To bonk or not to bonk?
That isn't really the question
by Ben Jonjak It is impossible to be a professional or amateur athlete without having "the Bonk" catch up with you from time to time. For those of you who don't know what I'm talking about, it's surely only the terminology and not the sensation that you don't recognize. Anybody who has ever saddled up on their dime-wide, sew-up rims or pulled tight the laces of a pair of sleek running shoes has experienced the Bonk.
It creeps up on you like a
leopard and then pounces like a gorilla. Your blood sugar drops like a stone. From the moment it hits you, you're as weak as a kitten and twice as disoriented.
Now, you'd think, being the mature, experienced adults that we all are, the Bonk would be easy to avoid. All you need to do is make sure you pack enough food or money (for buying those cheap gas station sandwiches) and you'd be OK. But the fact is that if you're trying to squeeze 500 or more training hours a year in with work
and family obligations, inevitably there'll come a day when you find yourself at mile 50 of a 100-mile bike ride with a growling stomach and not so much as an acorn to chew on to appease it. That's when things get ugly and you find out the truth about yourself – a truth you might have been happier not knowing.
The Bonk, my friends, is not a a mere case of the munchies as experienced daily by grumpy adolescents. The Bonk is a feral response to a threat to your very survival.
In the
throws of the Bonk there is very little you will not consume. The body is dying, it needs sustenance so you obey its primordial call.
Frank is usually the culprit who gets me into trouble.
"Hey Ben," he said casually in the midst of his 100-year program of rigorous ultra-human training. "Let's go for a bike ride."
"Uh ... well ..." I responded, trying desperately to think of a way to escape this terrifying prospect while preserving my manhood. "I haven't been riding much
lately. I wouldn't want to slow you down."
"Nonsense. We'll go slow. It'll be fun! Three hours, tops."
Curses, the man is persuasive. "Only three hours?"
"Yeah, just a nice little spin."
Three hours and 97 miles later I was gasping in a ditch near a town called Earl, Wisconsin, trying to wrestle eggs away from an angry mother snapping turtle.
Of course I hadn't brought any food or money. Money would have been worthless anyway since there isn't a store or
another human being for 200 miles in any direction. Meanwhile, Frank, oblivious to my plight, stood by the road scratching his head. "I guess we should have taken a left at Highway AA," he said.
Ask anyone that you see regularly in athletic tights and they'll have a story to tell you. In the throes of a Bonk, it's surprising the things that you'll eat. The TV show "Fear Factor" ain't got nothing on a starving athlete.
I've climbed over fences to steal apples from orchards. I've
scraped the mold off stale bread lodged itself between my car seat cushions. I've dug out promotional packets of fluorescent power gel sitting abandoned in my pack for, literally, years.
"I had a packet of that once," Frank said, semideliriously. (He was Bonking, too, but I'm too Bonked to notice.) "I think they had to stop selling it because it killed somebody or gave them cancer."
"I don't care," I snapped, ripping open the top and gobbling down the horrific stuff in one
vicious motion. The beast was momentarily appeased. We limped back to our car.
But the worst Bonk moment for me came during Grandma's Marathon. This was probably 1999. It was a hot year and kind of a strange day. People were passing out left and right.
I wasn't in exceptionally good shape that year, but that didn't stop me from running along with this spectacularly beautiful blonde girl who was an absolute joy to talk with. She was running something like a 3:40 pace. That
wasn't a mark I was going to hit that day, but there are some callings that are higher and more powerful than common sense. (Come to think of it, I can't remember the last time my common sense called in anything louder than a dull whisper.)
"So, how about if we slow down a bit and enjoy this marathon?" I asked, trying desperately to figure out how I could admit this chick was killing me and – again – still preserve my manhood.
"Come on. Run with me! You can do it!"
What an angel. Testosterone let me fake it for 10 miles, then the wheels fell off and burned.
"I've got to slow down," I said and veered away. She went prancing off into the multitude never to be seen again, like all my brief romances. At least I didn't lose any money. But I digress.
I faked it for about five more miles before it hit me. The slight tremble in my hands, the blurred vision, the cold sweat, the agony, the weakness. Oh no. The Bonk!
I patted myself down
looking for food and found none. In the past I'd been smart enough to staple a couple GU packets to my clothing, but not on that day. I lumbered awkwardly on, realizing that my mental agility was beginning to slow. What was I going to do?
An aid station! As one of the region's largest annual competitions, there had to be food somewhere. The next aid station appeared on the horizon and my heart soared. I focused my weary eyes on all those little hands holding out water in Dixie cups and
sopping sponges.
Water.
Water.
Water.
The first 10 outstretched hands did't phase me. I was confident food would be had somewhere down this line of course volunteers.
Water.
Water.
Water.
Don't tell me they don't have anything to eat. Wait! What's that? Some yellowish goo. Is it ...? Drat. It's a platter of Vaseline.
I had just about run completely through the aid station, all hope draining from my battered body, when I saw it.
There, at the end, a hand offered a single, solitary Twizzler. I put on the breaks and snatched it. No Twizzler was ever eaten so fast.
I pushed myself on, trying desperately to will the sugar into my diluted bloodstream. Strength momentarily returned. But it was all too soon that I discovered how much energy there actually is in a Twizzler. Almost nothing. My reprieve was momentary. I needed something else.
But the next aid station was miles away. Despair again set in. I
wasn't going to be able to make it. I was starving. In my mind's eye, I imagined my body turning against itself, the internal corpuscles harvesting bits of redundant flesh to toss into the raging furnace.
The situation was dire. I stared at the black asphalt that stretched out before me. Other runners flashed in and out of focus. Then I started seeing little shiny patches glowing in the darkness. I squinted.
GU packets. Empty GU packets that had been cast aside to torment me.
Everybody else had brought food, why hadn't I? What was I thinking?
I continued running and the flattened GU packets continued to taunt me. Until recently they were full of the electrolytes and nourishing calories I so desperately needed. If only they were still full. If only some GU still remained ...
Then a nasty thought occurred to me. I tried to discard it. Three more agonizing yards passed. My body was at the brink, I need to eat. The distasteful idea returned.
Perhaps some of those GU packets still had a bit of GU in them? No! I put the thought out of my mind the way plane crash survivors in the Himalayas probably do when they first consider cannibalizing other crash victims. But we all know how conflicts like that eventually turn out.
No! The idea was too terrible. What if I got some kind of disease from the leftover saliva? Actually, I told myself, that's absurd. These packets were tossed aside by marathoners. They're all doctors and
lawyers and such. They're all healthy ...
Shut up! I couldn't let myself rationalize.
But it wasn't merely my inner morality with which I was arguing. It was the Bonk. And when the Bonk is angry, it must be appeased.
A few meters later, I found myself bending to the ground to scavenge my first packet. I put it to my lips no longer caring who I was sharing it with. I squeezed and produced a pea-sized drop of GU. The line had been crossed.
From that moment on I
hardly traversed a foot without picking up at least one or two used packets. It was a disgusting business. No doubt I would have finished running the entire marathon that way. But bit by bit, my strength returned.
Then suddenly, I saw it. There on the pavement, shining brightly under the illumination of a single beam of light glimmering straight down from heaven, there and virtually untouched was a Power Bar.
I sprinted toward it like a hyena fearing some other Bonking madman
would stoop to claim the prize first. I reached down and pressed the glorious relic to my chest. The sun had warmed the candy bar to the perfect temperature. A Power Bar never tasted so good.
I lumbered onward to the finish line. The Bonk had been appeased.
My story lacks dignity, I suppose, but dignity's got nothing to do with survival. After all, isn't that why we do silly things like marathons? Isn't that why we push ourselves, why we train, why we sweat and suffer? Don't we
want to discover where our limits are and then exceed them? I know I do.
But then again, it brings something Hunter S. Thompson once said to mind: "You can't trust anybody about where the edge is because the only people that know for sure are the ones that have already gone over."
Amen, brother. Amen!
And actually, when you come to think of it, maybe I am smart enough to avoid the Bonk. Maybe I let it take me from time to time on purpose?
The Bonk is dead, long live the BONK!
Ben Jonjak is a native of northern Wisconsin, is an avid skier and marathoner who now lives in Peru. He can be reached at bjonjak@gmail.com
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