In my daily Internet travels yesterday, I came across this headline: “Jogger sues paralympians over injuries caused during morning run.”
The story: In January of 2010, Mimi Lepage (a Canadian citizen who is apparently a government employee) was crashed into from behind by a group of runners during a morning run along the Rideau Canal. The group included “top Canadian paralympians Jon and Jason Dunkerley.” Jon and Jason Dunkerley are both blind and have been since birth, and on that day they were running with sighted guides.
Mimi Lepage filed a personal injury lawsuit at the end of 2011 against the group of runners and the Ottawa Lions Track & Field club. Her claim: “After the collision the Dunkerleys fell on top of Lepage, injuring her so badly she had trouble walking and has been unable to tend to housekeeping, let alone run.”
According to the Dunkerley brothers (who are the focus of the media) it was just a terrible accident. They’re shocked about the lawsuit. And they have proof that she wasn’t injured, they say: they Googled Mimi’s name and found that she had run a 10k in April of 2010.
The reaction so far has ranged from neutral/curious to disgust. One blogger on Yahoo! Sports is of the opinion that Mimi Lepage is completely in the wrong and she should not be suing the brothers…because they are blind and have overcome a lot of obstacles in their lives in order to become elite runners.
Now, I don’t think anybody who is reporting on this knows all the details. Did the sighted guides react appropriately to the presence of other joggers? Was the group of runners (nine in all) being considerate and safe in their use of the path? Was Mimi Lepage wearing an mp3 player?
One of the arguments being made is that the brothers should not be considered at fault because they are blind. Our friend over at Yahoo! Sports, in fact, has this to say about it:
“Common sense would suggest that there is no way a man who competes in a Paralympic class “for runners who have no light perception in either eye and are unable to recognize the shape of a hand at any distance or direction” can be held to the same standard of care as a sighted person.”
On this, I disagree. Every runner has a responsibility to make themselves aware of others and try to avoid danger, and I think the Dunkerley brothers would agree. After all, they were running with sighted guides. Those people not only ensure the safety of their running partners but the safety of other individuals. In my experience, sighted guides for visually impaired runners generally do an excellent job of avoiding collisions, even on crowded race courses. That’s why they’re there. It seems to me that the brothers themselves were holding themselves to the same standard of care as a sighted person by using sighted guides.
I tend to think, then, that the group may have been at fault for their actions and not so much the individual brothers. Groups of runners are, unfortunately, not always very considerate. I’ve seen situations where groups of runners do not, as Ms. Lepage says about this group, share a path or sidewalk and don’t offer any kind of warning to others who might not see them coming. Members of one of our local running groups were called out last season for being very rude to some walkers sharing the paths in a cemetery (a public place) where a workout was being held. If you’re running in a group, you have to be aware; groups move more slowly than individuals, so being attentive to others is key to avoiding accidents like this. I think it was their responsibility, along with the other sighted members of the group, to be careful of other runners.
And of course, there’s also the mystery of exactly what went down on the part of Mimi Lepage. One detail that all parties agree on is that this group ran into her from behind. But I don’t know if the group of runners called out to her to let her know they were approaching. It’s not a “rule” that you have to notify people when you’re about to pass them, but it is the decent thing to do. Was it also Ms. Lepage’s responsibility to remain aware of her surroundings? Yes, absolutely. If the group of runners did attempt to notify her and she was blasting music into her ears from an mp3 player, well…I don’t know. That’s kind of a hazard of listening to music when you run.
I’m also curious about the area of the path they were on. If you’re running on a straight path, there’s no reason a group of runners approaching another runner from behind shouldn’t be able to maneuver out of the way or call out to warn her. If it was around a tight corner, then I can see how they might have made the turn without realizing she was there, and if they were running at a considerably faster speed, then it was already too late. Again, we’ll probably never know all the details, but there were a lot of factors in play.
Finally, there’s the “proof” that she was not actually injured in the form of a 10k she ran a few months later. Lots of media personnel are holding this up as incontrovertible evidence, but I just don’t think you can do that. She hasn’t posted any race results since then, and as most semi-experienced runners know, sometimes you don’t know how bad your injuries are until later. Although her pace was decent (8:41 per mile) and she doesn’t appear to be in pain in the race pictures, I still would have trouble making a judgment on this alone. When I tore my groin, there was no outer sign of an injury. I was in pain virtually every time I ran, but it’s not like you’d know if I showed you the race pictures. An injury from that particular point of impact might have taken a while to develop, and some runners (hello, personal experience) try to ignore them for as long as possible. However, according to the news articles, she did claim to be unable to run since the incident. We know she ran one time, but we don’t know if she ran at other times or how she felt after the race. Right now when I say “I can’t run,” what I mean is that I can’t run without pain afterward. (Yep…she should be more specific, but I still think there’s two sides to this, and hers shouldn’t be totally discounted.)
Is Mimi Lepage right to sue the the group, which includes the Dunkerley brothers? I’m not sure, but it doesn’t strike me as a laughing matter on either side. If the group of runners was being reckless and caused lasting injury, then I’m not sure if it’s really that harmless of an “accident.” Do I think the Dunkerley brothers themselves are to blame? In this case, I don’t. They were taking precautions by using sighted guides. But whether the rest of the group (that they depended on for their own safety as well as the safety of others) behaved appropriately for the situation is still up for discussion.
At any rate…
How to Run Safely in Public
1. Watch where you’re going. It might be tempting to stare at your shoes (I don’t know why, but it might be) but seriously, don’t. Make sure you’re glancing around to see if anyone is ahead of you or coming up beside you and be prepared to react. However, if a group of people is behaving like one big jerk, I don’t blame you if you accidentally hit them with your elbow as they go by and nearly force you off the sidewalk. Nobody should be the one to always leap off the path, but in public we have to share.
2. Alert other runners of your presence, even if your attempt may be thwarted by headphones. I sometimes run with headphones on, but I don’t blast my NPR podcasts. If someone said that they were behind me in a normal tone, I’d be able to hear them. An uncool thing to do is to blow by somebody at a really close range on the path or sidewalk without saying anything ahead of time. Old people especially tend to have a heart attack when you do this. Obviously sometimes you’re really busting it and can’t say anything, but if the path is wide, I’m cool if the occasional person goes by on the other side with plenty of room…still, it never hurts to warn people.
3. Know that humans don’t have eyes in the back of their heads. Yes, people are responsible for being aware of their surroundings, but you can’t expect someone to be wrenching their neck around to look behind them every minute when they’re trying to run. Nobody I know does this because it would be painful and also make it very hard to keep moving forward. (See #2.)
4. Don’t blast your music. If I can hear your music from 100 yards behind you, that most certainly means that you can’t hear my gentle footfalls coming or, god forbid, an out-of-control biker or someone yelling at you to watch out for a speeding car. Turn it down.
5. If you’re running in a group, be nice. The decent thing to do when running in a group or pair is to, you know, LOOK AROUND. Go single file when other people approach you. This also applies to everyone on the path, but especially runners because we are generally barreling through at a faster pace and I dare say we can maneuver a little more quickly. Just because you’re in a group does not mean you automatically have the right to take up the entire sidewalk.
6. When an accident happens, say you’re sorry. Yep. Sometimes things happen in this crazy world. Apologizing when an accident happens is a nice thing to do.