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Running on the roads is very safe compared to many other activities like driving, cycling, or even as a pedestrian going about your normal business. Let me tell you a tale.

I was a keen competitive marathoner running about 100 miles a week. That included a ten-miler each evening after work along the country roads on Western Pennsylvania.

It was lonely running in the early evening. Cows were being milked in the barns, families were in at the supper table and the sun was going down, but I enjoyed the solitude and the rush of adrenaline in doing speed trials in the middle of my run. After the run I would return to my work location a plant in the middle of fields to have a shower and change before driving home.

This evening was no different from the others. I had crossed the river at the covered bridge and, running on the left of the road, I had turned onto a curved bend. There was rarely traffic at this time of evening but running on the left was a basic safety function running against any cars that might appear.

Then I felt a blow at the back of my legs and I fell prone onto the tarmac, scraping my hands and knees. A car, driving on the wrong side of the road, had hit me.

I looked up and found that the car had stopped above me and my legs were still between the front wheels. I pulled myself up by the front fender and leant on the hood. I noticed that I was dripping blood on it and said stupidly to a person who had got out and come to my side, "I'm sorry, I've got blood on your car."

It turned out that both the driver and his wife were deaf and dumb. The driver, in trying to talk to his wife in sign language, had lost control and drifted to the wrong side of the road. A non-handicapped person in the back seeing what was happening couldn't get the driver to hear her warning.

They drove me back to my work location and the stupid driver did it once more. He signed to his wife and nearly lost control of the car again.

The lawyer that I went to explained that there was little I could do. The driving license number that I was given showed that the license could never be revoked because these disabled people couldn't do without a car. I thought of a few solutions to that situation but Pennsylvanian law didn't allow any recourse.

My leg was not broken but badly bruised and strained so that I had to walk with a stick after and I had to quit my training for the Boston Marathon, which was coming up in a few weeks.

In the end I did run at Boston carrying a packet of aspirins in case the pain got worse as well as a five-dollar note for a cab if needed. However, I finished the 26-plus miles in a respectable time though slower than normal.

I remember the incident well because in the years since the weakness in the leg that took the main impact of the car has troubled me many times.

However, since in twenty years I ran over 74,000 miles mostly on the roads, the incident didn't persuade me that running on the roads isn't as safe as any other endeavor and much safer than most.

Learn more about this author, John Graham.
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