THE TIME GAME...A RACE WORTH RUNNING

Photo by Flis Zucchi - Photomyway Photography

“Be patient. Great things take time.”

Haile Gebrselassie, Former Olympic and World Champion Marathon and Long-Distance Track Runner

Zigzagging in a close line through the forest before the sun surfaces, acutely aware of only the feet of the runner just in front of you, your surroundings become a blur as you draw inwards, slowing everything down to then be able to secure your footing, your balance and get a grip on your speed for when it is time to move onto new terrains. A deep, focused understanding of the environment you are experiencing and the call to patient action are crucial aspects to pass though without getting injured. Running in Ethiopia as part of his research to discover the truth about Ethiopian runners and what motivates and propels them to do great things, Michael Crawley, an anthropologist, marathon runner and the author of the book Out of Thin Air starts to invest in a new way of running in unison with his time, learning to appreciate the zigzagging and all the ups and down of these intertwining training and life lessons.

The distant church bells strike a decisive hour, then minutes pass, a half hour passes… Dong…It was winter and now it’s spring. Nature’s lush greenery and shoots breaking through even the toughest, most resistant ground come just at the right time. I have been putting off writing the sequel to my original article "The Time Game" as the more I read and researched different sources, the more questions I had and the more uncertainty I had about being able to bring everything together at the right moment. Then I reasoned that this was exactly why I was writing this, to illustrate how our perception and reaction to any given activity or period of time can influence whether or not we thrive and work together with our time, or fight against it and waste energy on trying to slow down or stop the inevitable passage of time, of our lives.

Jon Batiste, the composer and musician who wrote American Symphony and his wife, Suleika Jaouad, an Emmy award writer, musician and motivational speaker who has spent a lot of her life living with Leukaemia, are witnesses to the importance of understanding and working with the varying momentum of time and finding something that sparks creativity, holding on and being willing to make peace with and adapt to life. 

As Batiste embarked on his biggest life project so far, and was nominated for eleven Grammy awards, so too Jaouad had to start chemotherapy after five years in remission and was having a bone marrow transplant. It was a crucial time for both of them in different ways, but they supported each other’s ride along interlinking timelines. Jaouad found a new means of expression, drawing her way to freedom, as she went through the transplant and treatment, and sharing her husband’s musical journey. Batiste in turn grasped the importance of the things that really matter, how to bring out the best of himself and his family, and learnt to soar.

Ethiopian runners train on different surfaces at different stages of their preparation. As the author Crawley mentions in his book “Nobody runs on asphalt during their formative years, or until they are about 18.” Training starts in the forest on tough terrain requiring extreme focus and neat footwork that prepares for the coroconch, the rough road, that is uneven and continues to test the athletes which then leads them onto the asphalt that is considered to drain the runners’ energy and is the final preparation stage leading up to a marathon or important race. Once again, it is a question of adaption. 

How we adapt our time to the different challenges we face, how we use our time to prepare effectively, how we use what we have to go through sudden changes in pace and our willingness to adjust our available time to get to where we need to be, all have an impact on our potential to succeed. In Out of Thin Air, Crawley focuses on how the Ethiopian athletes share GPS watches to monitor the pace of the group, not just the individual and they do not allow the time set to dictate the pace and the overall training goal if they feel that something else is needed. They trust their own “feeling of certainty” (Out of Thin Air) that will go with their own understanding, experience and allow them to deviate from the specific time set if it is in the best interest of the team.  The time we establish doesn’t always need to be set in stone, we can shift the aim, the focus, the speed and adapt ourselves to create a steady flow. 

If you can accept time, a person, job or situation as they are and work with them, life will be a lot better. We cannot change the process of time passing or be in control of the terrain we are going along or what or who we will encounter along the way, but we can gain a knowledge of that landscape to develop a training that encourages “slowness rather than speed…the foundation upon which everything is built.” Every twist and turn, every moment that is unprepared for can become our greatest way of seizing life and living those moments intensely; they become a gift, not a struggle. Fasil, one of the runners who Crawley trained with said that “If you are working like I was before, you will break your back, but you will change nothing. With running you have a chance to change your life.”