DATE: Tuesday, August 19, 1997              TAG: 9708190448
SECTION: SPORTS                  PAGE: C1   EDITION: FINAL 

SOURCE: TOM ROBINSON

                                            LENGTH:   74 lines

IF PAIN'S YOUR PLEASURE, HERE IS YOUR DREAM NIGHTMARE

There is a monster out there called the Marathon des Sables. Every year it snatches about 400 men and women from around the world and, sadist that it is, heaves them into the Sahara Desert.

It tortures them for seven days, makes them run 150 miles, up 600-foot sand dunes, over beds of rocks, around snakes and scorpions, through temperatures that range from 120 degrees by day to 40 by night.

The monster burns gaping blisters into feet and melts toenails, and often brains. Worse, it makes its victims feed it money before it tries to kill them. The $2,200 from each only perpetuates the evil, assuring that the monster will survive to make life hell for others.

Welcome to Buddy Gadams' nightmare, over now for four months. Gadams, of Virginia Beach, is proud to speak of it, though, to prove that creatures such as the ``Marathon of the Sands'' really exist, and that individuals such as himself possess the hardened minds and bodies to defeat them.

``I'm always looking for unique adventures,'' says Gadams, 27, an area sales representative for American Funds Group and a distance runner since his high school days in Richmond. ``I felt that this is probably one of the most unique things you can experience, so why not want to be a part of it?''

(Why not? Why not?!! There aren't enough hours in the day. . . .)

So, this is how unique Gadams - who ran eight 26-mile marathons and some half-marathons in 10 months to train for the monster - was when he stood at the starting line in the desert far outside the Marathon headquarters of Ouarzazate on April 7:

Of 360 entrants, he was one of 15 Americans; his sister, Mary, a veteran of four Marathons, was another. However, Mary, who once finished second among women competitors, dropped out halfway through this time.

Her despair was captured in a National Geographic Explorer documentary, the same film in which Buddy, feverish and dehydrated after the race's 50-mile leg, staggers into camp near midnight bemoaning ``the worst day of my life.''

Anatomy of a monster:

The Marathon is run in six stages over seven days, 50 miles being the longest on Day 4, which is followed by a day off. Runners carry one backpack - Gadams' weighed about 22 pounds - that must include food for the entire week (Gadams mostly went the freeze-dried route), a sleeping bag, and required items such as a signal flare and a snake-bite kit.

Water is provided at check points, as are IVs, but each are rationed; water to about nine liters per day, while taking more than two IVs during the week disqualifies you.

Stages start late in the morning, diabolically timed for when the sun starts to sear, and meander over sparsely marked courses from which runners often stray. What sleep racers find comes under open-sided tents set up at the end of stages.

Gadams lucked out in that he never encountered a sandstorm, nor a rabid camel, though a desert thief tried to steal his water.

He never thought he saw a little island with palm trees on the horizon. Never began speaking in tongues.

Most impressive, he never quit.

He lost 20 pounds, but he finished 122nd in a total time of 29 hours, 50 minutes and 58 seconds. The winner, a Moroccan, clocked 17 hours, 19 minutes and 58 seconds.

``When I crossed that finish line, I thought of all the months of intense training,'' Gadams says. ``I thought, I did it all for this. And it was worth it.

``Some people can't understand why anyone would ever put themselves through this. Others have told me, `You motivate me when I think about what you accomplished out there.' ''

The Marathon des Sables has motivated Gadams, too - to not come within a continent of another one, at least for the foreseeable future. Not that he's doomed to boring old road marathons the rest of his days.

``There are so many different challenges out there,'' Gadams says.

Uh-oh. ILLUSTRATION: Color photo

Buddy Gadams lost 20 pounds to the sands of the Sahara in what could

be the ultimate marathon.

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