100BEFORE40

1- the Soweto Marathon, Soweto, South Africa,2 November 2014 “The miracle isn't that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start.”  I will never forget the above words (by  ―  John Bingham, No Need for Speed: A Beginner's Guide to the Joy of Running)  stuck on a big board as I was struggling going up one of the last few hills on the Soweto Marathon, 2014 route. I had been walking for about 3 kilometers. I had nothing left in the fuel tank. I had started believing the legend around the Marathon distance. Legend has it that the first man ever to run the Marathon distance, Pheidippides, ran about 26 miles from Marathon to Athens to deliver a message of the Athenian army’s victory over the Persians. He arrived in Athens, shouted “Nenikikamen” (“Rejoice we conquer”) and collapsed and died (https://www.awesomestories.com/asset/view/Legendary-Runner-of-Marathon-Pheidippides) I had sprinted the earlier downhill parts of the race. I was completely out

from (failed) goalkeeper and wicket keeper to comrade I grew up fancying myself as a “ball games” guy. I never thought of running as a true sport. Most sports require running. You cannot play football, hockey, rugby, basketball, cricket, you name them all, if you cannot run. To me running was just part of the minimum skills required for any sport – of course chess or darts are obvious exceptions to this. I hated the first term of the year at school. For us, at Dandamera Primary School, the first term was all about athletics. Athletics meant running. Nothing else. Ball games would come later in the year, during the second term. I was perpetually ill during the first term of each school year. I even self-diagnosed myself an asthmatic. My mother did not help matters either. She would pay the school a visit at the beginning of the year to remind the teachers that I was an asthmatic and should not take part in any running activities. Back then parents ran schools, not careerist