Thousand Miles to Salamanca

My Thousand Miles Part 2

Where did the last 11 years go? I thought. And during this period of reflection, spring of 2004, I started thinking about patterns that started to pop up. Was my unwillingness to stay in shape indicative of some character traits of mine?

Then I dug in a little further. Are we pre-determined to repeat patterns? One memory in particular really made me think about my dedication and commitment to things. I remember one specific track meet...


It was a cool spring night in Salamanca, NY. I was a senior in high school and was there for a meet. It wasn’t just any track meet ; it was the Super 8 Invitational. The Super 8 was an invitation only event where only the top 8 runners in each event were selected to compete based on previous times up to that point in the season. Runners were selected from three counties in the Southern Tier: Chautauqua, Cattaraugus and Allegany.

I had been to this meet once before, that was the previous year where I ran the best mile of my life, a 4:44. This time I was invited to run the half-mile. I was the eighth invite, barely made it. Yes, my 2:06 half-mile was good enough to get me into the meet and I was happy to be there.

It was one of those nights where just the right breeze could make your hair stand up . The lights were on and I could hear the loudspeaker calling out first call, second call and final call for all the events.

I had my gold yellow jersey on and a diagonal red stripe crossed the front of my jersey. Along the red stripe was the letters Olean right across it. I had my red hooded sweatshirt above my jersey and had a pair of light blue shorts over the top of my red uniform shorts. I was wearing my spikes where I had my eighth-inch spikes in. In my right hand was a thirty-two ounce bottle of Gatorade. I was sipping on it as I waited for the loudspeaker to announce the first call for the 800 meter. I waited nervously and occasionally got up to jog about fifty yards and jog right back to my spot to sit down.

“First call, 800 meter. First call, 800 meter. Please report to the tent,” the announcer said.

I sprang up from our teams spot on the Junior High lawn and started walking over to the tent.

“Good luck,” my teammates shouted as I headed on. I turned around and waved and gave them a half-smirk. I walked over towards the bleachers and weaved past the parents, grandparents and friends. Unfortunately my parents couldn’t make it, my mom was sick at the time. I walked past the fence in between the bleachers and the track and followed it all the way to the bottom of the track towards the concession stand.

I walked over to the tent and sat down in the first row in one of the chairs. I was the first one there and periodically other half-milers would trickle in and fill-in the empty chairs. I knew most of them. These were the guys I ran against year after year. In particular there was this six-foot-two guy in a maroon uniform. The official came in shortly after the second call and read off the role to see if everyone was there. My name was called last--eighth.

He told us how it would go. We’ve all heard this a thousand times. They got us together before hand just to keep the schedule running smoothly. Finally, we made our way out of the tent and towards the starting line.

We got a breeze that sent chills up my already twitching arms. I looked down at the track as I walked up towards the starting line. The other runners were jogging back and forth. I just stared at the ground. I got up to the starting line and jogged in place for thirty seconds or so. I reached down and took my shorts off, the outer layer and threw them over to the side by the fence. I jogged in place some more and took off my sweatshirt and threw them on top of my shorts. The announcer was reading off names and lining us up accordingly on the marginally staggered starting line. I was the furthest on the outside.

“Runners set,” the announcer yelled. I leaned forward onto my right foot and then I heard the shot. “Boom.” The race started. I sprinted out and fought like hell to stay with the pack. We were all right together through the second turn of the first lap. I was still in the third lane of the track. The difference between the lead runner and the last runner was only five yards. We were all right on top of each other. We sprinted down the backstretch of lap one, still in the same clump. I was now on the outside of the second lane, still, the pack didn’t thin out. Turn three came, same thing. Still together. I was on the outside of the pack. The lead runner was three feet in front of me to my left. We sprinted down the stretch of lap one.

“Fifty-four, fifty-five, fifty-six,” I heard as we sprinted by the starting line. Those were our splits.

“Fast lap,” I thought to myself. The pack was still together and I was getting boxed out on turn one of lap two. Finally I got sick of being box out and sprinted like hell after turn two and fought to get position in lane one. I had run the first 500 yards in the outside lanes. That guy with the maroon jersey was boxing me out so I challenged him. He took the challenge and continued boxing me out. I sprinted like hell. I was right on his shoulder, right on his shoulder. We passed the pack and I was in lane one with a little over 200 yards to go.

“1:27, 1:28, 1:29,” I heard the caller calling off the splits.

“Holy shit, I’m on track to break two minutes with less than 200 meters to go.” I thought about it for fifteen steps. Then I slowed down. “I’m not that good.” So I slowed down more. My arms became heavy; I was weak and down the last stretch it was all I could do to finish the race.

I got sixth, a 2:06, again. I gave up on myself. I didn’t think I deserved to be there. So I didn’t. I gave up. I never broke 2 minutes.



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posted by Gray @ 8:29 PM