Finished today at the Bataan Memorial Death March civilian heavy division (carrying a 35lb ruck) in just under 7 hours. Making it my second slowest marathon finish. I really don’t have a benchmark for this sort of thing. So, it is neither good, nor bad. It’s just a thing. On a related note, if you have never done this event, I have two pieces of advice: (1) Do it, and (c) maybe try once before you decide to go heavy, unless you’re an idiot such as myself, who apparently likes suffering. Not a lot went right this trip, but enough did that I come away from this experience in a slightly better place. Still processing a lot of the details. But in the mean time. Not so fun fact: in the real Bataan Death March about 60-80,000 Filipino and American service members, starved from three months plus of combat in siege-like conditions would be forced to march as much as 66 miles without food or water from Japanese captors taught that everyday cruelty is acceptable behavior even within their own ranks, and with too few resources to support their POWs. Men too slow we’re bayoneted, or shot. They were crammed into railroad cars that would take them to under resourced prison camps for years, and in some cases loaded onto “hellships“ and sent to Japan to function as slaves. I’m tempted to make some larger point about war, but what the hell do I know? I went to some peacenik school. I’ve never served. I’ll just say this: we have some really tough characters who have volunteered to protect us. We owe it to them to give very serious thought to situations that would put them in harm’s way.
