![]() The main message of this story, we think, is to challenge the status quo.Īll the other athletes trained hard but basically, they did what their predecessors had done before.You are never too old to chase your dreams? Of course.Absolutely, and you might have heard that before as well. And, I think this is not something extraordinary new for you. He ran because he enjoyed running and he thought he can do it. ![]() He kept nothing for himself.Ĭliff Young did not run for the money. He felt bad because the other athletes worked so hard and he split the money between them. There was a prize of 10,000 Dollars for the winner. ![]() Interestingly, all six competitors who finished the race broke the old record. That was almost two days faster than the previous record. He took the lead, he continued his strategy, not sleeping, just running, and after five days, 15 hours and four minutes he finished the race, he won the race. On the next morning the athletes woke up only to recognize that Cliff Young had been running all night long. The general idea of the race was to sleep for six hours at night and run for the rest. Cliff Young had the courage (and probably the stubbornness) to give it a try.Īs you can imagine the story does not end here. If you have a dream, a big dream, it is worth pursuing it, also if you do not win, also if you do not even finish. As you can imagine the race takes several days and at the end of day one Cliff Young was far, far behind. During the run he imagined he was running after his sheep, trying to protect them from a storm. The runners started to run, and Cliff Young started to – well – to shuffle. When asked, he mentioned he had been chasing his sheep in gumboots all of his life and now he is ready for the race. He left his dentures, however, because he found them disturbing. At the race he showed up in overalls and work boots. ![]() To say he was the underdog is an understatement. In other words, this is quite a challenge even for trained, professional athletes. Or, it is like running from San Francisco to Los Angeles and then add another marathon, and a half. This is as much as running from Berlin to Frankfurt, and from there further to Munich and after than add another marathon. It was a race from Sydney to Melbourne with a distance of 543.7 miles or 875 kilometers. He wanted to run.Īnd in 1983, at the age of 61, he wanted to compete in a race. He lived with his mother most of his life and he took care of his potatoes and sheep. Although we usually hear about the kings, queens, rulers, scientists and artists, history is made by, what we call, ordinary people as well.Ĭliff Young was that kind of a person. In fact, he was a farmer and shepherd born in Australia in 1922. Albert Ernest Clifford Young might not be the most famous figure in world history. In the course of history, a lot of things seemed impossible that are now possible. The current world record is almost 17 seconds faster than four minutes. The interesting thing is that in the same year another person ran the mile in under four minutes, in the following year three and up until today over 1,400 people ran the mile in under four minutes. It is impossible to run a mile in under four minutes.Īt least this was the common belief, the status quo, until when Roger Bannister ran one mile in 3:59.4.
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