Running Like Crazy

I do not like jogging. But I love sprinting. More accurately, I used to love sprinting. Nowadays it causes me to tear muscles. Mostly when I am playing football. And when I say “football”, I mean “soccer”, not the game played by numbered knights in tights chasing odd-shaped balls. I am a striker, an attacker. Which means I am hard-wired to chase any ball rolling towards goal in an attempt to ram it into the net. I am pretty sure that, even at the age of 80, I will leap up out of my wheelchair to answer the call of my adrenaline.

Fortunately, I am unlikely ever to reach that age because I recently decided I want to run a marathon. Call it a mid-life crisis if you must, but I was watching runners of all shapes and sizes completing the last kilometres of the Amsterdam Marathon, when the urge suddenly hit me. Perhaps it was my last drop of adrenaline speaking, like a dying demon placing a curse upon my aging mind: “Do it or die trying.”

At first I laughed it off, but the urge kept rearing its ugly, jogging, wheezing head at the most inopportune moments. To make matters worse, two close friends recently ran marathons. In fact, one of them – you know who you are, you gung-ho bastard – recently completed his second marathon. This has terrifying consequences for me. It means that an ordinary 42-kilometre-plus marathon is just not going to cut it anymore. The demon in me says I need to do something more extreme, longer, harder, more heroic. Deadlier, even.

Unused adrenaline clearly feeds on rational thought, because I recently found myself googling ultramarathons. I thought that by reading up on these gruelling races, which regularly kill younger and fitter men than I, common sense would prevail. But I was wrong. The demon grew ever stronger.

So strong, in fact, that I decided to discuss the matter with my wife. I can still hear her laughing, even though I locked her in a cupboard a couple of hours ago. On the bright side, this has given me time to come up with a plan, which is to run the most beautiful ultramarathon, in the most spectacular landscape that will distract my wife long enough for me to complete the run.

I’m hoping readers will help me decide which superultramegamarathon is most beautiful. There’s the 90-kilometre Comrades Marathon in South Africa, of course, which kept me glued to the television in my youth. But there are also epic desert races like the Marathon des Sables in Morocco (a six-day race covering 250 kilometres), the Sahara Race in Egypt, and the Gobi March in China.

But I’m not very fond of heat, so I may try something cooler, like the Antarctic Ice Marathon, which is only 100 kilometres long, but apparently costs around $14,000 in entrance fees and travel expenses.

So, if you think your country has the most beautiful ultramarathon, please let me know. Meanwhile, I’ll be designing a set of mobile goalposts with a ball dispenser that will be towed ahead of me during the run to ensure a steady flow of adrenaline.

Posted by:   Richard de Nooy  | 
Join the conversation Show comments

Alistairreid

How about the wall run? West to East along Hadrian’s wall in the north of England. Running it in 6 weeks.

Richard

That sounds fabulous, Alistair. Will you be taking six weeks to run or will you be running in six weeks’ time?

Alistairreid

How about the wall run? West to East along Hadrian’s wall in the north of England. Running it in 6 weeks.

Richard

That sounds fabulous, Alistair. Will you be taking six weeks to run or will you be running in six weeks’ time?

Robert O'Brien

If you are on FB, contact Roy Pirrung (Sheboygan, Wisconsin USA). He’s an accomplished worldwide ultra runner & a member of the Badgerland Striders. Another FB source is Bart Yasso (CRO -Chief Running Officer – ha -at Runners World). Bart has visited the Milwaukee Lakefront Marathon on a number of occasions – great guy, with loads of his personal running stories from all over the world. 

Richard

Excellent! Thanks for the tips. What a strange quirk of fate the comedian Eddie Izzard is currently in South Africa running 27 consecutive marathons over 27 days to commemorate Nelson Mandela’s 27 years in prison.

Robert O'Brien

If you are on FB, contact Roy Pirrung (Sheboygan, Wisconsin USA). He’s an accomplished worldwide ultra runner & a member of the Badgerland Striders. Another FB source is Bart Yasso (CRO -Chief Running Officer – ha -at Runners World). Bart has visited the Milwaukee Lakefront Marathon on a number of occasions – great guy, with loads of his personal running stories from all over the world. 

Richard

Excellent! Thanks for the tips. What a strange quirk of fate the comedian Eddie Izzard is currently in South Africa running 27 consecutive marathons over 27 days to commemorate Nelson Mandela’s 27 years in prison.

Mitulbiswas

 It is a very nice blog.All information is so good.

Mitulbiswas

 It is a very nice blog.All information is so good.

sawon

  This is a very nice article. And very positive post.

sawon

  This is a very nice article. And very positive post.

William

Thanks,  Robert O’Brien for this information. I will try to contact Roy Pirrung on FB. Also thanks Richard to share your information. William say……

William

Thanks,  Robert O’Brien for this information. I will try to contact Roy Pirrung on FB. Also thanks Richard to share your information. William say……

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