God Save the Queen!! And other reasons to run 100

A few days ago I mentioned the extra .2 was the Brit's fault, well, I looked it up just cause I couldn't remember the entire story.  Goes something like this...

So we all know who Pheidippides is, right?  You missed him in your ancient Greek class?  Well, he's the reason we run marathons.  Or at least where the name marathon came from.  See, he was an Athenian runner, he actually got paid to run (man am I jealous!) who ran from Marathon to Athens Greece to let tell the king of the victory over Persia.  He then promptly died.

In honor of his historic and monumental feat (feet??) the Greeks held, during the first Olympics in 1896, the first modern marathon, having runners go 40k (24.8ish miles) from the Marathon bridge to the Olympic Stadium in Athens.  The next few marathons (Boston began their race in 1897, 1900 & 1904 Olympics, etc) were a fairly standard 25 miles.  But in 1908 when the Olympics went to London they had a course set out that was extended to 26 miles.  It was set to end at the front of a stadium, but the royal box was at the other end of the stadium, 385 yards away.  Enter Queen Alexandra. 

A tradition I hadn't previously experienced but I'm pretty sure I will spearhead here in Birmingham: at mile 24 a tradition developed to yell out "God save the Queen!"  If it weren't for her after all we'd be done now.

In the 1924 Olympics the distance was standardized to 26 miles, 385 yards (42.195 kilometers).  I suppose we should be happy.  Apparently the track the race ended on (where the royal box was 385 yards away) was round and the racers could have been made to run around the other direction, and it could have been even longer!  God save the Queen!!

Now what does this have to do with running 100 miles, you ask?  Well... that's the interesting part!  See, I've known the story of Pheidippides (or Phidippides or Philippides) for a while now.  Or so I thought...

The real story (and probably the reason the guy died...) was that Pheidippides was really tired when he ran that marathon.  See, earlier that week, he was sent to request the help of the Spartans in defending Athens.  So he did.  In roughly 36 hours.  He covered over 250 kilometers, or roughly 150 miles to the other Americans out there, in 36 hours.  The Spartans said no.  Or rather, they said not yet, that they couldn't march until after the new moon in like 2 weeks, but then they would.  He then promptly turned around and RAN BACK!  He made it back in time to join in a surprise attack by the Athenians who routed the Persians!  He was then sent to Athens to report of their victory.  He covered the 40k, arrived at the kings foot and said something like "victory, we won!"  And gasped his last breath. 

So now there's this race called the Spartathlon that recognizes the really amazing part of the story.  It's a 153 mile race held late September in Greece.  It has a cutoff of 36 hours.  That sounds really daunting, doesn't it?  It's only an average pace of 14:07 minutes per mile.  To just qualify for Boston I'd have to run 7:03 min/mile.  Sounds easy, no?

Reading about the other side of Pheidippides' story brought so many emotions to the surface.  First off a little defense, to all the people who tell me it's crazy to run 100 miles, I can say oh yeah, well 2500 years ago they did it three times in a row, so there!  It also makes me wonder about the Spartans and their mythical status.  If a guy just ran 150 miles to come ask for my help, I think I'd be obliged just on principal.  But most of all, it fills me with dread.  I'm gonna get killed when I ask my wife to go with me to Greece, not for a family vacation, not for an anniversary or something special, but just cause I want to be a SPARTATHLETE!!