SETTING ASIDE DIFFERENCES FOR THE LONG RUN

MICHAEL MADDEN
They all came down the spiral, blue-carpeted stairway of the Parkman House on Beacon Street of the old Boston with smiles on their faces and harmony on their minds. Mayor Raymond L. Flynn came down with New Balances on his feet.

They had come to save the Boston Marathon, when for years they had accused each other of burying it. All had spoken of their love for this special race on Patriots Day, but few had practiced it, so "tradition" had become a code word for intransigence and "progress" a synonym for greed. Boston, as it should, fights major wars when tradition and progress are posed on opposite fronts. This one was bitter.

The scene yesterday was all the more remarkable because of past words and old feuds, and perhaps only Tom Grilk, the Marathon's vibrant finish-line announcer at the Pru, could have done it justice. Billy Rodgers was standing next to an official of the Boston Athletic Association, both smiling, and people who used to slur at each other were purring. Best of all, there was hope amid the questions.

"Will this in fact commercialize the Boston Marathon?" Mayor Flynn asked. ''I can tell you that I'm very much in favor of the Boston Marathon not being overcommercialized and that it doesn't lose its flavor of a unique amateur event."

Therein the dilemma. New York and Chicago, the rich, glitzy marathons of America that the elite runners hold high above their heads as the model for all, have money but no tradition. Boston has tradition but no money. Finally, though, there is movement.

The plan is for the Boston Marathon to finally award prize money to top finishers, again attracting elite runners, and move the race from its old Victorian home on Patriots Day to Sunday, luring television while guarding tradition. Of course, even if its official name is never tawdrified by calling it the Dole Pineapple Boston Marathon, all that will be difficult because money and television tend to tarnish. A soul must be protected.

So this Saturday morning in July may have seemed hot and stifling, but a new and cooler breeze was blowing. The elite runners who had battered and bruised and embarrassed the one race they claim to love by staying away from it, talking it down, promised to return now that they would be paid. The Boston Athletic Association now concedes that times have changed and the BAA is willing to acquiesce, at least, to the new order. None of the groups has moved totally from selfish concerns to selfless, but reality can be a comfortable mid-point.

"If prize money is awarded, I think the top runners will be here," said Rodgers, Boston's best-known marathoner. "I've always felt that Boston is to marathoning what Wimbledon is to tennis . . . The dignity of the race will still be here."

Significantly, the plan that the mayor presented last week and explained yesterday was the runners' plan to revive Boston. The BAA was not involved in its drafting, although the plan vitally affects the BAA's own race. In other years, this would have led to more frayed feelings, but as the BAA's Guy Morse pointed out, "People have to realize that not only the Marathon is changing, but the BAA is changing also. The BAA is not what it was two years ago."

Representatives of all parties (some used to be known as factions until the new plan was announced last week) were at the Parkman House meeting - the runners, the BAA whose race it is, the Boston business community, and officials from the cities and towns between Hopkinton, where the race starts, and Boston.

All were there, that is, except officials from Hopkinton, who are not known to be in favor of 15,000 or so runners and friends and T-shirt entrepreneurs tending to business on the front lawns of their churches on a Sunday morning in April. The absence of Hopkinton was neither significant nor symbolic, we were told; merely prior committments.

This much seems for sure. Prize money will be awarded for the first time for the 1986 Boston Marathon, although no one now has a clue exactly how much money there will be. Morse, administrator of the BAA, said the BAA already was planning a vote on the prize money question before Mayor Flynn's proposal became public last week. A vote on prize money should be taken by the BAA within the next few weeks.

"Whether we would vote for changing the race to Sunday is stickier," said Morse. "The main concern of the BAA is preserving Boston 'as Boston,' preserving all that is good about Boston. We're not all that certain that running on Sunday will be better than running on Monday."

The Sunday before Patriots Day next year will be Easter Sunday, a most unlikely day for a marathon. Mayor Flynn ("I'd run it on Christmas Day just
because it's Boston") favors an ultimate move to a nationally-televised race on Sunday, but the BAA may not favor such a move because, as Morse pointed out, "I have a fear of television." The BAA's hope is that money can be raised from corporate sponsors for a financially-competitive race without the need for television money.

"I will race myself if there is prize money," said Rodgers. "Holy cow, if the BAA ever makes the decision (to award prize money), it'll be mind- boggling to the runners. They'll flock to Boston again."

The runners' influence on the mayor's plan is clear from the many dollar signs in the proposal. In addition to some $300,000 in prize money, there are provisions for additional bonuses of $10,000 each for a man and woman who breaks the course record, $10,000 more for an American record and as much as $75,000 to $100,000 for a world's record. Furthermore, a liberal plan for paying for the hotel rooms of elite runners is included.

"How can we be sure the top runners will sign up even if we decide to award prize money?" asked Morse. "What if the runners feel it is not enough?"

A real concern. Indeed, Rodgers was saying yesterday that it might not be enough for the BAA to merely offer prize money, which would have been enough for the unhappy elite runners last April, but that it should offer "good" prize money. "Our main concern is that we have a good race," said Rodgers, ''and to have a good race, you must have depth in the field. To get good depth, you need good prize money. You don't go halfway."

The mayor's concern was not focused so precisely on the money but that top runners return to Boston while its amateur status is maintained and "the race remains open to all people who love running." The BAA's concern is that Boston adapt to the times while still retaining its traditional uniqueness that helped spawn the running boom, while the runners' concern is that they should be paid because there are only so many marathons they can run.

These can be conflicting concerns. Only if more remarkable events happen - such as Rodgers and the BAA's Morse standing side-by-side yesterday - can they be settled. Both the elite runners and the BAA already have done too much to damage the one thing they both claim to cherish, the Marathon. A few more steps from selfish to selfless, and their old friend might be back on its legs.

Home | '86 Races