Standing Up to the Pub Crawl

They said it was for drinkers with a problem.

A running problem, that is.

Three-hundred showed up, but that is par for the pub-crawl course. Each year, the Bench Warmer, a Ventura tavern, sponsors a contest that defies political correctness. Or, rather, it puts its arm around and burps in the face of political correctness.

The pub crawl is a run--that is the correct part--to six bars--that is the incorrect part. At each, contestants gulp a bottle of brew and run on. And on, ad nauseam.

You can picture this event happening in the 1960s, but not at the turn of the millennium, when people pay more for a bottle of water than for a hamburger.

Now, you would expect a low-cal wheat-grass crawl that involved “finding the quiet moment inside” and aromatherapy candles called “harmony.”

I grew up in Southern California, learning the letters of the alphabet off vitamin bottles before learning them in school. My grandma slept in a magnetized bed to realign her electrons.

As a result, I have become a full supporter of alternative medicine. I drink Postum in the morning, never coffee. I take Epsom salt baths, and hold bitter Chinese herb concoctions under my tongue.

So I had my doubts about this pub crawl. But at the same time, it seemed so seductively uncouth, so retro it was modern, so quintessentially ‘00s.

I knew I had to try it.

My strategy would be to minimize the damage to body and mind. I wouldn’t drink or run too fast. On my grandma’s suggestion, I started taking an extra dose of vitamin B-complex a few days before the race, to help metabolize the alcohol. I stopped taking my homeopathic remedies for teeth grinding because I knew alcohol deactivated them.

The night before the big event, I learned I wasn’t the only one making preparations.

A bunch of us contestants gathered at the Bench Warmer for a meal of limp spaghetti. The conversation was all about the game plan.

My favorite strategy: Don’t drink any water for two days and then the beer will act like water and you won’t feel the alcohol.

Another plan: Arrange to be dumped by your boyfriend, then you will be in the habit of drinking and exercising to get in shape.

Others disagreed about whether to gain a lot of weight so your tolerance goes up, or to start drinking the night before so you don’t feel it. Someone suggested pouring the drink down your shirt and pretending you drank it.

Many of these drinker/runners had been pub crawling since the event started, back when Reagan was president and I was in grammar school.

They had grown up in Ventura, gone to high school together and knew all about times, scores and stratagems.

They also knew who would win the men’s division: a strapping chap called “The Brick” because he looked and ran like one.

The more interesting race was between Mary and her pal Steve. Mary was sanguine about winning the women’s division. This 5-foot 2-inch, hard-packed bullet of an athlete had run marathons since high school and won the women’s division each of the last three years. She said, “I just want that fourth cup.”

But this year, Steve bet $100 that he could beat her time. This provoked rowdy cheering and rambunctious laughter at the Bench Warmer.

Most believed Steve didn’t have a chance. The next morning, Mary went out and ran nine miles before the 10 a.m. start time, just to be in the groove, she said.

So how was the run? you ask. In a word, fun.

One woman wore a shirt that said, “Thank you for not projectile vomiting.” I planned to stay next to her.

A group of men wore plaid kilts, some threw a football around.

I stretched and was thankful for the ginger tea I drank that morning to settle my stomach.

Then we tilted our heads back, opened our throats and downed the first beer. Along with everyone else, I threw my empty in the recycling container--after all this is California. Then we headed for the open road.

The first couple of beers went down smoothly, though they sloshed around in my stomach. I burped my B vitamins and beer.

The whole affair was more civilized than one would expect. No one got hit by a car.

But the running was very disorienting. My head pounded, my lungs heaved, but thank God my stomach didn’t, though it felt like a burbling sulfur hot springs.

My mind started to drift and feel hazy, my eyes almost rolled back and then didn’t. Then I reached for another beer.

Just for the record, I didn’t see anybody actually crawling, even at the finish line, when many looked like they should be.

Just as expected, Mary beat Steve. Steve said he lost it at the third pub. They arrived together, but she downed her beer and was off, leaving him nursing his bottle and waiting for his stomach to settle.

Maybe next year, he said.

Maybe next year I will work a little harder as well. I finished in the 200s. Not so good, but not so bad for a novice.

Maybe next year I will train on a treadmill with a bottle of Coors next to me. Maybe next year, I will claim to be in recovery and ask for O’Douls.

One thing’s for sure, next year, I will skip the B vitamins.