Somewhere in the middle of the 70s the Army got all "run" crazy. Bernie Rogers, the new Chief of Staff of the Army, decided that we all needed to be able to run two miles in less than seventeen minutes regardless of what the PT test standards were (at the time, a guy in my age group was required to run one mile in less than ten minutes or so). This, coupled with new weight standards (which overnight made me 20 pounds overweight), created some concern. We all were given ninety days to get up to (or down to) the new standard. I struggled with this because I never was a runner; when I did run, it was slow and not very far. Struggle though it was, I was able to make the adjustment, barely.
A few years later I was assigned to drive our new Commander-in-Chief Europe, who also doubled as the Supreme Allied Commander of NATO forces. Wearing two hats like that meant he had to be "read-in" to all the stuff going on at both the US EUROPEAN COMMAND (USEUCOM) at Patch Barracks in Vaihingen, Germany and at Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers Europe (SHAPE) at Brussels, Belgium. I was not his full-time driver; that would be a fellow up in Belgium. But for the week he was at Patch to be oriented, I was his guy. And as fate would have it, it turned out to be General Bernie Rogers. I was prepared to be miserable and hateful and resentful and all the other -fuls; he was the guy who had made my life hell a few years before. But almost immediately upon meeting him and his wife, I became...I don't know...can a staff sergeant be friends with a four star general? 'Nuff to say I liked him and he apparently liked me, too, because whenever he came to Patch, he expected me to be his driver. We were friendly enough that on one long drive I confided in him that his policies had became a real problem for me. He chuckled and allowed as how I probably didn't like him much for that. But then he explained what spurred the new policy and why he felt so strongly about it. Someone had embarassed him.
Before he became the Chief of Staff of the Army, Gen Rogers was the FORCECOM Commander. He was reviewing a parade in honor of a visiting General from South America somewhere and as the troops marched by the SA General leaned over to Gen Rogers and chuckled, saying, "In my army the Generals are fat and the sergeants are skinny...in your army the sergeants are fat and the generals are skinny..." From that moment on he made it one of his life's works to eliminate fat sergeants...or fat anybodies.
But that is just background, not what this is all about. When I left Fort Ord for Patch Barracks in 1977, I was still struggling with the weight and the running. My new First Sergeant looked me over and perceived that that might be the case. He suggested that I get a good pair of running shoes and start hitting the trails through the forest behind Patch. Lots of "good running" out there, he claimed. In my mind there was no such thing as "good running" but he did manage to convince me that if I was to have a future in the Army, I had better get more familiar with those trails. So I did. It wasn't easy, and I still wasn't fast, but I was regular and determined. I was tired of being afraid of PT tests and all that. I swore I would work hard at it and get in good enough shape that if someone sprung a surprise PT test on me I would sigh with relief because that would be an easy day. The plan worked out pretty well and inside of a year I was in better shape than I had ever been in, and getting better. But I still wasn't fast. I don't remember the exact requirement at the time; I do know that I could run two miles inside the maximum allowed, but with not too much to spare.
Told you all that so I could tell you this: It was a warm spring day and we were meeting on Husky Field for our PT test. Push-ups and sit-ups were not a problem; I never "maxed" those events but I did score high enough to be far above average. I had agreed to run with one of the mechanics, named Isenhower (that's the way he spelled it). We were about the same size; he was a little younger than me but we had about the same pace. Husky field is an irregular-sized field so the two mile run started in one place, went around five times, and then ended some distance past the starting point. One of my buddies from the motor pool, SSG Dixon, was timing us. We had a rough estimate of what our times should be at each lap and Dixon would call out our times so we could figure our pace. We started out at "Go" and settled into the pace we thought would get us through in time. After the first lap, the timers would move up to the point where the finish line would be, so no one really called out the times because it was an irregular lap. At the end of the second lap, Dixon called out a time. But it was a way longer time than it should have been. Ike looked at me and we nodded to each other...we were behind and had to step it up. We pushed each other harder and harder but we couldn't seem to gain any time. As we approached the last hundred yards or so, Ike said he had to kick out; he couldn't afford to fail. I kicked, too, but couldn't keep up with him. I sprinted as best I could, lungs burning, legs of rubber, arms weighing a ton. I crossed the finish way behind Ike and, I was afraid, 'way behind the time I needed. I think the slowest time I was allowed was in the neighborhood of seventeen and a half minutes. I blew through the finish line, then jogged a few yards to slow my heart and catch my breath. I looped back over to Dixon to get the bad news. He was smiling from ear to ear..."14:42..that's 'bout your best ever, ain't it?" It was. A personal best, managed because Dixon thought he was a funny guy and kept calling out bogus times, making Ike and me think we were 'way slow. He laughed about that for weeks. I was POed...big time...but then, it was a personal best.