Science Article

I have never been a dedicated athlete, but at age 32, I started running for fun with the Hash House Harriers. Every week, I was running with many friends in the dunes and sabkhas around Dubai, in the Arabic Emirates, where I lived. Eight years later, I joined the Schlumberger team to run the Holmenkhole lopet, a relay race around the hills of Oslo, Norway. After having made a couple of 20-km races, I was challenged by my daughter to run 25 km with her. I overbid her and ran 30 km that day. We were in October 1994. The Houston marathon, "just" 12 km longer was in January. I started training, finding out that a marathon is in fact two races: a 20-mile race, then a 6-mile race of equal physical difficulty. I had only one objective, to finish, but as I was running in the race, I found that I could beat Oprah Winfrey's time (4 hours 16 minutes), then a bit later that I could beat the 4 hour limit. I did it. The sense of accomplishment at the finish line was overwhelming.

Very soon after running my first marathon, I was very intrigued that the distance was so precise (26 miles and 385 yards or 42 km and 195 m). Every meter counts. Phidippides, the messenger who set the marathon tradition, ran between the battlefield of Marathon, a small Greek village, to the Acropolis in Athens to announce victory (in Greek, Nike, pronounce Neekee). But how could we remember from which bush or tree on the battlefield he started? at which exact place in the Acropolis he arrived (and incidentally died)? did he take a short cut, etc.… History tells us where the exact distance comes from. In the ancient Olympics, a distance around 25 miles (40 km) was used. Then the new Olympics, started in 1896 also used a 40 km distance.

The distance of 26 miles 385 yards was established at the 1908 Olympic Games in London. According to legend, the British royal family wanted to have, at the same time, the start at Windsor Castle so that King Edward VII's grandchildren could see it, and the finish in front of the royal box at the Olympic stadium so that Queen Alexandra could watch it. So the course was lengthened to accommodate these requests.

This distance was exactly measured and frozen for all forthcoming marathons. In naughty marathon tradition, the runners, in a last second of consciousness, are supposed to scream "God save the queen" (or maybe something a little bit less respectful) when they cross the 40-km mark as we owe the extra distance to the British royal family.

Since 1994, I have encouraged many friends and colleagues to undertake the fantastic adventure to run a marathon. I claim that (almost) everybody can do it. It takes six months of dedication and training to run the first marathon, if you are able to run only three miles even with difficulty (check with your doctor beforehand). Today, I run the marathon in comfort, using Jeff Galloway’s method, which consists of walking a minute or so every mile, starting from the first mile. This allows me to run a marathon within a couple of minutes of my planned time.

A last comment. Marathon-running is as much a mental feat as it is a physical feat. During a marathon, one learns that he or she is schizophrenic. After 15 miles, your find two noisy people arguing inside your skull. One says: "This is silly. Stop. Sit down. Quit. Have a cool beer." The other one retorts: "Go on. Don’t stop. You can beat your PR (personal record). Hear the people cheering you." So far the second person has always won the argument!!!