BREAKING AWAY : Doctor Takes Time From Work Each Afternoon to Run for Fun and Fitness in Balboa Park

SAN DIEGO — At 12:30 every weekday afternoon, Greg Marino and George Luiken, two doctors at San Diego Naval Hospital, leave their work with cancer patients and go to Balboa Park.

Not to conduct a clinic or give lectures. Not to tour museums.

To run.

“Our division head (Luiken) felt that it was important to take an hour a day and devote it to physical fitness,” Marino said. Seven of the eight doctors in his division are runners.

Marino, 33, is a hematologist and oncologist at the hospital. His mornings are spent with his patients, 90% of whom are “the neatest people you’ll ever meet.”

“For me it’s a nice break,” Marino said of the midday runs. “It’s a good way to clear my head and forget about the real tragedies that you’re witnessing every day.”

Marino is probably the best of a large group of runners called the Horny Toads.

The Horny Toad Running Club is a group of men and women ranging from recreational to serious runners who meet daily at the Federal Building in Balboa Park to run any of five courses that range from 6 to 8 miles.

Marino has been running with the Horny Toads for the last four years, Luiken for the last 17.

“I use the term group very loosely because the group itself is an extremely loose organization,” Marino said. “It’s just a group of guys and women who meet in the park every day to run.”

Marino said the group may have 20 to 25 runners one day, 8 to 10 another. He said most are in their early 40s, with a few who are 50 and 60, and they have a wide range of occupations.

The one thing they all have in common is the middle part of the day off.

“I’m about the only one who races seriously,” Marino said.

Marino won last year’s Great Earth 10K Workout with a personal record 32 minutes 44 seconds. He is one of the favorites in this year’s race Sunday at 7:30 a.m. at Balboa Park.

Marino said he was a three-time Class B state cross-country state champion in high school in Connecticut. He continued running at the University of Notre Dame, competing in cross-country and track. But he stopped after his sophomore year of college in 1974.

“I just got burned out,” Marino said. “I didn’t really feel like running anymore. I was training hard, but I was running worse than when I was a sophomore in high school. College is more than studying and running.”

After graduation from Notre Dame, Marino went to medical school at the Chicago College of Osteopathic Medicine on a Navy scholarship. He served his residency at the Naval Hospital.

From his final two years at Notre Dame through completion of his residency, Marino’s schedule was not conducive to running.

“Schedules being what they are, it’s difficult to get in any running,” he said, adding that he spent a lot of time working shifts late at night. “There’s one thing worse than being tired, and that’s being tired and hungry.”

As a result, he gained weight.

In 1984, Marino began to run again. His weight dropped from 170 to 140. He has been running ever since.

“I look forward to my afternoon workouts,” Marino said. “It gives me an energy boost. I get a lot of satisfaction out of running. All in all, it’s a benefit for a lot of people. It relieves their pressure, relieves their anxiety.”