223 lbs on the hoof, killed on Flack Lumber Company property, on the Pea River in south Alabama, December of 76.
It's stomach contained mushrooms, gallberrys, acorns and rape browse.
I have to assume Kerry is so damned important and busy in his life that he simply goes out, crawls around on his belly and kills a deer (with his double barrel shotgun, don't ya know) that his assistants take care of from there on out.
As I said, Kerry is a horse's ass.
He is not a friend to the sportsman hunter and his interest in sports and athletics is purely political.
The doofus dumbass is an embarrassment to the dimlibs and the best thing anyone could do for the ignorant, elitist, limousine liberal POS is give him a one-way ticket to France.
Make that two, so that sweat hog Terayza can go with him.
And I don't care if he is a US Senator and I'm a retired senior Noncommissioned Officer of the US Army. He does not have my respect and even if he won the election with a 80% plurality (fat chance!), I would still let the world know that I think he is a treasonous, lying, self-aggrandizing, stinking, liberal Kennedy-esque POLITICIAN, beneath my contempt.
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