East of Boston

Hodgie-San

 
For just a brief time when I was a kid, they used to have a big race on Duxbury Beach every summer. They called it the Gurnet Classic Beach Run. It was a straight up-and-back shot down Duxbury Beach, probably one of the few races an elite talent like Bill Rogers or Alberto Salazar were ever in that involved making a U-turn.

More races should have U-turns. No, that's not where I'm going with this, but I just wanted that on the Internet somewhere. Look at the Olympics... no U-turns, except in the swimming events. It's wrong. The NFL, NHL, and NBA are based on back-and-forth movement of players and teams. The President's Physical Fitness Test involves a shuttle run, which is back and forth in nature. Why not the Olympics?

I'm a Mommy now, but I worked in a factory, as a waitress, and as a teacher. Running back and forth between stuff is a viable and important part of American existence.... and I'd imagine that the eggs don't bring themselves out to the table in Finland or Thailand, either.

All the better sports evolve out of human activity. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to envision where racing, boxing or wrestling came from. You could imagine where javelin throwing or archery would be handy skills to have in the caveman days... and once you establish an activity as being important, it's only a matter of time before people start betting on who can do it better.

It takes a little more creativity to guess that hockey is the natural competitive outgrowth of some poor Mongolian who had wandered across the frozen Bering Strait.... and figured out that he could get somewhere faster by sliding on the ice than stepping.... then figured out how to use a stick to push his supper (a penguin, baby seal, or whatever Eskimos eat) along the ice with him, as it was too cold to carry. Other Eskimo people see the success he enjoys, and get their own sticks to try to steal the penguin from him. Eventually, you get hockey.

Racing is more innate. Horses and dogs do it. Running goes back in history at least as far as "trying to get away from the Mammoth." But we got pretty close to the time of Christ before running made its true mark in history. Peep this: Battle of Marathon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

2500 years have passed since then, but running is basically the same now as it was when the saber-tooth was chasing you. They have races as arduous as 26 mile marathons and as brief as racing your sister to answer the phone when you both are waiting for a call... hell, those were sometimes as short as 3 feet in my house, and sort of resembled the scramble that the XFL used to have to determine possession of the opening kickoff.

Boston is known for marathons, but Duxbury was known (in running circles) for the Gurnet Classic Beach Run. Run in late July on a flat barrier beach, it started and ended at the infamous Gurnet Inn... hence the U-turn we spoke of earlier, which occurs just before the village of Saquish (Wampanoag: "many clams") at the end of the mini Cape.

There really wasn't a better place to watch a race. Why pay $50 to park on someone's rhododendron just to watch the Boston Marathon go by as you shiver away an April morning in Natick?  Trust me... Duxbury Beach in July is better, and everybody goes by you twice. You can sit in the sand, mix a nice iced drink, and enjoy the day's entertainment in style. Ayup... as far as racing goes, the Gurnet Classic Beach Run was the bee's nuts.

Of course, I was just a kid. No margaritas for me at the Classic. I was just enthralled to see my lonely spit of land become a beehive of activity. I'd circulate with my friends among the watch-the-race people who would slowly get sloppy drunk in our front yard. I'm pretty sure that my first beer was given to me- when I was maybe 9 years old- by one of the Eliot Lounge people.

We had some kick-ass races, from a running fan's perspective. Bill Rogers, Alberto Salazar, and Bob Hodge would have been the Olympic marathon trials in 1980 if Jimmy Carter hadn't decided to politicize the Olympic team.

I don't really run much, myself... I move with a sort of short-legged mother duck waddle that belies the myth of me actually beating someone to something. But other people do.. and, as far as Google is concerned... there is no greater authority than Bob Hodge.

Bob Hodge was a Lowell kid who made it to the top of the marathon business. He's won races from here to Japan. He'd have been an Olympian, except that he peaked right around the the Olympiad where the Soviet Union went into Afghanistan... so there went that.

Instead, the local jogging elite squared off at Duxbury, running to a lighthouse and back. Folks in Green Harbor and Duxbury still talk about Bob, Bill and Alberto going neck and neck down the stretch... although, rather than settling the issue, they chose  to cross the finish line together in an act of Runner Solidarity.

Here's some Bob Hodge goodness:

Bob Hodge (runner) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Hodgie-San Through Miles of Years: Bob Hodge Running Page

I tracked down and hassled Bob Hodge... and he was good enough to do a brief email interview. A lot of my interviews die once the subject reads/hears my questions- WWE superstar Chris Nowinski is my biggest loss in this area- but Mr. Hodge was a trooper.

Enjoy! 

Stacey:  What did the Gurnet Classic Beach Run mean to you?

Bob Hodge: A day at the beach.

S- Did you ever win it?

B- Sort of.... http://www.bunnhill.com/BobHodge/Articles/GurneT78.htm

 Aug. 5, 1978 - 6M Beach Run, Duxbury - 30:39 (tied for 1st w/ A. Salazar)

1982 Gurnet Beach MA - 5m - 24:17 (mass group tie for first)

S- What advantages and disadvantages lie in running on a beach?

B- None. It is still one foot in front of the other, repeat.

S- How long was the longer version of the GCBR?

B- No one really knows for sure, perhaps six miles?

S-  About how long does a serious runner need to recover after a beach race before heading up to the Gurnet Inn bar?

B- Depends, you buying?

S- Wish I could. The Inn ws flattened by a nor'easter. They ran the bar for awhile, but I think there's like 2 big houses there now. It's a shame... I liked having a bar I could stumble home from in the neighborhood.

S-  Were you a big Eliot Lounge patron? We used to have two guys park in front of our house every year and drink like 20 beers each as the race wet on. They claimed to be "personal emissaries" of Tommy Leonard's, and yelled "Epic!" a lot. I know that they were allowed to take the official microphone now and then during the course of the day, so they must have had some clout.

B- Yes. My feet were cast in concrete outside.

http://www.bunnhill.com/BobHodge/rtp2.htm

I moved to the South Shore in 1978 to work at the RUNNERY in Hanover for owner/founder Sharpless C Jones of Scituate. They sponsored the race and of course Jack McDonald, father of the GBTC masterminded it. Eliot Loungers are everywhere awaiting the next reunion.

S- My husband said something about casting my feet in concrete once, but he said we had to be offshore in his boat. But anyways.... Did the GCBR hold prestige in the running community? If you lost the Boston Marathon to Alberto Salazar, could you sneer "Well, I whipped your ass in Duxbury" at him?

B- No.

S-  How'd you do at Falmouth?

B- I had multiple top ten finishes beginning in 1975. My best was 4th in 1980, 32:38.

S- Would a Kenyan runner enjoy the same advantages in a shorter beach race that he seems to enjoy in the marathons?

 B- What advantages do you suppose they have?  

S- Running from Kenya.

S-  Did anyone ever use a Boston Whaler to sort of pull a Rosie Ruiz-style circumvention of the race route?

 B- .....

S-  A beach seems like a strange place to hold a race. Have you ever raced somewhere sillier?

B-  Mt Washington? A beach is the ideal place to race, at least at low tide.

S-  Why do they call you "Hodgie-san?"

B- http://www.bunnhill.com/BobHodge/Races/races82.htm

S- Did you learn to run fast while fleeing thugs while you were growing up in Lowell?

B-  http://www.bunnhill.com/BobHodge/HighSchool/HSchool.htm

S- Do you think Marathons are dangerous for rookies?

B- Preparation is the key.

 S-  Did you ever bail out mid-race take a leak?

B- ....

S-  A runner I know from Duxbury ( SRR Profile: Tamara Toselli-LoVuolo) has been flashed like 5 times during races at various levels of competition, including once during her high school career. Do/did you have any race groupies?

B- No

S- Did you ever get any Jordan-like sneaker company endorsements?

B- No, but I did OK.

S-  Have you ever run the historical Marathon-to-Athens route? I figure that'd be like a Jogger Hajj.  

B- No, I wish I had. Perhaps I will.

S-  iPod on a runner. Cool or Fool?

B- No iPod for me.