Editor’s note: Chicago native Bill Hillmann attempted to complete 101 encierros, or bull runs, this summer in Spain. This is the last in a series of updates on his journey he shared exclusively with RedEye.
Please note that one photo below contains mildly graphic content.
In mid-August, I headed to the town of Iscar, Spain, with my friend Dyango Velasco. Iscar is a small town near Cuellar and has an enormous, brand-new domed bull ring. I wish I could tell you exactly what happened in Iscar but it is impossible. I ran 19 times over three days at all hours.
One afternoon I was running the bulls out of the ring with my friend Pablo Lopez and Ernes Fernandez took this incredible photo.
I’d started a friendship up with one of the greatest American runners ever, Tom Gowen. He’d started running in the ’70s. He was seriously wounded in Vietnam during his service with the 101st Airborne Division. He came to Pamplona after the war and immersed in fiesta with his friend Harry Hubert. Gowen is also a musician and a poet and his personality can fill all of Plaza de Castillo even at age 70.
After Iscar I headed to Navarra, where I stayed with his friendly and hilarious girlfriend Maria in their apartment in Plaza de Castillo.
Falces’s encierro is unbelievable, it is called El Pilón and is a mountain trail going down a cliff. The fall is deadly and one woman lost her life falling off it after the bull run the day before I arrived. In some spots it is dirt and others it is jagged rock. They run Spanish fighting cows down the mountain in Falces and they are very dangerous and incredibly fast.
My friend Aitor Aristregui continued his phenomenal summer of runs in Falces. He ran half of the mountain on the horns of the lead bull every day even though he had a cast on his hand and wrist and took a bad hit in Falces. On my last day in Falces, I got lucky and ran the top half of the course and my friend took this photo of it.
I showed the photo to Gowen later and he wrote this poem.
Hill-Man
Well named this boy,
for this, this day,
this downtown dance
manada Colorado
twisted horns
twisted man ahead
the cloud of fortune’s dust behind.
To have that gang chasing you
with those weapons
does put CHI.
in perspective.
I headed back to the fair in Cuellar and it was a big success. They dressed me up as a knight and I sold a lot of books.
I headed to Sansebastian De Los Reyes, an industrial suburb of Madrid. The night before fiesta started, we received terrible news that Julen Madina had nearly drowned in San Sebastian. He was placed on life support with little chance of surviving.
I had failed to run well in Sanse in my four years attending the festival. My first year I got stuck in a pileup in the tunnel headed into the arena; I tried to help the other crushed runners and was nearly gored. The experience haunted me.
As the rocket went off that first morning in Sanse I said to myself, “do it for Julen.” I ran the center of the street and was lucky enough to lead a bull down Estafeta.
The signing at Pernatel Bookstore that Luis Barbado set up after the run went very well; the mayor of Sanse even came and bought a book. The bookstore turned the entire front window into an homage to me. Then the photos of that day’s run taken by the Sanse Pasion website were broadcast on a loop and I was in several in front of the bulls. After all my failures in Sanse, it was surreal to have such astonishing success.
Stephanie Matsaerts came to town and we decided to stay one more night in Sanse. The next morning, a 21-year-old American named Mike Gattis was gored in the butt. Mutsaerts and I went to visit him and Mutsaerts helped translate with the doctors.
We all headed to Cuellar, where there was a big group of foreign runners. My obsession with Cuellar started in 2011 when I met Dyango Velasco via Facebook. He was posting videos of the most incredible bull run. It was a stampede of hundreds of horsemen and a pack of bulls careening down a hillside. They were all wrapped in a huge cloud of dust. With Velasco’s urging I made it to Cuellar that next summer. I convinced others to come and it’s turned into pretty a large group. Velasco has since become like a brother to me and he helped orchestrate a huge chunk of my book launch and adventures this summer.
Gattis’s friend Anthony Fizer, a 26-year-old from Utah, was showing genuine interest in running. The bulls really got a hold of him, but I didn’t quite realize how much until the third day in Cuellar. I was running the bottom of the steep hill into town and as two bulls entered, Fizer ran the horns of the bulls with me. Then later on the course a bull nailed him with his horn and almost gored him.
We found out during fiesta that Julen Madina passed away. He was my friend and teacher and one of the greatest runners ever and leaves behind a young daughter.
I passed my 101st run in Cuellar and said what the hell, I’ll try for 150 now.
Juan Carlos Rebollo set up an event for me in Medina del Campo. It was a great event and beforehand I got to see all the bulls of their festival released from the trucks and into the bull ring. There were a lot of great bulls and they were really fired up. It was a nice time with Rebollo and his family; they were very kind to me.
Medina del Campo is a very special run. There is a funnel like in Cuellar where the bulls transition from the fields to the streets.
After you run the funnel, you can take a shortcut and run to the bull ring and run the final stretch into the arena with the same bulls. I fell more deeply in love with the bulls in Medina than I have ever been before. I ran the funnel every day and had great experiences with the animals.
Chapu Apaolaza was in town with his journalist friend Juan Ramon Lucas and we started to bond running together. My book is interesting because it is about how the heart of the tradition changed my life for the better. Apaolaza’s book is great because it is the heart of the tradition. I’m grateful for Apaolaza’s friendship, and it is already changing me for the better.
After Medina del Campo’s festival finished, I stayed there. I really liked Medina del Campo and had found a cheap and friendly place to eat and write in Bar Castellano, where they treated me well. I began doing the night runs in Valladolid Circuit. The first night I ran 26 runs, including four with my friend Luis Antonio Prieto in his hometown of Laguna de Duero. I smashed the 150 mark with 12 days left in Spain and set the new goal of 200.
Juan Pedro Lecuona brought Tom Gowen and I to Lodosa for their Bull on a Rope festival. It’s extremely dangerous. I tried to get Gowen off the course and he refused. Later we argued and he told me that I was absolved of any sin if he got injured and we shook on it. Gowen gave me a replica of the shirt the legendary Matt Carney used to wear back in the 1970s to wear for my final few runs.
Later that night I went to a few small towns and cleared 200 runs in the town of Olite running with teenagers and kids. That’s when I chose to stop counting runs. It has never been about a number for me. But the goals helped get me out of bed and on the road a lot this summer. It’s been a long, exhausting road. The reason I wanted to hit such a ridiculous number is because it’s very possible because Spain has a thriving and wonderful and ancient tradition of running with the bulls.
The next day I took Gowen to a couple runs and we ended up in Olite. They released what we later identified as a 3-year-old bull named Mandarino. Later Mandarino ran away down the street. I went to run him back into the little square Gowen and I were in and Gowen followed me into the street. I told him get somewhere safe, but he chose to stand still like a tree in the street. I led Mandarino past him, keeping him from harming Gowen. After we got passed, Mandarino returned and found Gowen and mauled him, knocking him unconscious and inflicting three shallow horn wounds, including one to the head. I ran in and grabbed Mandarino’s horn and he threw me back and started after me. Then he went back and tossed Gowen some more before I got him off. I dragged Gowen into a doorway and the medics arrived shortly thereafter. Gowen woke up and got up and walked to the stretcher.
We spent eight hours in the hospital. No one suffers like Gowen. He had some hilarious banter and displayed a form of toughness that seems to be drawn from the old days. He refused to stay in the hospital because he had a concert to perform the next night.
The next night I watched him walk up on stage at Bar Toki Leza in Pamplona and play one of my favorite John Prine songs.
“Make me a poster of an old rodeo…”
As I prepared to leave Spain, I found out Aitor Aristregui was in the hospital having trouble breathing. I truly believe he had as great a summer running with bulls as anyone in history. I’m just glad I was there to see it and hope he recovers soon.
Bill Hillmann is a RedEye contributor.
