Running on The Coast: The Marathon

Big Sur isn't very far away.  About 35 miles or so, maybe 40, down the winding rock-encrusted coast.  At the end of the month, the last Sunday, a whole host of school buses fling open their doors at 5 AM, gather up a horde of humans and bring them all the way down to Big Sur where they are released.  Then, the horde faces north, the direction from which they have just come, and they all run back.  From the time they begin until exactly 12 noon, the coast highway echoes with the soft, rhythmic plop-plopping sound of running shoes on asphalt, murmuring voices and heavy breathing.  At one-mile intervals, music wafts in the morning salt air rising from the shore far below.

Running is what we humans do, when we aren't walking, squatting or lying around.  We are meant to run. Modern life insists that instead of running we sit, lounge, recline, and shuffle from cubicle to car to Barcalounger.  The organizers of the Big Sur International Marathon decided that whoever has the will and desire to spring off their La-Z-Boy and use their legs as they were intended would be rewarded in  magnificent style.

They stop all traffic on the gorgeous coast road, provide zillions of enthusiastic volunteers to ply the sore muscles and lagging spirits of runners with massage, snacks, drink, medical attention and encouragement.  They find musicians and haul them down to strategic points along the 26.2 mile route to play fine, heavenly music; a grand piano plays at the bottom of a long descent that culminates at the base of the Bixby Creek Bridge, for instance.

The runners must still head home, like homing pigeons in a flock that wears high-tech gear instead of feathers.  The course is extraordinarily difficult for a marathon, far hillier than it has any right to be, but the event fills up immediately when it's announced.  The prestige and sense of achievement is undeniable.  Friends and relatives have run it, some many times, and they all talk about how hard it was to do, how they suffered, wonder about their own sanity.  But none of them regrets it.  I took part in the 10-mile walk one year, an adjunct to the actual marathon, presented at the same time on part of the same course.  It, too, was difficult.  My feet were tired beyond the normal understanding of that word, but I was elated.

You can drive along the coast in your car, but, as usual, you will be missing a lot of the sensory experience that slower, human-powered travel affords you.  Get out and walk for a little way (be safe, of course).  Or ride your bike.  The coast will feel wilder, and I'll bet so will you.

The event will be happening next weekend, last weekend in April.  Probably the most unique thing that happens in the area, the most human of all things, running wild, for the good of our souls.