Finding Gobi Page 3

  Start minus fifteen minutes—pack up sleeping bag and inflatable mattress, leave tent, and join start line.

  To anyone watching, however, the last hour of my routine looks a little weird. I stay in my sleeping bag right up until it’s time to leave, even when I’m eating my can of All Day Breakfast. While everyone else is hopping up and down outside, having eaten their dehydrated meals, I’m curled up in my bag, beanie hat pulled tight over my head, tucking into a cold can of beans, sausage, bacon, and mushrooms. I get a few looks because no multi-stage runner in their right mind would ever carry canned food; it’s just not worth the weight. But I take just one can that I eat before the race starts, and the 450 calories are more than worth the bemused stares as people wonder what kind of amateur I am.

  It tastes especially good knowing that for the next six days I’m going to be eating nothing but cold, rehydrated meals that taste like salmon or Bolognese-flavoured pasta, the occasional strip of biltong—dried and cured meat from South Africa—a few nuts, and dozens of energy gels. I’ll be sick of this food before the end of the week, but it’s lightweight nutrition that keeps my bag weight down.

  I savoured every cold mouthful. I couldn’t see the three Macau boys anywhere, but I could tell that the rest of my tent mates—two Brits and one American—were staring at me like I was a fool who was way out of his depth. Nobody said anything, and once I’d eaten, I lay back down and curled up as tight as I possibly could in my bag. I guessed they were probably still staring.

  With a quarter hour left, I climbed out of the sleeping bag, packed my things away in my rucksack, and headed for the line. People stared as I knew they would. They always do when they see me coming on the first day. My skin-tight running top is bright yellow and covered in my sponsor’s logo. And because I’m tall and skinny, I look like a banana. While confident in my pre-race preparation and training, I always start to question myself, seeing the start line. As much as I try to avoid it, I end up thinking the other runners look better than I do. They all seem to be fitter, stronger, and look more like endurance athletes while I suddenly feel like an amateur again. The only way through it is to clench my jaw, hide behind my sunglasses, and tell myself it’s time to get down to business.

  For a lot of runners, the act of lacing up their shoes, heading out the door, and letting their lungs and their legs find their perfect rhythm as they run through nature is a beautiful thing. It’s about freedom, peace, and the moment when all time seems to stop and the stresses of daily life fade.

  I’m not one of those runners. My wife is. Lucja runs because she loves running. She races because she loves the camaraderie and the sense of community. Not me. I don’t love running. I don’t really like it either. But I do love racing. I love competing.

  It took me thirty-seven years to realize that racing was for me. For most of my teens and twenties, I played competitive cricket and hockey. Right from the start I loved the action of a well-bowled ball, a perfectly struck cover drive, and a rocket of a shot that sails into the top right corner of the goal. To me, both of those sports have the potential to fill me with the kind of peace and happiness that Lucja describes when she runs. But even though I could master the technical aspects of hitting and bowling, I never could deal with the dynamics of playing as part of a team. I’ve watched myself fly off into a rage at my underperforming teammates so many times during matches that I know I’m more of a solo sport kind of guy.

  I played golf for a while and got pretty good too—good enough to hustle the weekend players on courses throughout the western suburbs of Sydney and come back home with enough money so Lucja and I could eat for the rest of the week. But there was something about the pressure and the need to fit in with all those etiquette rules that riled me. After I threw one too many tantrums and broke one too many putters, I finally decided that golf was not for me either.

  When it came to running, I discovered, quite by accident, that my competitive side returned. We had moved out of London and were living in Manchester at the time. It was New Year’s Eve, and I was listening to a friend from cricket go on and on about how he was going to take part in a half marathon in the spring. Dan was talking about bringing down his personal best of 1 hour 45 minutes. Thanks to Lucja, I knew enough about running to know that was an okay time, not amazing but better than a lot of people could run. Dan was quite fit as well, so I reckoned he was probably right in feeling confident about becoming a bit faster.

  But he was just so cocky about it all. So I put down my beer and spoke up.

  “I reckon I could beat you.”

  Dan laughed. The music was loud, and he had to lean in to make sure he’d heard correctly. “You what?”

  “I could take you. Easy.”

  “You’re not a runner, Dion. No way.”

  “Dan, I’m so confident I’ll even give you five minutes.”

  The conversation got a bit wild after that. People were laughing and shouting, and pretty soon the deal was done. If I didn’t beat Dan by five minutes, I’d take him, his wife, and Lucja out for dinner. If I won, he’d be the one paying.

  Lucja gave me the kind of look that said, Here we go again. I just smiled back and held up my hands. As far as I was concerned, I’d just won a free sumptuous meal for the two of us.

  The race was at the end of March, and I knew I had a double mountain to climb. I’d been running for a year or two, but never farther than two or three miles at a time; any more than that and I’d just get bored and fed up. I’ve always hated running when it’s cold or wet—and Manchester in January and February serves up nothing but cold and wet. So a few weeks went by, and my training had barely begun.

  Dan is one of those runners who can’t resist coming back from a run and posting his times on Twitter. It wasn’t long before his overconfidence began to show, and when I started to read how far he was running and how fast he was getting there, I had all the motivation I needed to get off the sofa and hit the streets. I knew that as long as I pushed myself to run farther and faster than the times Dan was posting, I’d be able to beat him.

  I lined up alongside Dan and Lucja at the start line. Dan was looking fit and up for it. Lucja was loving the pre-race-hype and crowd-warm-up routine from the announcer whose job it was to get everyone pumped for the race start. I was feeling out of place among the thousands of other runners who all had what looked like better sports equipment than I had.

  “You know I have very expensive taste in wine, Dion,” Dan said. “You’re going to need a second mortgage to pay for the meal tonight.”

  I didn’t say anything. Just smiled.

  “Seriously, mate,” he said, looking genuinely concerned. “Are you all right for this? It feels hot already. Don’t push yourself harder than you should.”

  I was feeling nervous. My mouth was dry, and it was all I could do to suck as much air as I possibly could into my lungs.

  The gun was fired, and we were off. Dan was at my side, and we were going at a fair pace already. Lucja dropped back, and the two of us carried on together. He seemed strong and in control. I felt fine about keeping pace with him, happy that we were finally under way.

  When we passed the first mile marker, it hit me that I had only twelve more in which to gain five minutes on Dan. So I did the only thing I could think of. I decided to give it everything I had, running as hard and as fast as I could. Pretty soon my lungs were in agony, and I felt as if there wasn’t enough air in the sky to keep me going. I wanted to slow down just a little and recover, but I forced myself to keep up the pace. Those five minutes were going to come my way only if I kept pulling away from Dan.

  Never once did I look back. Somehow I knew it wouldn’t help. If I saw him close, I’d probably panic, and if he was too far back already, I might end up slowing down. I knew that the race was going to be won or lost in my head. If I kept focus and pushed on, I’d avoid distraction.

  Dan was right about it being a hot day. I’d never experienced heat like it at that time of year in
Manchester before, and all through the morning the noise of the crowd was broken up by the sound of ambulance sirens as they raced to help exhausted runners.

  For me, though, the heat wasn’t a threat. It was like a welcome friend. It reminded me of my childhood in Australia. I’d spend hours on summer days playing cricket or riding my bike in temperatures pushing up to 110 and 120 degrees. It wasn’t anywhere near that hot during the race, but all the same I found myself getting stronger as the heat increased and the miles passed by.

  At least I did until mile eleven. That’s when I started to feel myself slowing down. My legs were numb and weak, as if someone had stripped half the muscles from them. But I kept running, pushing hard and reminding myself what was at stake: my pride.

  I crossed the line in 1:34, a respectable time for a first-ever half marathon, and nine minutes faster than Dan’s previous personal best. Was it going to be enough? He’d set off pretty fast, and his training had put him in line to beat it. All I could do was crouch at the finish, feel my lungs begin to recover, and watch the clock tick by and hope not to see him.

  It was Lucja who crossed a little more than five minutes after me. We high-fived each other and smiled as we waited the best part of another ten minutes for Dan to finally come home.

  “What happened?” he said once he had recovered a little. “You just sped off. You must have done more training than you let on.”

  I smiled and gave him a pat on the back. “You need to get off Twitter, mate.”

  The start line at the race was much like any other start line at any other race around the world; everyone doing their own thing to cope with the nerves. I was at the side, second or third row back from the front, trying to distract myself by looking at the others around me. Tommy Chen was there, looking focused and pretty damn good. He had his camera crew to the side and plenty of fans among the pack. “Good luck, Tommy,” someone called out. “Hope you smash it!”

  “Yeah, thanks,” he said, shifting his feet back and forth. I watched as the smile fell quickly from his face. He was just as nervous as the rest of us. Maybe more so. I knew he was one of the up-and-coming stars of multi-stage ultras, but he’d come in second in the first of the five races the organizers hosted that year. The pressure was on him to deliver.

  To keep myself busy for another minute or so, I did one more final check of my kit, making sure the straps were tight enough across my chest, the food I needed during the stage was in the correct pockets, and my bright yellow gaiters were covering my shoes properly. I knew we’d be running up a sand dune pretty soon in the day, and the last thing I wanted was to spend the four or five hours that followed with pieces of grit irritating my feet, which could possibly lead to blisters and other foot issues.

  The start horn sounded, and what little noise there was from the small crowd disappeared from my world. The race began on a wide stretch of grass, and as we got under way, the usual crush of people was surging down the middle. You get all sorts wanting to take the lead on that first day, and I don’t mind so much. That’s the beauty of these races—even though world-class athletes are lining up alongside happy amateurs, there is no sense of hierarchy or rank. If you want to run at the front and can keep up the pace, then be my guest.

  I had guessed that the start would be a little bit tricky, with the runners bunching up as they usually did, so I’d put myself far out wide of everyone else. I didn’t want to be tripped off the line, and if I went off fast enough, I could get ahead of the slower runners before the course narrowed and dropped down into a rocky canyon.

  My plan worked as I soon fell in closely behind Tommy after the first 100 meters. It hadn’t been raining in the night, but the rocks were slippery from the morning dew. I struggled to keep my footing and felt a bit uneasy and took it steady, just like Tommy. I guess we both knew that if we put a foot down wrong and twisted an ankle, we’d have no choice but to put up with a whole lot of pain for another 150 miles or, worse yet, a Did Not Finish.

  I heard someone move up behind me and watched as a Romanian guy flew right past me. He was skipping over the rocks as if they were mini trampolines. Once Tommy knew he was behind him, both of them pulled away from me a little. Keep it steady, I told myself. No need to worry. I had put together a detailed stage-by-stage race plan with my coach before I’d left Scotland. We’d looked back at my other races and noticed that I’d been making the same mistake a lot of the time.

  I tended to start slowly and then make up ground as the week went on, particularly on the long day, which had become one of my strengths, when the stage typically covered fifty miles or more. The truth is I’m just not a morning person, and the first morning always seems to hit me hard. I’ve often found myself twenty minutes down on the race leaders at the end of day one, which makes it close to impossible to make back up.

  Even in training runs I struggle to get going, and for the first mile or two, I always question whether I want to keep going. I spend those first few minutes feeling like I’d rather be doing anything other than running. But if I push through it, I’m usually fine, and during the last half of a run, I’ll be flying.

  I trusted that as long as I kept Tommy and this Romanian guy in my sights, I’d be all right. If I was close at the end of stage one, keeping pace but not overcooking, I’d be putting myself in the best possible position for the rest of the week.

  Halfway through the day, when the Romanian started to tire and fell back so far behind us that I could no longer hear him, I looked up and saw a sand dune towering up ahead. It was steep and wide, easily three hundred feet high. I’d seen dunes like it in Morocco, but this one seemed different somehow. The sand on the side looked harder and more compact, but the path I had to run up was soft and offered almost no resistance at all.

  There’s a key to running up a sand dune, and I learned it the hard way back when I first competed in the Marathon des Sables. I didn’t know that you have to keep your stride as short as you possibly can, ensuring a quick cadence to avoid the sand breaking underneath your feet and slowing you down. I didn’t know that sometimes the longer path is easier than the shorter one. As a result, I tanked and came in so late at the end of the first day that I was seriously considering dropping out altogether.

  Tommy attacked the dune ahead of me, but after just a couple of strides it was obvious that sand in the Gobi Desert was not like the Saharan stuff. It must have rained in the area overnight, and the sand was darker, clumpier. It gave way with the slightest pressure, falling away like weak clay, and at times I had to use my hands to gain a little extra grip. We weren’t running up it; we were scrambling.

  Once we were finally at the top, I could see the dune more clearly. The only option was to run along the narrow peak that stretched ahead for almost a mile. On both sides, the dune fell away, and if anyone put a foot wrong, he’d end up falling all the way down to the bottom. It would take ages to clamber back up, wasting precious time and precious energy.

  Tommy was loving it. “Look at this view!” he shouted. “Isn’t it magnificent?”

  I said nothing back. I’m scared of heights and was terrified that I’d fall. I moved ahead as cautiously as I could. More than once my foot slipped, and I threw my arms out in a desperate attempt to regain my balance. At that point I didn’t particularly care how much ground Tommy made on me. All I could do was stare at where my feet were heading and hope that the sand held.

  As much as I hated being on top of the dune, when it came time to run down it, I was in heaven. I put a bit of power into my legs and sprinted down as fast as I could. By the time I hit bottom, I overtook Tommy. I felt his surprise and heard him keeping close behind me.

  We ran side by side for a while until the Romanian caught up with us, and then the three of us traded the lead from time to time. The course took us through muddy fields and over bridges, alongside a giant reservoir. The vast sands and cruel heat of the Gobi Desert were a couple of days away, and we ran through remote villages that belonged in another
century. Tumbledown buildings squatted on the land like an abandoned movie set. Occasionally we’d see locals, standing and staring impassively at us. They never said anything, but they didn’t seem bothered by us either. It wouldn’t have made any difference to me either way. I was flying by this time, full of hope that the race in the Gobi Desert might not be my last race after all.

  4

  I was born in Sydney, New South Wales, but grew up in an Australian outback town in Queensland called Warwick. It’s a place that barely anyone I meet has visited but one that contains the kind of people everyone can recognize. It’s farming country, with traditional values and a strong emphasis on family. These days it’s changed a lot and become a small, vibrant city, but when I was a teenager, Warwick was the kind of place that would fill up on a Friday night. The pubs would be crammed with hardworking men looking for a good night out involving a few too many beers, a couple of fights, and a trip to the petrol station—which any self-respecting Australian calls the ‘servo’—for a meat pie that had been kept in a warmer all day and was hard as a rock.

  They were good people, but it was a cliquish town at the time, and everyone knew everyone else’s business. I knew I didn’t belong among them.

  It wasn’t just the scandal of my abnormal childhood and family situation that prompted people to react badly. It was the way I behaved. It was who I had become. I went from being a polite, pleasant little kid to an awkward, pain-in-the-ass loudmouth. By the time I was fourteen, I was the class joker, riling the teachers with my crowd-pleasing comments, getting thrown out of class, and swaggering my way out of the school gates as I walked to the servo for an early afternoon pie while the other fools were still stuck in class.

  And when my school year ended and the headmaster greeted each of us with a handshake and a friendly word about our futures at the final assembly, all he could say to me was, “I’ll be seeing you in prison.”

  Of course, there was a reason for all this, and it wasn’t just the pain of losing my dad—not just once but twice over.