Running for my Life
by Steve McGill
I was 17 years old, a senior in high school, about to compete in my first race after coming back from a life-threatening battle with aplastic anemia — a rare blood disease characterized by bone marrow failure that leads to a steady loss of blood cells. It was a cold, windy March afternoon on our home track, made of cinders, at Malvern Prep in Malvern, PA in the Philly suburbs. Four months earlier, for almost the entire previous November, I had been laying in a hospital bed, receiving treatment for my illness. The fact that I was running competitively so soon after being discharged was a miracle unto itself. My coaches, Mr. Keeley and Mr. McAlpin, told me that they were proud of me for just rejoining the team and taking part in workouts. They were not pressuring me in the least bit to perform at a high level. “The fact that you’re out here at all,” Mr. McAlpin said to me that day, “proves that you have a strength and courage that is rare.”
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But his words did not make me feel proud. Instead, I felt confused. As a competitive athlete, the mindset I had always adopted was to race to win. The idea of being proud of myself just for racing, just for giving it a try, didn’t resonate with me. As I was warming up for the only race I would run that day — the 110 meter high hurdles — I found myself thinking, based on Mr. McAlpin’s words and the cold weather, that I should play it safe and keep my expectations low. Just get through the race, I told myself, and let this first race serve as a benchmark to build upon. I hadn’t raced as a healthy athlete in two years. In the spring of my junior year, I already was dealing with the symptoms of aplastic anemia, although I had yet to be diagnosed. Back then, I had constantly been grappling with severe levels of fatigue, even during fairly easy workouts. Now, stretching in the infield by myself, I found myself wondering if I could pick up where I had left off two years ago, or if I could never reach that level of performance again, or if, maybe, I’d come back even better.
With the temperatures in the mid-40’s and the wind swirling in different directions, I told myself that, yes, playing it safe made the most sense. I’d been to the bottom during my hospital stay, with tubes and wires attached to my wrist, and intravenous fluids coursing through my veins. Plagued by multiple side effects of the medicine, such as hives, chills, fever, and monstrous headaches, I had fallen into a deep depression and had given up on the idea of ever running competitively again, of ever finding out how good of a hurdler I could be. So yeah, I told myself, just get through the race.
While doing my warmup drills and practicing my start, I wore a heavy sweatshirt, heavy sweatpants, a wool hat on my head, ski gloves on my hands, and earmuffs over my ears. Bruh, it was cold.
But as my body gradually warmed up, and my race time was rapidly approaching, I changed my mind. Even though my coaches weren’t pressuring me to run fast; even though my teammates looked up to me as a leader who led by example, and still would still regardless of whether I finished first or finished last; and even though my parents, like my coaches, were proud of me for making it this far, and were cautioning me to take my comeback one day at a time, I couldn’t lie to myself. I wanted to win.
More specifically, I wanted to find out how fast I could run. On this day. In this weather. If I’m nowhere near where I was two years ago, I want to find out. If I’m faster than I was two years ago, I want to find out. If I’m somewhere in the middle, I want to find out. I don’t want to cross the finish line wondering how fast I could’ve run if I had tried harder. So I took off the earmuffs, the hat, the sweat shirt, the sweat pants, grabbed a set of starting blocks, and placed them behind the start line.
I ended up winning the race in a new personal best. I even beat my teammate, Mike Stinson, a lanky 6-5 dude who had beaten me in every 300m hurdle race the previous year. Back then, I had conceded the long hurdle race to him and would always joke to him, “I’m the man in the 110’s, you can have the 300’s,” trying to convince myself that I didn’t really care.
After I crossed the finish line and walked back to the start line to retrieve my warmup clothes, I received high-fives and “good job!”s from my teammates, a hug from Mr. McAlpin, and a proud-dad smile from Mr. Keeley. As I soaked in all this praise and jubilation, I felt strange to see how everybody was so happy for me, and that I had inspired them. Even Mike, who was disappointed to lose after beating me like a drum for a whole year, shook my hand and said “Good race, Steve. But I’m comin’ for ya next meet.”
As the next race began and the focus turned away from me, I realized something: the only person who knew the significance of my accomplishment was me. The personal best meant that I had reason to believe I could go on to have an outstanding season, but the personal best wasn’t the real accomplishment. My first place finish meant that I would probably be a contender for a conference championship, but the first place finish wasn’t the real accomplishment. The real accomplishment was that I had challenged myself to give my all in that race, on a day when no one was expecting anything of me. The real accomplishment took place before the race even began. The real accomplishment was my mindset. I could’ve settled, I could’ve played it safe. But I didn’t.
On that cold, windy March day in 1984, I taught myself a life lesson that I’ve continued to carry with me into all aspects of my life. Like the great distance runner Steve Prefontaine famously said, “to give less than your best is to sacrifice the gift.” My gift was that I was still alive, that I had not only survived aplastic anemia, but that I had made a full recovery in time to return to the thing I loved the most: running over hurdles.
It’s a lesson I have taught many of my students and athletes over the years throughout my adult life. It doesn’t matter how good you are or aren’t. It doesn’t matter if you’re 3-stepping or 4-stepping. It doesn’t matter if you will or won’t run in college. What matters is that you put all of who you are into everything you do, every time.
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