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Click here to read about the best running books ever written. Above and opposite page: Street art is the destination as well as the scenery along the way on BlacklistLA’s runs.
What does it feel like to run together with several hundred people through a city at night? It’s obviously fun. But it’s also powerful. It’s intoxicating. The 19th century psychologist Gustave Le Bon, often recognized as the father of crowd theory, wrote in The Crowd: A Study of the Popular Mind that “an individual immersed for some length of time in a crowd soon finds himself … in a special state, which much resembles the state of fascination in which the hypnotized individual finds himself in the hands of the hypnotizer.” Joining a crowd is, in some sense, a surrender of the self. It’s there in the language: “People” is plural; “a crowd” is a singular entity. After all, we’re not racing. And when we all take off down the hill, music blaring from those portable boom boxes that the pacers are carrying, everyone is excited, almost under a kind of spell. We are all moving together in the dead of night, like shock troops invading a city to a soundtrack of hip-hop and EDM. There’s also a cheap thrill to this: If everyone is staying on the sidewalk (which they mostly are) it’s a lawful gathering—but in any case, this certainly isn’t sanctioned. The run starts, people are whooping, and we make it all of two blocks before being stopped at a crosswalk. Everyone is giddy and full of adrenaline, practically twitchy at being held up like this. Then we get stopped at the next light. And at the following block too. The tension is palpable. As soon as that final crosswalk signal beckons, the runners at the front are off, and the group strings out. We’ve been let loose into the night; a PulseKeeper is usually nearby, but otherwise all anyone’s got is the person in front of him or her to know where to go. We dogleg into Little Tokyo, where we see signs of life. A few awestruck pedestrians; a driver stuck in a driveway for the foreseeable future, wearing a look of resignation as dozens of runners stream past his idling car; outdoor dining furniture that requires
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some agile maneuvering around. Then onto a straight, mile-long industrial stretch, following a pair of disused train tracks over a mix of sidewalk, gravel, dust and scattered trash as we pass warehouses, homeless people sound asleep on loading docks, concertina-wire fences and massive bus yards. Every so often you see Valiente for a split second as you run past—or at least you see the flash of his camera. He’s continually leapfrogging the group, taking pictures then sprinting ahead on his road bike. A guy in the group running with a dog is feeling it; he’s shouting “Blacklist, yeah YEAH!” over and over, in a call and response, and a few people join in. The PulseKeeper nearby is feeling it. When we stop at a red light, she’s effusive with compliments and generous with fist bumps. Of all the things one could be doing past 10 o’clock on a Monday night, most don’t compare to this. A little farther, past a major intersection, and we’ve reached our destination: a giant black and white, abstract-expressionist mural by an L.A. artist of some renown named RETNA. It stretches eight stories high on American Apparel’s antique factory building, covering basically every surface that’s not a window. Phones are out. People are taking a breather, texting, ’gramming, sitting on the curb, chatting with the person next to them. Runners continue to trickle in. Valiente is across the street with a megaphone. After a few minutes and shooting some more shots, he gets on the bullhorn and gives a brief bio about the artist, reminding the group to tag him on social media. Everyone mills around a bit longer, then poses for a group photo. Then it’s back more or less the way we came, but on parallel streets. The group is far more strung out. The final 10 blocks or so are straight and uphill. When we finally reach the curb onto the Walt Disney Concert Hall plaza, several waiting hands are offering high-fives. The giant amp is still playing music. As everyone comes in—minus those who headed straight for their car or the Metro station—there’s
6/14/16 5:34 PM