Distant Heroes

An Athlete's Search for a Graceful Exit.

I’ve been playing Schul’s story again and again in my mind ever since. Maybe the reason he seems so gracefully retired is because he won the gold; he lived out every distance runner’s ultimate dream and had nothing left to prove. Or, maybe it’s because the tiny town of West Milton, Ohio threw him an honest-to-goodness American parade when he came home; he was a hero. Maybe it’s because he continued on in the sport as a teacher and coach. Or maybe, just maybe, Schul knows that his spectacular race will someday come to light as the inspiration it should have been all along.

Sure, a part of Schul is bitter that the history writers have overlooked his singular achievement. Sure, he would have preferred to be included in the Century Club of Ohio’s greatest athletes. Sure, it hurts that few people can answer, "Who is Bob Schul?" in track trivia games. But I have a feeling Bob knows those are small things. For tiny minds. Big souls will remember only this:

"That one man, scorned and covered with scars,
Still strove with his last ounce of courage
To reach the unreachable star."
      —from The Man of La Mancha

*  *  *

"I left the woods for as good a reason as I went there. Perhaps it seemed to me that I had several more lives to live, and that I could not spare any more time for that one."
     —Henry David Thoreau

Jim Beatty

Back then I wanted to know what is required for athletic greatness. "How do you begin the journey?" I asked. Now I needed to know, how do you end? It was like a time warp. Here was the same man sitting behind the same desk some 15 years later, and here I was—again, a neophyte —once more asking questions.

Naturally, we covered some old ground. I wanted to hear again the story of his indoor mile record (3:58.9), the 40,000 screaming track fans at the Los Angeles coliseum, the live ABC television coverage, what he felt about this unique moment in track and field history.

"I was pretty fortunate," he said. "You know, right-place right-time kind of thing. I really believe that the indoor sub-4:00 mile was there waiting for me." I believed it too. Beatty was a mystical man. He didn’t just talk; he made pronouncements. Whether this came from being in the public eye most of his life or from some pre-ordained wisdom, Beatty spoke knowing people would listen. I found myself eagerly awaiting each kernel of track truth.

On American distance running: "I believe in the basic premise that all peoples can do all things. A lot of these things go in psychological cycles. Once upon a time it was the English who were great distance runners, then at one point in history it was the Finns, then the Hungarians, then the Russians, then the men from down under, then the Kenyans. But America didn’t have great runners. Others could do it but we couldn’t. That was big time wrong. Big time wrong. And that’s what the LA Track Club set out to prove. We CAN do it."

On Mihaly Igloi and the LATC: "Imagine never having to go to a work-out and ask yourself, `What am I going to do today?’ and having your coach give you the right thing to do for every single work-out. Your mind doesn’t have to question, ‘Am I doing the right thing?’ That element is eliminated. It’s already charted for you. Every single person who came to train with Igloi had their own individual work-out. And you never saw him writing it all down. When he went home at night, he had a book on everybody; he would record their work-outs. He remembered everything, every single person, forty people! Believe me, when I say he was brilliant, he was brilliant."

On what it takes to be a champion: "1.) speed, 2.) stamina, 3.) capacity to train hard, 4.) ability to race well, 5.) rise above self, 6.) wear winning gracefully."

On how The University of North Carolina contributed to his success: "I believe in the sequence of events that leads to certain things. If you are a good athlete within your home state and you go to your state university, I believe that the people appreciate it. Every single person, where you had touched their life somewhere along the way, exalts in your joy."

After a time, I finally got around to the subject of athletic retirement. "Did you ever have a tough time with it?" I asked. "No, no not really," he said, pausing for the first time in the interview. "I was an angry person internally. I had injuries that kept me from doing other things I wanted to do (an Olympic medal, for one) and that angered me. But I could always come back and justify and somewhat soften the anger by saying ‘Well, I did enough. I really wasn’t destined to do everything. I was destined to do what I did do and part of that was the indoor 4-minute mile.’ I would have liked to have done other things, but what I did was okay."

What I did was okay. It sounded so simple, so wise. A part of me didn’t believe it. This was almost corny, a little too much like the over-used serenity prayer (you know, the one that goes, "Lord help me to change the things I can, to accept the things I cannot, and the wisdom to know the difference"). I knew Beatty had been in peak form in 1962, setting five American records during a spectacular 16-day European tour in August and becoming the only American male ever to hold records simultaneously in all events from 1,500m to 5,000m. Then, the next year he severely cut his foot in a fluke accident, requiring some twenty-seven stitches, and was never able to get back in shape to make the 1964 Olympic team. His running zenith occurred between Olympic Games. How was he able to accept this so easily? I needed more.

"How did you finally find peace about such an abrupt ending to your career?"

"Being first forever overshadows a lot of things that maybe I could have done." Another pronouncement. This one I accepted. Earlier Beatty had told me that races were won "not by force but by art" so, at last I asked, "Didn’t it sadden you that you that you could no longer give the world your art?"

"Oh, no. You have to remember," he explained, "that no matter what would have happened I wasn’t going to run anymore after ‘64 anyway. That was it. That was the end of it right there. I never planned to run forever; I had other things in life to accomplish."

Here was his last nugget of wisdom. In order to move on in my life I have to name an ending, like Beatty did in 1964, and say, "That’s it. That’s the end of it right there." I have several more lives to live and cannot spare any more time for running.