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Legally blind,
Runyan in NYC chasing a dream
The
Associated Press
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www.bridges4kids.org.
DREAM COME TRUE: Since she was a child, Marla Runyan has
wanted to compete in the New York
Marathon. "It's very personal for me to run and
complete this race," she said.
Driving the potholed, furrowed
and scarred streets of New York can be an
obstacle course in and of itself.
But Marla Runyan will attempt to run 26.2
miles on them, following a blue line and racing
opponents she can barely
see.
When she gets to the final
stretch in Central Park today, she'll have to
have faith that the finish line is there,
because she won't be able to see
it until she's a few strides from crossing it.
Runyan, the first legally blind
athlete to compete in the Olympics, has
chosen a new challenge in her
expanding running career: the New York City
Marathon.
Runyan, 33, will make her
marathon debut on a course pocked with potential
hazards-sewer grates, manhole
covers, sharp turns, rough bridges, undulating
pavement. Add to that the danger of colliding with
other competitors and most
sightless runners would stay on the smooth and predictable
surface of the track.
But Runyan says running is easy
compared to reading or going to the store.
What are a few bumps in the road to a woman who used to
be a heptathlete negotiating
high-jump bars and hurdles she couldn't see until
they were 4 yards in front of
her face?
Often it takes a person like
Runyan to lead those of us who take tasks such
as crossing the street for
granted. Superstar athletes inspire
awe because of their gifts. Athletes with
disabilities simply inspire. They
inspire us to ponder possibilities, not
limits. We watch Barry Bonds, Kobe Bryant, Marion Jones
and say, 'How did
they do that?' We watch Runyan, paraplegic skier Muffy
Davis, amputee University of Miami
runner Dan Andrews and say, 'How did
they think to do that?' It's their
imagination that sets them apart.
Runyan might have 20/400 vision
according to an ophthalmologist, but it is
immeasurable given the
courageous choices she has made. She doesn't like the
"blind" label because she doesn't consider herself
deprived. Resourceful would
be a better description.
She has always yearned to run New
York, ever since she was 9 years old and
watched Grete Waitz win the
first of her nine New York titles.
"I still remember thinking then that I'd like to run this race
one day," Runyan
told Bloomberg News Service. "It's very personal to
compete in and complete this race."
At age 9, Runyan was also
diagnosed with Stargardt's disease, a congenital
condition that causes
degeneration of the retina and leaves a black hole in
the center of her vision. She has bands of peripheral
vision. By turning her head
she can see within a 15-foot radius out of the corner of her
eyes. She uses a
special magnifying device to read -- which didn't stop
her from getting a master's degree
in the education of deaf-blind
children-and has to sit within
inches of the screen to watch TV.
While running, she can't read her
wristwatch, and other runners are fuzzy,
faceless figures. Yet she has
never fallen in a race nor had any major
collisions beyond the usual jostling. She hurt her knee
one month before the
2000 U.S. Olympic trials when she veered to avoid
hitting a boy on a bike who rode
into her path when she was training.
Despite pain that almost forced
her to withdraw from the meet, she made the
team, then finished eighth in
the 1,500 meters at the Sydney Games, the
highest finish for an American woman. She never saw
favorite Suzy
Favor-Hamilton fall or the ensuing chaos and joked
afterward, "Who won? Who fell? What
happened? I needed a narrator at the
finish line."
Since then, she has emerged as
the most versatile female distance runner in
the United States, setting the
national indoor record for 5,000 meters and
winning national titles in the outdoor 5,000 and on the
road at 5K and 10K.
Her goal is to finish in the top 10 today in 2:28, well
off the world record of 2:17:18 set
by Great Britain's Paula Radcliffe
last month in the Chicago Marathon
but close to the American debut record of
2:26:58 set last year in New
York by Deena Drossin.
Race director Allan Steinfeld is
making two accommodations to enable Runyan
to compete with sighted
runners. A cyclist will ride behind her and read
signs designating mile markers, water stations, hazards
or turns. He will
shout out what the race clock says. Another cyclist
will ride ahead to each fluid stop,
stand at the table, hold her bottle
steady and call out her name. If
Runyan can't grab it or drops it, she'll get no extra
help acquiring the bottle.
"This isn't meant to give Marla
an advantage," Steinfeld said. "It's
just a matter of turning visual cues into
audible cues." Runyan, who
lives in Eugene, Ore., with husband and coach Matt Lonergan,
also has less chance of
getting trampled because for the first time the top
50 women will start 35 minutes before the
other 30,000 runners, which will
allow the women's winner to cross the line before the
men's winner. The risk
for Runyan is losing contact with other elite women and
having to run completely alone.
She seems less worried about
running 26.2 miles through New York's five
boroughs than anybody else. After
all, she already runs thousands of miles
in preparation, without barricades or police to protect
her way through the
obstacle course of everyday life.
The Result?
(AP) Boston Marathon winner Rodgers Rop of Kenya won the New
York City Marathon Sunday, and
legally blind Olympian Marla Runyan
was the first U.S. woman across the
finish line. Rop won the men's title
in an unofficial 2 hours, 8 minutes,
6 seconds, followed by countrymen
Laban Kipkemboi and Christopher
Cheboiboch. Joyce Chepchumba of
Kenya pulled away with a fierce charge to win the
women's title in an
unofficial 2 hours, 25 minutes, 55 seconds, in
temperatures in the 40s and no wind.
"This time was my time," said
Chepchumba, whose previous best finish in New
York was third in 1996. Los
Angeles Marathon champion Lyubov Denisova of Russia was
next among the women, just 22
seconds behind her, and Olivera
Jevtic of Yugoslavia came in third
despite taking a tumble. Runyan, the
first legally blind Olympian, came
in fifth among the women in her
first marathon. The 33-year-old
Californian has a degenerative eye
condition known as Stargardt's
disease that limits her sight to about 15 feet in every
direction. During the 2000 Olympics in Sydney, she
finished eighth in the 1,500. In
Sunday's marathon, she finished just
ahead of defending women's champion
Margaret Okayo of Kenya.
For the first time, the top women
started about 30 minutes ahead of the men.
The idea was to give the
women a chance at the spotlight, and also to allow
them to run without having to navigate crowded roads.
Still, there was some
bumping. About 10 miles in, European champion Maria Guida of
Italy crossed in front of
Runyan and both slightly stumbled, though neither fell.
More significantly, Jevtic and
Kerryn McCann of Australia got their
feet tangled at the 21st mile and
both fell. The commotion allowed Chepchumba and
Denisova to break away. The two remained
stride-for-stride into the 24th
mile. That's when the Kenyan made
her move, throwing off her black wool
gloves and pulling comfortably ahead just before the
runners entered Central
Park.
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