LITTLE ROCK — My knees hurt just watching.
You'll feel their pain, too, when Nova takes 13 running neophytes and whips them into shape for the 2007 Boston Marathon.
Nova: Marathon Challenge airs at 8 p.m.
Tuesday on PBS and AETN. It's only an hour long, but you'll feel as if you've run along with them.
This is an especially inspirational hour for those who would like to run a 26.2-mile race but fear it is beyond them. The novice runners range in age from 22 to 60 and include a former smoker, a heart-attack survivor and one overweight woman who looks as if three flights of stairs might do her in.
Granted, the training program took nine carefully monitored months. That's twice as long as most marathon-training programs.
Granted, one savvy coach was Uta Pippig, three-time winner of the Boston Marathon, and another is Strong Women expert Miriam Nelson.
And one final great big granted - the runners did not have to post qualifying times for Boston, a goal that has frustrated many a dedicated marathoner.
The 13 runners were guinea pigs of sorts - experiments to determine what it takes for the average person to lace up and tackle one of the country's toughest races.
Nova not only had the backing of the Boston Athletic Association, which puts on the marathon, but the expertise of exercise and nutrition specialists from Tufts University.
Veteran Tufts coach Donald Megerle guided a weekly training regimen that proved to be as much a psychological challenge as a physical one.
Finally, all sorts of fancy machines and expensive technology were used to monitor the runners' progress and document their transformations from couch potatoes to marathoners. Viewers will learn about the beneficial physiological changes that take place during exercise.
It's an eclectic bunch that gathers for the experiment. Among them are Steve DeOssie, 43, a former NFL linebacker who used to run only a few yards at a time before hittingsomeone. Jonathan Bush, 37, is a businessman (and President Bush's cousin) who's the father of five and undergoing a stressful divorce.
Xenia Johnson is a sedentary child psychiatrist staring at 40 and Jane Viener is a 59-year-old preschool teacher and breast cancer survivor.
The most inspirational Team Nova member, however, is Betsey Powers-Sinclair, a 41-year-old hospital administrator who packed on the pounds while recovering from major surgery, going through a divorce and managing two teenagers.
Labeled "moderately obese" by her doctor, Powers-Sinclair got angry, then got determined. She hoped that training for a marathon would be a turning point in her life. Her tale is the most inspirational, but viewers can pick any of these runners and root them on.
Each runner has a different experience. Each has a different challenge. The only thing they have in common is that they have never run a marathon before.
Before the training begins, the Tufts scientists administer a battery of tests to establish baseline levels for weight, oxygen use and other factors that will be monitored over the training period.
Although each runner responded favorably to increased activity, 26.2 miles is still 26.2 long miles. Being fit enough to tackle the distance is only half the battle. The psychological challenge can be equally as daunting.
The special shows how important it was for the team membersto have group support. It was paramount to their mental training and chances of success.
"We have a lot of fun," Pippig says. "It's almost like a love fest."
A lot more than love was needed on race day, which was April 16. The forecast called for gale-force wind, driving rain and even the possibility of snow flurries. Yikes! Every runner who has ever stood in line at the portable potties while wearing a garbage bag for a poncho will identify with this part of the Nova special.
It's all the more painful when it's raining and there are 20,000 other shivering folks waiting for the potties.
How did the team do? Did they all finish? I won't spoil it for you. All I'll say is that you'll feel like cheering at the end.
ActiveStyle, Pages 27, 32 on 10/29/2007