Interviews

The Interview That Never Was

A few years ago, I had the great pleasure of striking up an acquaintance with John MacLaren, fitness coach and former Navy SEAL. John was kind enough to talk about the importance of strength training for endurance athletes as well as some of his work with actor Tom Jane, now of the HBO series “Hung,” to get buff for his role in the superhero movie “The Punisher.”

During one of our many chats, John started talking about his older brother Jim and how proud he was of his accomplishments.  He went on to describe how Jim was 300-pound defensive end for the Yale football team and one night in 1985, while riding his motorcycle in New York City, was broadsided by a 20-ton bus.  He was pronounce dead upon arrival at the hospital.  Abbreviating the story a bit, his brother survived and left the story missing his left leg below the knee.

Jim recovered and went on to compete in the Hawaii Ironman and the New York City Marathon. It was during the bike leg of one of his 1993 triathlons that a van was misdirected onto the closed course. Jim hit it and was launched head first into a telephone pole, breaking his neck and leaving him a quadriplegic.

“That guy is your brother?!” I asked.  “Man, I never made the connection.  Everybody in triathlon knows the story of Jim MacLaren. He’s an amazing and inspirational man.”

We discussed trying to set something up where I would interview Jim and do a piece about desire, willpower and what it takes to overcome obstacles and do so with a smile on your face.  For reasons I can’t recall, we were never able to get that interview going and I was saddened to learn this morning that Jim passed away earlier this week. He was 47.

You can learn more about Jim’s life from his web site and this brief remembrance at Triathlete Magazine.

The family is asking that Jim be remembered by making a donation to the Challanged Athlete’s Foundation through the Jim MacLaren Memorial page.

Since thinking about Jim’s death today, I can only think of just how fitting the following is. When Meher Baba, Pete Townsend’s spiritual advisor, died, the act was not mourned as a loss, but rather a celebration. In the eyes of his followers, Baba hadn’t really died.

He simply dropped his physical body.

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