ads1.advance.netNL NEWSLETTER 10Open ↗ newsletter_pop.html
Marathon man
David Spielman runs five miles a day, every day, no matter what, no matter where he may be -- for
3,550 consecutive days and counting. Wednesday November 19, 2003 Angus Lind
Ron Forman may be the CEO of the Audubon Institute and some may refer to him as director of the zoo
-- but David Spielman runs the park.
Not only does he run the park, he has run on every continent except Antarctica, he has run in 49 of
the 50 states (Alaska excepted), he has run in a hurricane and, as of today, he has run on 3,550
consecutive days.
On February 16, he'll hit the 10-year mark -- a decade of running without missing a day.
Spielman runs 5 miles at an eight-minute clip, which, as he says, "is pretty good for an old guy."
But what the 53-year-old commercial photographer is not is -- what's the word we're looking for? --
he is not a total nutball. It's difficult to believe that any explanation of such fanatical devotion
to one form of exercise would be plausible, but Spielman insists it's as simple as this: Like
eating, sleeping and brushing your teeth, exercise is part of his daily routine. It's his quiet time
and, at 4:30 a.m. when he leaves his house to run, it definitely is quiet.
"I'm not the disciple of running," he said. "I don't go to a cocktail party and try to
convert anybody."
But 3,550 consecutive days?
"I started it on a whim and I'll end it on a whim," he said. "Certainly I'm compulsive but it's not
an obsession."
Spielman's life is stressful.
"I'm a freelancer. I'm a hired gun. I do commercial work. I go anywhere and everywhere. I can't
control my work. It's nothing but deadlines on top of weather on top of budgets. I travel three or
four months of the year on assignments."
He could be in Russia one week, Bali the next, followed by the Gulf of Mexico, Nicaragua, Bombay and
Northern Ireland.
He also runs his gallery at The Rink on Prytania Street, collects photographs, manages his
finances, does work for local clients and, like a mailman taking a weekend walk, shoots pictures on
his days off.
"My run in the morning prepares me for my day," he said. Out there on the open road, he sorts things
out, anticipates what lies ahead, addresses his concerns.
One of his favorite spots in Audubon Park is what he calls "Sleepy Hollow," the gorgeous colonnade
of oak trees nearest Walnut Street heading toward Magazine from Hurst Street. The breadth of their
branches forms an archway over the jogging and biking roadway.
"You know they've been out there since horse and buggy days," he said, "and you really feel the age
of the city and its charm when you're in the park. It's an exceptional asset."
He'll also tell you that while he's out there contemplating its beauty, "I've figured out how to fix
world peace, get rid of all the crooked politicians and solve the city's problems. But the mayor
hasn't called me yet."
On the walls of one room at Spielman's home hang 60 pairs of running shoes, a virtual chronology of
the history of running shoe technology from the earliest leather Adidas Italias to Asics Tigers to
New Balance 990s to Nikes and many more. Surprisingly, and fortunately, they don't smell.
None of this was planned, he said. It just happened. As a kid growing up in Tulsa, Okla., he played
tennis and swam. By the time he got to Westminster College in Fulton, Mo., he was into soccer. At
his fraternity house one year during alumni weekend, he saw guys who were only 10 years older who
were terribly out of shape and looked bad.
Already into photography, he started looking around for something to do the rest of his life to stay
in shape, "thinking about something I could do anywhere in the world without a partner."
When the gears stopped spinning, the answer was always the same: running.
At the Southern Hills Country Club in Tulsa, he hooked up with an older group of 15 men and women
-- some who were contemporaries of his parents -- and started running under the watchful eye of
D.P. Hall, who became his running mentor. Now around 80, Hall still runs with Spielman when he
gets to Tulsa.
In January of 1973, Spielman packed his cameras and jogging shoes and moved to New Orleans simply
because he wanted to be a professional photographer and "New Orleans looked like a European city."
He lived in the Garden District at first and ran on St. Charles Avenue.
"The park still had cars in it so it wasn't exactly runner-friendly," he said. Runners were so
scarce back then, "If I saw another runner, we'd stop, exchange names and running tips. There was
nobody out there running."
So Spielman "watched the entire running thing evolve, the different races, the fad of it. You'd see
groups come and go." He has never run a marathon, runs only a couple races a year and says his only
goal is, "I'd like to run until the day I die -- or the day before."
A minor point: This is not his first running steak. There was the one that ended at 1,099 days. He
was in Europe. "I took a day off because I didn't want people to think I was compulsive," he said.
Running on the road has provided some interesting moments. In Guatemala at Lake Atitlan, believed by
some to be the most beautiful lake in the world because it is surrounded by rolling hills, volcanoes
and Mayan villages, Spielman was coming down a hill and spotted a band of armed guerrillas a couple
hundred yards in front of him.
"I gave them the peace sign and started running the other way," he said. "I had heard gunshots
earlier and had been told it was an old Guatemalan custom to shoot off fireworks on birthdays."
He has run down major boulevards in cities from Vienna to Paris, past where the storming of the
Bastille took place. He has run near the Pyramids in Egypt, too.
"My travels have really given me a sense of history. You look at the Pyramids and realize they were
there before Christ was born. We're going to be here about 70 years. That's about as significant as
a grain of sand."
His travels also cause some problems with the streak. When he flew from Miami to Frankfurt to
Moscow, he said, "You're jumping ahead in time. I didn't get in until 11:30 p.m. I had to get out
before midnight to get my run in for that day."
Then there was the time he was photographing oil platforms in the Gulf of Mexico and the weather
delayed his flight. So he went up on the helipad and ran first clockwise then counter-clockwise
until he got his run in.
He flew to Bali for a one-shot assignment. He went across the International Dateline, a problem for
streaks because you're moving backwards on the time scale. So he ran the morning he left New
Orleans. He arrived in Bali the afternoon of the day before. The next morning he ran, which is the
same day he left New Orleans. Then he got back a day ahead and ran.
If none of that makes sense, try this: He kept his streak intact but, "That was a real worry."
As for a diet, there is none.
"It's all moderation," he said. "I get on the scale every day." He's 5-foot-10 and weighs 148
pounds. "No soft drinks, no fried foods. Living in New Orleans is almost impossible for diets. But
if you cut out all the bad stuff, you wouldn't have any fun. I just tell people the muscle I
exercise the most is pushing away from the table."
Spielman insists this is not a Guinness Book of Records quest, it's not his version of baseball's
Cal Ripken chasing Lou Gehrig's consecutive games played record -- it's just David Spielman being
David Spielman.
"It's not advertised," he said. "A lot of people who know me don't know anything about it."
But as much as he loves his running and is admittedly having fun with the streak, not every day when
he laces up is euphoric.
"Runner's high? Sometimes, but some days it hurts," he said. "But then you get that feeling of
accomplishment that it's in the bank for that day."
Luckily, on this streak he has been sick and injured but nothing major. And when it ends?
"I hope to be in Paris with the woman I love and say, 'You know, I don't think I'm going to
run today."
. . . . . . .
Columnist Angus Lind can be reached at [email hidden] or at (504) 826-3449.