Road Trip: Rono on the Road
Not that long ago, Twitter-ready expulsions from elites like "Simon Karori got his ass fried by a woman!" once trickled to the public almost entirely through a small set of formally edited channels
The article below originally appeared in the July/August 2003 issue of Running Times and, soon afterward, on the magazine’s companion website. I have left the original text from this dual production alone other than, ONE, oomphasizing names and other terms at my consistently whimsical discretion and, TWO, adding a grainy image—expanded from an unattributed thumbnail—of me with my arm around a somewhat famous woman with cartoonishly balloonish fake knockers.
I’ll have soon more to say about this piece (the article, not the obviously Southern gal) and the other items in the mini-revival I’ve embarked on this week of my musty published work. But among the more significant developments after the publication of the article was the two-year doping-related suspension of 10K road world-record-holder Asmae Leghzaoui, the Moroccan who tested positive for EPO within eight months of the 2002 Crazy 8’s. After Leghzaoui returned to the roads and won the 2005 Freihofer's Run For Women 5K, The Washington Post reported on this as if Leghzaoui’s long hiatus had been driven by events leaving no stronger a moral signature than a stress fracture.
Three men, slouched in a parked pickup—a garrulous New Englander, a laconic Southerner, and an inscrutable Kenyan by way of Canada—watch late-afternoon traffic pass the Doubletree Hotel in Asheville, N.C. Since the two Americans, Chad Newton and the author, collected 27:53 10K runner Moses Macharia at the airport and rumbled into downtown, the truck has sat in the parking lot for three hours.
Shortly a black SUV pulls smartly alongside. The driver, dressed in a loose-fitting shirt and baggy shorts, crisply unfolds his 6 foot 3 inch, 148 pound frame from behind the wheel. He is very, very late, and beaming, his smile as broad as his East African physique is long. When Elly Rono speaks, only his rich accent belies what seems a wholly ingrained Western cultural heritage: "Wassup?"
As he helps his passengers load their gear into the SUV, Rono has every reason to project confidence in the face of ever-shifting, last-minute plans. Such travel-related madness might seem particularly befitting of a race called the Crazy 8’s—where Rono is slated to race Daniel Komen and others on the same course at which the current men’s world record for 8K was set—but this is how he lives, and this is how the 32-year-old runner thrives. While on the roads, he, in multiple contexts, is in his purest of elements. Rono spends an unusual amount of time racing, and hence, traveling from his home in Chapel Hill, NC. Yet the only time Rono is in a hurry is when someone fires a starter’s pistol nearby.
Newton, the owner of the pickup, greets Rono—with whom he shares an athlete manager, Missy Foy—with a handshake. Hoping to reach the Olympic Marathon Trials for a second time (he placed 36th in 1996), Newton logs weeks of up to 140 miles over unrelenting hills in the Pisgah National Forest, fitting his training around his duties managing a Christmas tree farm. His work, typically lit by a scorching sun, is, like his training, as methodical and quietly brutal as his manner is easy.
With the $1,500 he pocketed in winning the Vermont City Marathon in May, Newton had some repairs done on his truck, to some avail. It gets him as far from Pisgah Forest as he needs to go—typically, to a road race. But he is no stranger to either mechanical mishaps or their often bizarre consequences: After his truck broke down on the way back from a half marathon in Charlotte, Newton hitched a long ride home with a group of boisterous fellows who, as it happened, were "huffing" their way across the state—inhaling the pressurizing gases from various cans of spray paint. Later that month, he and the author would be forced to pool their modest winnings from the Louise Mandrell 5K in Pigeon Forge, TN to have Newton’s truck towed 100 miles back to North Carolina after a wheel-bearing mishap.
In the passenger seat of Rono’s van is Randy Mayes, who introduces himself as a journalist researching the training, racing, lifestyle, culture and genetics of Kenyan distance runners. He has recently moved to Chapel Hill and lives willingly and conspicuously in Rono’s shadow. Upon learning a Running Times writer is on board, Mayes grows animated, expounding on his theories—all of them familiar—surrounding the nonpareil talent and work ethic of Rono and his compatriots.
Northbound on the highway again, Rono, figuring a truck weigh station for an ordinary exit, pulls dutifully behind a row of tractor-trailers until someone in the backseat gently points out his mistake. Cackling, Rono guides the SUV back into traffic, noting gleefully that Kenyan masters standout Simon Karori "got his ass fried by a woman!" at the recent Peachtree Road Race. This remark will baste in its own irony during the heat of the following night’s battle.
Indeed, Rono, bearer of perhaps the most famed running surname in history, is playful. But behind the gurgling stream of jokes and easygoing, almost disjointed manner are the mind, body and spirit of a man whose aspirations could not be more serious, or more difficult. Rono has just run 2:10:57 to win Grandma’s Marathon in foul conditions and he speaks of running in the 2004 Athens Olympic Marathon—wearing the uniform of the United States of America.
Rono’s Roots
Elly Rono grew up in Eldoret Village in Kenya’s highlands, attending the same schools as 800-meter stars Japheth Kimutai and Wilson Kipketer. He attended college for a time in Kenya before investigating opportunities to finish out his degree in the United States—an opportunity he initially believed would help him from a career standpoint, not necessarily a running one. After accepting a scholarship at Southern Indiana University, he became the 1999 Division II NCAA cross country champion, a feat he accomplished while working 40 hours a week on the graveyard shift.
Since graduating and moving to the South, Rono has become the most prolific elite marathoner in the country. He and many of his Kenyan ilk have earned the jauntily pejorative term "road whore" for their propensity for dashing off to wherever the cash is. On the surface, Rono’s schedule appears overly hectic and lacking in long-range focus. He has won 12 marathons since 1999—including Flying Pig (1999), Columbus and Cal International (2000), Ocean State and Pittsburgh (2001), Mercedes and Grandma’s (2002).
Only recently, however, have both Rono’s name and undeniable progression as an athlete come into prominence. He led the first half of the 2002 Boston Marathon, his lanky torso and long, spindly legs impossible to miss at the head of a pack of men on average almost a foot shorter. Though Rono, unlike others, had no financial incentive to front the field, he, an unabashed publicity hound, admits that leading the Boston field for as long as possible was a contrived move: "I wanted to get myself out there for all to see." He finished 16th.
Rono speaks freely of his deep mistrust of agents and handlers. Pleased as he is with Foy, he views the typical runner’s agent as opportunistic at best and boldly dishonest at worst, summing up such persons thusly: "If they do not work another job and their only job is to be a manager then it cannot work, because such people are going to steal."
Road Talk
Rono drives the tangents of the gently winding mountain road just as a seasoned road racer might run them. As he drives, Rono examines the tendency of his compatriots to pursue women who are somewhat, well, large, then segues into a forthright explanation of his plans for the coming year: a 2:08 fall marathon, a win at the 2003 Boston Marathon. Meanwhile, Mayes and Macharia are rhetorical opposites: the former details his public-relations role with the late Reebok Enclave, his written contributions to Washington-area running community, and the fundamentals of his research, while the latter has not spoken in hours.
When the quintet reaches the hotel in Kingsport, Macharia is assigned his own room, while the others, sharing lodging, decide how best to distribute four men among two double beds. Mayes, still building momentum, makes it clear he believes that Kenyan runners’ bodies, from their bloodstreams to their metabolisms, are fundamentally different from their Caucasian counterparts, raising the inevitable question of innate talent vis-B-vis hard work. Everyone in the room except for Mayes, no distance runner, has trained over 150 miles in a week before. Rono’s response is quick but passionate: A simple shaking of the head. There is no such dichotomy; to a man who runs 140 miles a week, a lot of it dangerously close to five-minute pace, the notion of "talent" can only be an abstraction. The hammer of basic, monomaniacal training has shaped whatever natural endowments Rono possesses.
Across the room, Rono, unpacking cans of product from one of his sponsors, tells Newton that if he quits his job and moves to Chapel Hill, he can rise to the top of the American marathoning heap. Such single-mindedness, he assures his audience, is the only way to become a truly great runner. It is also the only way Elly Rono knows. Mayes claims that Kenyans’ success lies in ugali and the unique manner in which their systems process natural foods. Meanwhile, Rono and Newton discuss the best way to mix Endurox.
Back in the hotel room after dinner at an Italian fast-food restaurant, Mayes, excited after an opportunity to interview Daniel Komen and now clad in garish running tights, posits that were Rono to gain U.S. citizenship and make the Olympic Team, American elites would resent the intrusion into their ranks. Everyone in the room, Rono, included, disagrees. There is nothing duplicitous or underhanded about his desire to represent America on the world’s foremost athletic stage; Rono does not believe he needs to become an American simply to make an Olympic team, because he believes that ultimately there’s nobody he can’t beat.
Perhaps, a listener thinks, he’s right. On the mark or otherwise, the gentle giant is an easy man to root for.
Working for a Living
The Crazy 8’s is held as part of the Kingsport Fun Fest and starts at 9:58 P.M. An array of candles dots both sides of the humid evening streets in an event unique in both its organization and its assemblage of talent. Though the prize-money purse is itself modest, with $1,700 going to the winner, a $10,008 bonus awaits any man or woman who breaks the existing world records of 22:03 for men (set by Peter Githuka at the 1996 Crazy 8’s) and 24:38 for women (notched by Paula Radcliffe). Komen has definite designs on the men’s mark, while Moroccan Asmae Leghzaoui—who recently set the 10K world record of 30:29 at the Mini Marathon in Central Park and passed through 8K of that race in about 24:20, seems almost a sure bet to take down the women’s record. Rono, for his part, is hoping to hone his speed, which, in relation to his marathon best, is comparatively lacking to date. When asked what time he’ll shoot for, he demurs. Rono is fundamentally here to compete.
At the start, steady rains that have fallen throughout the day have abated, leaving moist, heavy air in their wake. The course, fittingly, is a figure eight and not entirely flat. At the gun, Rono shoots off into the gloom near the leaders, but this will not be his brightest day. In fact, Newton—who is motivated in part by his eagerness to defuse the journalist’s near-categorical dismissal of American runners—passes Rono late in the race. Rono is also a trifle disconcerted to find the churning legs of Leghzaoui pulling alongside him with less than a kilometer to go. He rallies late, however, all pumping arms and legs, and winds up at 24:25 to Leghzaoui’s world-record 24:27 and Newton’s 24:33. Nineteen-year-old Patrick Nthiwa wins the race in 22:37, with Komen losing a sprint to John Itati for second.
Rono winds up 14th overall, out of the money, save for the $50 bonus given to any man to dip under 25:00 who does not finish in the top eight. Macharia runs 23:48 for seventh, thus earning $100 for his trip from Toronto to Asheville to Kingsport and back.
Afterward, Rono is philosophical and far from downtrodden. He complains of lower back pains but notes that the right iliotibial band that has troubled him in training lately refrained from singing its harsh and plaintive song during the race. He is eager to reconnoiter in the invited athletes’ room with other Kenyans who have come from a smattering of locales across North America and beyond. It could be said that the trip was hardly worth it to a runner making his living on the roads, but if Rono is disenchanted with this state of affairs, he hides it well.
The author takes the opportunity to take Komen aside and acknowledge lamely that he named his Labrador retriever after the owner of what seems the most incredible of all men’s track distance records, a 7:20.67 3,000m. Komen smiles and appears understandably unmoved. It is a worthwhile moment.
The Long Drive Home
Returning to the crowded hotel room at around 2 A.M. after the awards and post-race party, Rono stretches himself out as best he can on the undersized bed next to Mayes and falls into an easy, untroubled slumber. Newton and the author do the same. Amid the mixed smells of liniment, coffee, bagels, beer and farts, four men slumber the early morning away in relative comfort, all of them, perhaps, dreaming restlessly of the next road trip.
Rising late the next morning, Rono quickly assumes his animated persona and the wheel as the runners depart Kingsport. He has a good six hours of driving in front of him and, well-rested, he is as expansive as the road unwinding before him. Macharia remains silent; even Mayes is more subdued.
Turning to the subject of his quest for American citizenship, Rono notes a typical smorgasbord of roadblocks: A lack of clarity surrounding the whole process, $5,000 spent—seemingly in vain—on attorney’s fees, and amplification of existing barriers in the wake of September 11. Rono currently holds an athletic visa and has a Social Security number, but still lacks a green card. His greatest concern as a thirtysomething competitor is whether he can gain U.S. citizenship in time for the 2004 Games.
Rono, who in conversation simultaneously evinces deep fondness for both his native land and his adoptive one, stresses that his drive to become an American in no way springs from dissatisfaction with Kenya or its athletic federation. "I came here, and I loved it here," Rono says earnestly. "So I wanted to stay. Many Kenyans feel the same way when they come to America for school."
But watching Rono at work—at play—it is clear that the United States can never be Elly Rono’s first love. Clearly, that space in his very large heart is already well-filled by distance running, and by his dreams.