Marty Travis, My Mother, Wins Her Third Marathon

Mom in her weary glory. That's Ivy reaching to embrace her.

Mom was deeper into her marathon career than I was into my journalistic career when I wrote this account of her Boston Marathon run in April of 1981. I'm afraid my inexperience shows! But in my defense, this story was written on deadline on race night. (The friend I brought with me was Brenda. We married the next year.)

BOSTON—My family climbed into the station wagon at about 8 Monday morning for what is becoming an annual pilgrimage to the Boston Marathon.

Mom rode nervously in the seat of honor. She was scrunched down, rubbing the fingers of her left hand together, slowly.

She worried about the weather, about making shuttle bus connections into Hopkinton, where the race starts. Marathon day is the biggest day of her year, and worries are a part of days that big.

At 49, Mom was about to run the marathon for the third year in a row.

Dad drove. My sister and a friend rode in back. I went too, and also brought a friend. My brother's fiance was even there, although Mike, at school in California for a semester, couldn't make it.

Still going strong, three years later.

I looked at Mom and couldn't believe what was about to happen. This is a woman who started running five years ago because our dog towed her along at a pace too fast for a walk.

Now she attends running camps, runs 60 miles a week and tests shoes for Nike. And runs the Boston Marathon.

We caught the shuttle bus without a problem and stepped out into downtown Hopkinton two years before starting time, a pilgrimage swallowed in a carnival.

Earnest Boy Scouts sold coffee and hot dogs at stands on every corner. They counted out your change and even brought you the cream.

There were more "I ran the Boston Marathon" T-shirts for sale than there were runners to wear them. A church across the street from the starting line held a special Marathon Mass at 10.

Far overhead, TV helicopters pounded in a circle around the start. They were painted yellow, red, blue—a handful of noisy circus balloons that had slipped from the hand of the vendor.

Closer to earth, some of the town's young and unruly hung out of second-story windows over a bar. They tossed beer caps at runners who wore the latest fashion.

As race time approached, Hopkinton swelled with runners. Many just rested on the green while the carnival swirled around them.

Others, like, my Mom, looked for a place to change.

It was cold, but not many wore warm-ups. Although Mom wore blue tights, the uniform for the day was a garbage bag pulled overhead as a disposable windbreaker.

The runners flowed like water to the start. We accompanied Mom past the front runners, the women, and the masters to the back of the pack.

Up front, all was serious. In the back, the realm of the unregistered runners, the carnival continued.

Families and friends mingled with the runners, seeing them off like soldiers to war. One man looked as if he meant every word written on his T-shirt: " What am I doing here?"

Mom, now a marathon vet, rubbed Vaseline on her face to guard against the wind. She hugged us each in turn, headed into the crowd, and vanished.

A few minutes later, we heard a roar and knew the race had started. But nobody could move in the back until the runners up front got underway.

The runners in the back began to clap, shuffle and, at last, to run.

They threw off their garbage bags, hats and even some sweatshirts as they started, leaving the street littered with clothing and looking like it had been looted.

None of us even saw Mom start off. As soon as the runners were gone, we scurried back to the car.

We had to race to drive to Wellesley, about 15 miles into the race, before Mom arrived.

It took us almost an hour, weaving through traffic. On the right, in the distance, we could see the TV helicopters over the front-runners.

An hour was fast enough. We beat even the leaders to the corner of Cliff Road and Washington Street, the 14.9-mile mark in the race.

People lined the road as far as I could see in either direction, many listening to the race coverage on the radio.

A police cruiser with flashing lights and a wave of noise told that the marathon was almost upon us.

The leaders shot past—not (Bill) Rodgers or (Toshihiko) Seko or even Mom, but a man in a wheelchair, spinning his wheels in an easy rhythm. The crowd erupted in noise.

Four more wheelchair racers passed, one propelling himself with pedals hung in front of his eyes, before the helicopters appeared overhead.

The leader was Gary Fanelli. He surged by alone at what would have been for me a sprint. Rodgers followed in a group about 200 yards behind.

He was running easily. So was Seko, stride for stride, about 10 feet behind.

The men came by in clusters for almost 15 minutes before the first woman, Patti Catalano, passed in another tremendous wave of applause.

And then the crowd quieted and began to disperse. The runners kept coming, uninterrupted, some striding easily, others laboring.

We kept up our cheers and waited. An hour went by. So did Johnny Kelley, the 73-year-old running for the marathon for his 50th year.

The leaders continued on to Boston, battling past Cleveland Circle to the Pru. Seko took and lead and could not be caught. Just after 2:09, he crossed the finish line.

Mom hadn't even passed us yet.

But it wasn't long before she did. There was time only for a quick cheer, a couple pictures and a quick exchange—Are you all right? Fine.—before she too was by.

The entourage gathered in her wake and decided she looked great. She had been running smoothly and looked as fine as she had said she was.

But we didn't have time to dawdle ourselves. Back to the car for the final leg of our race, to the Pru and the finish.

As we drove down Route 9 to the Mass Pike and Boston, Mom picked up steam.

She was running as strongly as she ever had, and thought for a while that she might shave a half hour—a mile a minute—from her best time.

She had even been ahead of the legendary Kelley and his wave of applause for most of the race.

But, about the time we left the Mass Pike for the finish, Mom ran out of steam. She had outrun her legs on the infamous Heartbreak Hill, just about the 20-mile mark of the race.

Mom walked to the crest of the hill, the first time she had ever walked in the Boston Marathon.

The atmosphere at the Pru was big-city carnival. People pressed against you wherever you went. The young and unruly were there, and so were the vendors.

The Boy Scouts had stayed in Hopkinton.

The Pru was littered with runners, some caressing sore feet and muscles, others just huddled in thin space blankets.

Dad took the high road and decided to stay on a plaza overlooking the finish. My friend and I headed for the finish line.

Meanwhile, Mom was struggling in. Another runner came from behind, put his hand on her back, and pushed her along. The crowds grew thicker and louder as the finish came near.

By 3:50, I had a spot just behind the finish.

The announced urged runners to keep going through the chutes behind the finish. Most tried, staggering on, leaning on the thin ropes that formed the chute.

At 4:01, the crowd gave a great last roar. It was Kelley, finishing race number 50, his hands held high.

After he came through, the chutes came down. We moved closer to the finish.

Mom was surprised to look up and see a sign saying she was only a quarter mile from the finish. She ran up a small hill and then down the slope to the end.

Dad spotted her and waved.

She crossed the finish line in four hours and eight minutes, an average of about 9 1/2 minutes per mile for the 26 mile, 385 yard course.

Mom almost walked right past me before I saw her and yelled. She stopped, turned and smiled.

We broke out a space blanket. Mom wasn't sweating noticeably, she wasn't winded, and although she was beat, it was Mom who led the way back to the plaza and Dad.

By 4:30 we were back in the car, Mom again in the seat of honor.

She sat in her space blanket and satisfaction and told us about the race. Walking was a big disappointment, but she still finished faster than she ever had before.

The talk turned to next year. Mom will have to run a marathon in 3 1/2 hours to qualify for Boston, and her strong start Monday suggests that she can make it.

Ahead: the summer. Mom figures it's time to get serious—70 miles a week, not 60.

We'll be back.

I'm struck as I read this story now by its innocence. Not only in terms of its writing, but its embrace of Mom's devotion to running. An obsession, really, and a central factor in what became physical and emotional struggles that overwhelmed her.

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