How (and perhaps why) I started running

My earliest “running” memory is only a moment. I remember running as fast as I can, from the living room to a bedroom, throwing myself on the the bed, panting, and feeling super happy. I think this is a real memory, because I remember the house, an apartment in Bahcelievler in Istanbul. Around year 1997, when we moved to another house in the same area, I told my mother that I actually remember the neighborhood, even our old house. She told me that I am making this up since I was barely five when we left this older house- perhaps I am making it all up? But no, I took a walk later, traced my steps back to this house and realized that I am actually remembering that moment in 1979. This is as far back it goes. My first running memory. The older I get, the more I appreciate the impact of our childhood on our lives. It scares me to think that most of our preferences, likes, dislikes, dreams could be set for life, very early on in childhood. Memory can not be fully trusted. Most of our childhood memories could be idealized, distorted fantasies, lies we told ourselves for so long, indistinguishable from real reality. I would like to believe that I always “liked running” and I want this story to be true but can never be sure. 45 years is a long time.

My running story began with a realization. I remember looking at the picture of a bright yellow building by the Bosphorus, Kuleli Military High School, in an encyclopedia. As 10-year-olds, most of us have a plan to conquer the world and mine was very simple. Get into a military school, run away from the terrible enclave of my small town life, become a pilot, go away, become independent, conquer the world. That seemed like a pretty solid plan by then. Except, I had a problem about getting into that school. I needed to take some physical tests and I was not fit enough. Tests include running, jumping, throwing a basketball (still don’t understand why), crunches and pull-ups. Running was the big problem. You had to do run 400 meters under 75 seconds. Period. The rest did not matter if you failed that hurdle.

It was September 1986. I had a bit more than a year to prepare for this dreadful test. One day after school, I went to our local “running track”, an ugly 400 m dusty loop around a rarely used football pitch. The sky was a dusky red and no one was watching. I only had an a wristwatch with an analogue-second-hand to keep time. I did not have running shoes. Without bothering to warm up, I run my heart out around the track in my leather boots. I still remember the sharp burn in my throat, a weird feeling of something going wrong in body, my limbs floating all around in a half-coordinated parody.

120 seconds. I was a self-admitted coach-potato but did not expect a time that bad. I tried a second time after catching my breath. Much worse. I packed my stuff, wiped my brow and headed home. That evening I read the admission booklet over and over. I don’t have that booklet today but according to current guidelines posted on the military school websites the requirements should be as follows:

• Running 400 meters under 59 seconds means 100 points (perfect score).  That means 2:28 pace per kilometer or 24,4 km/h.
• Running 400 under 75 seconds qualifies you. That is 3:08 pace per km or 19.2 km/h.

They must be joking, I thought. If you admit only battle-ready super-humans, then what is the point of military training? My weight was also “problematic”. At 12, I was 156 cm and 63 kg. Acceptable weight range for 156 was 50-68 kg.

Maybe, I was not destined to be a pilot. Maybe I was better off with books and biscuits. Maybe. But I wanted to give it a try. See what happens.

Next day, I found a “healthy nutrition” booklet, given as a weekend extra by a newspaper, smelling bad translation but enough to teach me about calories, difference between carbs and fats and the basics of good nutrition. It did not take me long to act on my decision though. In a week, I declared to my family that I would run for an hour every day after school. They needed to buy me lots of eggs, lemons, a pair of running shoes and a bicycle. They knew me very well of course and realized immediately that I was very, very serious. In a week, I got all I wanted minus the bicycle, which was way too expensive. I am one of those lucky kids blessed with a wonderfully trusting family. My three sisters did not publicize this new adventure to my friends in school and my parents kept bringing me more lemons. The booklet said drinking lots of lemon juice helps losing weight.

I started running. Almost every day. I don’t remember how far or how fast but I do remember running very consistently during this winter. My transformation was incredible. The feeling of running, running, running and still wanting wanting more. My face got noticeably thinner in a few months. I had to ask our shoe repair guy punch a few more holes in my leather belt. I was running four-five days a week, rain or shine and feeling happier despite a lot of not-so-good going on in my life. I did trial runs in the dusty running track now and then, getting faster and faster . In May, my best lap was 1:13. I was ready.

I got admitted to the school despite failing the pull-ups and 100 m test, because I was one of the fastest candidates in 1,500 m. I was running pretty much at the same speed regardless of the distance. The PT officer in charge, Major Baris, took me aside and made me promise that I would lift weights and improve my strength because they could never allow me to graduate with “0” pull-ups. He would first become my nemesis, then a good mentor in the coming years.

In Kuleli, I steered clear of the running team because I was very weak otherwise but I did continue running in my spare time, because I missed the meditation and personal space. Major Baris kept his promise and put me in the gymnastics team where I spent countless hours trying to improve my pull-us, try to perfect flic-flaks, cartwheels and handstands. Never performed a good flic-flak. Luckily, I was growing very fast and by the time I was 1:75, our gymnastics coach told me that I was too tall to compete seriously. After two years of training, my progress was next to nothing. Major Baris lovingly commented that horse cocks could play gramophone tracks if I could compete in gymnastics. “Oglum senden jimnastikci olursa at yragindan gramofon ignesi olur”. The old man had a point.

I never wanted to compete as a runner or get into the school’s running team – you had to be crazy dedicated to do that. Most athletes in school teams had very hard time keeping up with both training and academics. Afraid to lose my focus in my classes, I kept running as a hobby for afternoons and weekends. Ashamed to admit, I was also smoking now and then. In my final year in 1991, I was running 1.500 meters at 4:40 and 5.000 meters at 19:00. I was now a teenager- 1.83cm and 70 kg.

Between 1987 to 1997, I kept running 5 and 10 Km’s a few times a week thru the academic year. We had military camps during the summers. Typically, I was waking up 5:00 running a 10 k in formation in the mornings, going thru drills all day and adding another 5 or 10 Km in the evenings on my private time. During the weekends, I developed a habit of doing a long run on Saturdays and a long swim on Sundays. Of course, I was eating like a horse, drinking as much beer as I could afford during the weekends and still weighing 70 kgs.

After leaving the army, I started working as a sales rep in a pharma company. That was a relief from having to keep fit all the times because I no longer had to take physical tests regularly, but kept on running leisurely.

For the first time in my life, I had money and time to pursue other meaningful activities (mostly partying, playing video games, chasing girls). I would do a 10 k on Sunday mornings but otherwise I would go for a run only when I had nothing better to do.

This went on for almost 15 years, until I was 40. Sometimes, I would just put on my shoes, go to the nearest football pitch and run a few laps freely to relax, not worrying about distance or speed. In the gym, I would start my routine with a 30 minute run at 6:00 pace n the treadmill. In time, running became an integral but unimportant part of my life. I kept running only because I found it simple relaxing. I never thought myself as a runner. This a-few-times-5K@6:00 pace routine continued for years. I quit smoking in 2000 and never relapsed. Work became more and more important. I never stopped exercising but my weight crept in. I love wine and cooking. After getting married and having a child, I started running less and less. Years went by.

In September 2014, on a beautiful summer afternoon, before a routine family dinner, I decided to go for a run a few casual 400 meters in Burhan Felek track, where I used train as a cadet some twenty plus years ago. I did not expect much from myself, but I was not prepared for a disaster either. I felt absolutely horrible. My whole body was feeling sluggish and heavy. My lungs were burning. The next day, I had an unfamiliar pain and fatigue all.

Suddenly I felt somewhat old. Of course, years would take their toll, but I was simply not ready to accept this on an emotional level. What happened after is very typical Next morning, I took a note of my weight. 89. Not unhealthy but a bit heavy for running. I needed to make a decision. I could either be a fairly healthy wine loving middle aged guy with a 2-hour-a-week exercise habit or I go all the way back to 1987 and try to be middle aged wine-loving runner this time.

And just like that, I decided to run my first marathon. For years and years, I believed, (and told others) that I’ve always been a “runner” since I have always been “running”. Not true. I think I really started running after 40 and felt like a runner sometime after 45.

This is how. But there is also the why of it.

Why do some people like me start waking up 5:00am, spend countless hours running, chase PB’s, try to complete harder and harder races? Need for identity, beating mortality, boredom, lack of other problems, search for meaning, getting heathy, losing weight, sense of community, coincidence, a combination of those reasons or none?

I think I know my reason though. My answer comes again from a childhood memory but this time I know that it’s true because I have a witness. We must have been 6-7. Our parents used to leave me and my sisters to my grandfathers village in for summer vacations. The village was in the middle of nowhere and there was absolutely nothing to do. I spent most of my time wandering around the village, careful to not go too far. One day my elder sister asked me a question: what do you want to achieve in life when you grow up? I did not have an answer to that. But I knew what I wanted. I just wanted to be free: free to go faraway, to places I did not even know existed. I wanted my life to be very long journey story where nothing happened twice. That would be a very cool answer. Instead, I lifted my finger, showed her the highest hill I could see and told her that one day I really wanted to climb that “mountain“. I think this is it- I just wanted to be free to go away, to move, to discover. This is why everything I love has something to do with movement and travel. Running is a shorthand for freedom to me more than anything else. This is why I want to be able to run, walk or crawl, climb to mountain after another, until I can’t.