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Reminds me of the story of a 61 year winning the inaugural Sydney to Melbourne ultra marathon in his farming boots:

Short version: https://elitefeet.com/the-legend-of-cliff-young

Long-form: https://www.smh.com.au/national/when-age-and-modesty-won-the...



Wow, I've never heard of that dude before. What a legend!

Didn't sleep. Didn't even know there was a prize!


It's probably covered in the articles, but Cliff changed how everyone approached multi day ultra marathons. I was a kid when he hit the news and didn't appreciate what a legend he was. I only recently read about what he did and was blown away. Read the articles.


That longform writeup is a great read!

> [1983] was the time of the Pritikin diet, the one before the Liver Cleansing diet which was the one before the Atkins diet. It was also the era of The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner, a best-seller which inspired tens of thousands of people to join fun runs where they jostled each other in the search for solitude.

Running was the new source of eternal life. Eventually, people found that their knees were unable to read all those books about running. They were forced indoors into aerobics and onto circuits.


I recently learned that one of the elderly receptionists where I work used to do marathons in high heels.

It's amazing what people can do when they really want to do something.




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