The running club at a maximum-security prison

I DON'T KNOW about those shorts," the correctional officer says. "They're supposed to go to the knee."

"They do go to the knee," I say, tugging at my waistband until it's riding precariously low, "to the top of the knee. Look, I wore these last time and nobody said anything."

"Be that as it may," she says, "do they go any lower?"

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While the other outsiders slip off their shoes and pad toward the metal detector, I have to monkey around with my clothes. Maximum security, of course, is not the kind of club you typically argue your way into. Among others, the Happy Face Killer lives here, the latest in a long and storied history of serial killers to wind up in the Oregon State Penitentiary (OSP). Most of the people waiting for us in the yard have been convicted of violent, person-on-person crime; the dress code is ostensibly for our own protection. So I pull my shorts down an eighth of an inch, and another, until the officer finally nods.

Outside, my eyes hit concrete in every direction, with the occasional flourish of razor wire. On the asphalt track, the runners are warming up in sweatshirts and jeans. We civilians have a mandatory extra layer — an orange vest, to make it easier for the guards to pick us out from the blue-clad inmates.

As soon as the gate closes behind us, a small group of inmates approaches, holding out safety pins. There's a shortage of them, they explain, and they want to make sure our race numbers won't be flapping around for 13.1 miles. "This is Gary," I tell them. "My boss. Watch out."

Gary Geist owns the brewpub where I bartend in Portland. Even though he's nearly 50 years old, he has a 2:29 marathon to his name and is going to run circles around everyone today except for Jeff, the fastest inmate. Gary's never been inside a prison before. It's not hard to imagine what he's thinking: I was the newbie last time, and my friends Rebecca and Hopi were the veterans introducing me to the crew. But as soon as I saw how respectfully the inmates treated women, my anxieties were quelled.

One of the guys pulls me aside. "I'm glad you came back," he says, then confides that he woke up in tears before realizing that today was race day. We're the only visitors he gets.

"Twenty minutes!" the inmate doing the announcing says. "Twenty minutes till the second annual High Wall Half Marathon!"

AS EVERY RUNNER knows, this sport has a way of shaping one's identity. For many of the inmates at the OSP, particularly those who have been derailed by addiction, running offers a fundamentally different blueprint for how to live.

Located an hour south of Portland in the capital city of Salem, the OSP is male-only, but both women and men from the outside are welcome to compete against inmates in the monthly race series, which runs one day a month, a Friday or Saturday, from March to October — seven 5Ks and 10Ks (run concurrently) and one half marathon. Out of 2,000 inmates, 130 are members of the running club. More than four decades old, organized and funded by inmates, the program's very existence suggests that prison can be rehabilitative. Eighteen months of good behavior are required to join the club, and it can take years for space to open up to those on the waiting list.

It makes all the difference, a pair of inmates named Todd and James told me, to be able to set goals, to have races to train for. They're a few years older than I am: late 30s, early 40s. Because of their crimes, they no longer have a relationship with their families. Barring bad behavior — or worse luck — the two of them will be living together until Todd gets out in 2028. And then James will have four more years without his closest friend.

"When I run," James said, "I don't see the walls. There's a tremendous amount of realization that life has to go on. It can get pretty rough and dark in here. But we're not just going to be here."

"That's why race day is so important," Todd said. "Bringing outsiders in here. It's a chance to show that we're normal. A chance to feel normal. Ninety-three percent of us are coming back to your communities. We'll be running alongside you, just not wearing blue."

I suppose I shouldn't be surprised that only four outsiders have shown up today. How many people are able to take a Friday off work to run a half marathon in a prison? I ask Todd how today's turnout compares to last year's. "There's about twice as many inmates running," he says.

Mickey, a shirtless, tan, youthful 51-year-old, asks Gary and me how fast we're planning on going. When I tell him I'd be happy with an hour and 35 minutes, he fights off a frown. "Well," he says, "I might be able to keep up with you for a while."

"What about you?" he asks Gary, making the mistake of judging my boss by the lines on his face. Gary confesses that his finishing time will likely be somewhere in the 1:20s. "You'll be right there with Jeff," Mickey whistles.

We all turn and face the infield. As usual, Jeff is on his own, on the grass, stretching. The fastest inmate is bigger than I remember. He must be six-five, six-six. "I don't know why exactly," he says, "but I'm feeling better." He tests his Achilles tendon, which is when I notice that his shoes look more like cross-trainers than running shoes. Could be the reason behind his recent injury, but I bite my tongue. Jeff makes more than $100 a month doing laundry, which is actually one of the best-paying prison jobs available. But he can't just zip by the shoe store on the way home from work.

The loop around the yard is 2,250 feet long, not quite half a mile. Thirty-one loops add up to a half marathon, meaning that we'll get 30 water stops — making this perhaps the best-supported half marathon in the country.

"Runners on your marks — "

Thirty-seven of us toe the line. The rest of the running club is manning the water station, serving as our lap counters, or simply cheering us on for the next couple hours. "Get set — " says the announcer.

There is, of course, no gun.

JEFF AND GARY zip off. I settle into a pack with inmates Scott, Mickey, and Trapper. The pace is just this side of conversational, which means that a couple times per lap I'm able to summon the breath to chat. Even as Mickey and Trapper begin to fall back, Scott tells me how pleased he is to see other inmates in the mix. "So many people have improved," he says.

I ask him why he joined the running club. "I was facing 25 years," Scott says, "and I knew there was going to be limited access to health care in here. I wanted to take care of my heart. And emotionally, I just wanted to run."

Over the next few miles, Scott tells me about his first full marathon, back in 2011. He'd been dreaming of tackling one for ages but was worried that he wouldn't have quite enough time to finish it. He realized that his best chance would come on race day, because the guards always gave the running club a little extra time in the yard. If he stayed outside after the 10K and kept going, there would, he calculated, be just enough time to cover 26.2 miles before the guards cleared the yard. But he would have to break four hours.

Scott's marathon started the instant he was brought outside that spring day. He got in two miles before the official race even started, then fought the impulse to speed up at the end with his running buddies. He kept running through all the postrace relaxing. A little before halfway through, the running club went back inside, and the general population was let out, and he began dodging through the non-runners.

The worry set in at mile 12, the cramps at mile 14. He was behind pace, but just a little. It wasn't until mile 23 that he knew he wasn't going to do it. At mile 25, the guards cleared the yard. Barely able to walk, Scott was determined to finish his marathon back inside. He hobbled to his cell block, and after 10 blinding minutes on the elliptical, crossed the line with a 4:01:47. Since then, he's run three more marathons — all arranged around the yard schedule — with a personal record of 3:25.

Just about every body type possible is represented today out on the course, with inmates ranging from their 20s to their 60s. Some, like Jeff, are remarkably fit. Others are carrying a bit more around the middle. When each runner reaches a noteworthy lap, the announcer says that so-and-so is "halfway there," or "two-thirds of the way there," and there is a resulting cheer.

Before too long, I hear Jeff's footsteps behind me; he's lapping me again. "You're killing it," I say. Along comes Gary. "You gonna get him?" I ask, nodding at Jeff's receding figure.

"He's pretty fast," Gary says, pulling ahead of me effortlessly. "I don't know."

Gary catches Jeff around the horseshoe pits. Just ahead of them are two pairs of guys they're about to lap. Gary realizes that he has just enough time to get around the slower runners before the gate, so he throws in a surge. Jeff can't quite cover the move. Gary gets through the gate first.

"It was a little scary," Gary admits to me on the ride home. "When he finished, I felt a little sheepish going up to him. I still wasn't sure, you know? But he was so nice. Those guys put on a great race."

"Next year?"

"Yeah," Gary says. "I'd do that again."

DURING THE RACE, Kip was just one more man in blue. I have no idea how many times I lapped him; he didn't stand out in any way. In fact, I don't think I heard his name until an hour after I finished, long after my sweat had dried and my IT bands were as stiff as two wet towels left out in the sun. That's when I heard the announcer saying, "Kip has two laps left."

Someone was still out there? Here we were, gorging on fruit and lounging in the grass, and there was Kip, 37th out of 37, shuffling along in the shade of the 26-foot wall, with a photo of his family pinned to his shorts. We got to our feet.

While we watched him circle the yard for the second-to-last time, the guys told me his story. Kip had been a meth addict. One day he got himself into a high-speed chase and crashed into a cop car on the freeway. So he got sent here, and not long into his sentence, he was diagnosed with renal cell carcinoma. Cancer. In this place. But he beat it. And so, earlier this year, just a few months ago, he and his wife decided to become runners. They wanted to clean up for their kids and work toward something together. And here he was, about to finish his first half marathon.

We cast aside our Dixie cups and settled in behind him. Everyone was a runner, even the people who didn't run, the people in blue jeans — the lap counters, the water station volunteers, the guy standing alone by the horseshoes. Kip didn't acknowledge us. He just stuck his head forward and led us past all the old landmarks. By the time we rounded the barn, I was almost expecting the wall not to be there.

"There are three reasons we run in here," James had told me. "We're running from our past — and from the stress and depression that come from being in here. We're running to something, doing what we can to feel normal and healthy. And we're running for something — to show the world outside that we're improving, in honor of our victims."

The miles may never add up, but that doesn't make the effort any less noble.

Excerpted from an article that originally appeared in Runner's World. Reprinted with permission. Copyrighted 2015. Rodale, Inc.