On July 11, 2013, Peter Milligan, a Pennsylvania lawyer, was in Pamplona, Spain, for the annual Running of the Bulls, an event he’s participated in every year for several decades.
In the midst of that morning’s run, the horns of two separate bulls brushed his shirt, one after the other, but he escaped unscathed.
To his right, he saw a police officer motioning that all six bulls had passed. Recalling his own count, Milligan had doubts.
As he counted, he was clipped by another runner, and fell forward, snapping his ankle. “If I think about the sound it made too long, I still become nauseated,” he writes. “It was loud.”
Milligan fell at the entrance to the bull ring, “the perfectly wrong place to fall,” as “a street full of bulls and thousands of panicked runners is tunneled into a place hardly wider than my wingspan.”
He heard bull hooves on cobblestones and sensed the fear of the scattering crowd.
“I rolled against the wall in the fetal position, or as far into the fetal position as I could roll at 43 years old, and covered my head,” he writes. “Runner after runner after runner jumped me and kicked me and shaved the back of my head with their sneakered feet.”
He managed to stand up and lean against a wall. The smell of a bull came closer, and then he saw the beast.
“[A] white bull with blood dripping from its horns and malice in its heart had turned around while running and was holding the waves of lads behind me at bay. [A minder] was coming unhinged shrieking for me to flee. He looked like he was preparing to watch me die right there.”
As Milligan “reached down and [felt] two tiny nubs poking through the skin” of his ankle, his fingers now “covered in blood,” he saw that two more bulls had refused to be put in the ring and were headed in his direction.
His savior appeared in the form of “a senior-citizen Basque woman” who “leapt over the wall and shielded me with her body.” The bulls passed by without incident, and the woman helped emergency workers carry him to safety.
One might think such an experience would discourage further madness. But Milligan, in this new book, “Bulls Before Breakfast,” about what it’s like to run with the bulls and what you need to know to get out unscathed, dismisses this outright, calling the incident, “my ‘Starry Night’; my Apollo and Daphne.”
The Running of the Bulls has occurred every year since 1196 as part of the festival of San Fermin, named for the first bishop of Pamplona. A martyr to his faith, legend has it Saint Fermin was killed by being dragged through the streets by bulls. More likely, the running tradition started because the festival culminates in a bullfight, and the bulls had to be herded from outside the city into the bull ring.
Known as the “encierro,” there’s a run every morning from July 7-14. Originally held in October, it was moved to July for the better weather in 1591.
Despite their bulk, bulls are disarmingly quick, running about 35 mph. By way of comparison, cheetahs run 45 mph.
“In the street,” Milligan notes, “the difference is negligible.”
The encierro begins at precisely 8 a.m., when a rocket is fired to indicate that “the paddock doors are opened, and . . . the first bull has left the corral.” Soon after, “a second rocket announces that all the bulls have left,” and a runner’s ability to “count the seconds” in between the two rocket firings is paramount.
“Bulls running together are much less likely to engage in mischief,” he writes. “If there is a long time between rockets, it’s likely the bulls have become separated and danger is afoot.”
Once the run begins, the half-mile course has doorways along its path that look like perfect places to hide. They’re not.
“There is no safe doorway,” he writes, “and often bulls catch standers flush. And, climbing [over walls or railings] only draws the attention of the bulls. Running hard, and straight down the middle, is the safest option.”
One of the greatest challenges is timing the beginning of the run, which Milligan calls, “the absolute hardest skill to master,” noting that, “you may have to run dozens of times” before you do it well.
“Don’t wait for them to pass you,” he advises. “Run when you see the bulls. Or, run when you’re about to see them.” Later, he says that, “some friends advise that they start running when everyone stops looking back over their shoulder.” Runners used to time their runs with “the wash of camera flashes as the bulls approached,” but camera phones have made this obsolete.
“If you wait too long to run, [the bulls] will pass you before your brain can tell your feet to get on the move. When you are running down the center of the street, the bulls will quickly overtake you.” The trick, then, is to get out of the way in time.
Once you’re off and running, the most important thing to note is to “count the bulls.” There are always six, a fact made confusing by the presence of steers sent to guide them. There’s no consistent steer number, though usually between six and eight.
The greatest danger during a run, however, is not the bulls, but other runners, who might grab you in a panic or, worse, on purpose.
“It is not uncommon to hear an inexperienced runner talking about his intention to push someone else into harm’s way to avoid being gored,” he writes. “These statements are made gleefully and with foolish bravado. After someone pries my kung fu grip from his neck, I enjoy calmly reminding the dullard that civility is essential to the fabric of our shared community.”
He then adds, “if you push another runner into harm to protect yourself, the locals might murder you. Forewarned is forearmed.”
Last year, Milligan’s son, Sam, ran the event.
“I saw another runner clearly reach out to grab him,” Milligan writes. “My big right fist left a big red mark on his left cheek.” My momentum caused me to slide about 10 yards, and I rolled head over teacup a couple times, and then the entire herd danced over and on me, which I guess was better than on my grave,” he writes. “A bull and multiple runners kicked me in the head and stepped on my back and shoulders. I tore open my leg, my arm, and my shoulder, and I had hoofprints on my back and head.”
Even without evil intent on their part, one should be comfortable with the notion that at some point, other runners will step on you and worse.
During a 2010 run, Milligan was horrified to glance back and see that the six bulls were charging in a row. He “tangled” with another runner for space, then fell forward.
Considering that he’s run with the bulls over 50 times, Milligan has been lucky. Several he’s seen cannot say the same.
There have been 15 official deaths at the event in modern times, and Milligan witnessed one of them. In 2009, Daniel Jimeno Romero, a friend of Milligan’s, “died while trying to regain his feet or slip under [a barrier].” Milligan’s brother, Ari, his constant companion on these runs, was just inches from Romero as a bull’s horn “pierced his neck and lungs.”
Shy of death, there are still many dangers. In 2005, Milligan saw a runner named Xabier, whom he later befriended, slip and fall during a run, after which he was gored repeatedly on the ground. Xabier did the smart thing and stayed there.
Milligan says if you’re knocked down, staying down is key to safety, as getting back up leaves you in the path of other runners and gives charging bulls a clear target.
“If you try to stand up, you will be crushed,” writes Milligan, noting that for a bull, “your exposed abdomen is a perfect soft target.”
“If you fall, curl up into a fetal position while covering your head until someone clearly tells you all the bulls are past. Having a bull step on you is better than having it gore you as you get up.”
Another great danger at the event is runner pileups — when one or more runners fall, tripping the runners behind them, leading to a pile of bodies — which Milligan says can be the scariest parts of the encierro.
There have been 25 significant pileups in the past hundred years, with “in excess of 700 serious injuries.”
“Both Ari and I have escaped smaller pileups with minor injuries, but each was scarier than anything,” he writes. “The crushing weight on your chest, and that sickening panic of not being able to breath, even momentarily, is nothing but execrable. I think I’d rather take the horn. I know I would.”
In spite of — or, perhaps, because of — the danger, the Running of the Bulls has always drawn its share of celebrities. In addition to Ernest Hemingway — who, contrary to popular belief and his presence at the event, never ran with the bulls — older generations saw the likes of Orson Welles and Arthur Miller in attendance.
In recent years, the event has drawn Rosario Dawson, who “ran like a pro,” and Tara Reid, of whom Milligan says, “I’ve never personally seen a drunker person in my life.” The one prolific celebrity runner these days is “Dawson’s Creek” actor Joshua Jackson, who has run four times.
Dennis Rodman “ran” with the bulls in a marketing promotion for a gambling website in the early aughts, but Milligan portrays it as a sham.
“By the time the first bull left the paddock,” he writes, “Rodman had run into the bullring, climbed over the wall, left, had a drink, talked to some women, packed, and was halfway over the Atlantic. He never even saw a bull, let alone ran with them.”
Also increasingly present in recent years are crews from the American media. Milligan has nothing but harsh words for them.
“In the early years, it was ESPN. Lately, it has been Esquire TV. Both are a pestilence,” he writes, saving his harshest bile for ESPN commentator Rick Reilly, “a twitchy twit” who, he claims, not only spread misinformation, but put runners in danger while doing so.
While running, Reilly “leapt at the bulls from behind and the side and swatted [them] away with his newspaper,” Milligan writes. “A bull distracted like that makes the danger factor rise exponentially. In his column, he actually wrote, ‘Honor and bravery were mine!’ in describing his dangerous and disrespectful behavior.”
Milligan’s years of bull-running have taken their toll.
“I have bursitis in both elbows,” he writes. “I’ve had concussions and multiple broken bones. My shin was sliced open. I had a serious staph infection and a third-degree burn. Annually, no matter how successful my running, the plane ride home is always pleasantly uncomfortable. Everyone I know who runs yearly has spent time in the hospital, or worse, for injuries.”
And yet, like a stuntman or a daredevil, Milligan’s time in Pamplona has been defined by joy, as well as a sense of destiny. To Milligan and many others, running with the bulls, whatever its dangers, not only tests their mettle, but places them in a distinguished club — one that Milligan hopes to never leave as long as his legs can keep him on the move.
“Running with the bulls is not a sport. No one is competing,” he writes.
“The encierro celebrates grander topics, like brotherhood and honor and reverence. The running is not about calling attention to oneself. If you run bravely and with honor and valor, you’ll get all the attention you need.”
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http://nypost.com/2015/06/28/the-pain-in-spain-inside-the-running-of-the-bulls/
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