Marathon Running Has Come a Long Way

Only the brave--or the slightly daft--were there 16 years ago.

The New York City Marathon held its inaugural race in 1970--four loops around Central Park featuring all of 126 runners. The top finishers received $15 watches.

Many miles later, literally and figuratively, marathon running is a different animal. Thousands jam the starting lines and millions line the streets to watch. Pasta-gorging extravaganzas precede the race; disco parties follow. Corporate sponsors offer fistfuls of dollars.

The runners range from Italy’s Orlando Pizzolato and Norway’s Grete Waitz, winners of last Sunday’s NYC Marathon, to Anna Galarza, a 32-year-old New York preschool teacher who came in dead last among the 15,752 finishers.

There are the big-name marathons in Boston, Chicago and Los Angeles. And others from Yonkers, N.Y., to Huntsville, Ala., to Honolulu. Internationally, marathoning has swept London, Rotterdam, Seoul and Tokyo. Competitors, if they wish, can trek across the globe.

“There have always been ski trips,” Jane Van Horn, an official with the New York Road Runners Club, said Thursday. “Now there are running trips.”

According to the National Running Data Center in Tucson, Ariz., 254 marathons on certified courses will have been run in this country by the end of the year. In 1968 there were 38.

Jennifer Young, co-director of the Data Center, said marathoning peaked in the United States about five years ago when there were some 100 more races than currently.

She attributes the drop to the “frightfully expensive” municipal costs of staging a city marathon. She also points to the death of Jim Fixx, the running guru and author who recently died of a heart attack while jogging.

Races of shorter distances have sprouted, and Young acknowledges that perhaps these events have drawn some runners who might otherwise attempt a 26-mile-plus marathon.

“It’s like a seven-year itch,” she said. “People are getting away from one thing and trying something else.”

One woman trying something else was Galarza, who was running her first marathon and finished in 11 hours, 50 minutes and 46 seconds -- nearly 10 hours after Pizzolato.

Consider that Pizzolato could have driven to the airport after the race, caught a flight to Rome and still had time for a bowl of linguini before Galarza staggered across the finish line.

The Dominican-born woman had problems, all right. Late in the race the water stations along the route were abandoned and Galarza was dehydrated. Traffic resumed on the course and she had to run on the sidewalk. She entered Central Park late at night alone ... and scared.

Her husband, who finished two hours before her, told officials she was still on the course. A search party found her limping along, wearing a plastic garbage bag as a jacket to retain heat.

She received chocolate, raisins and mineral water for nourishment. Doctors questioned her to make sure she was still in her right mind. Meanwhile, some Mormon missionaries heard of her plight and consoled her. Young boys and cab drivers offered encouragement.

“I couldn’t believe it,” she said by telephone of reaching the finish. “I was overjoyed. It was wonderful.”

Her sisters had to practically carry her upstairs. Her arthritic knee ached, her legs swelled. All she wanted was a good night’s sleep.

“I was so tired,” she said. “But I woke up at 5 o’clock in the morning.”