(26-02-2012, 11:34 AM)Bierzo Baggie Wrote: On the topic of Aussie marathon runners, do you know anything about a guy called Derek Clayton? (first sub 2:10 marathon, ran for Australia).
Well of course. Clayton is still around, though I don't think he runs any more, and though his name pops up from time to time it has been years since he ran a race. Hardly surprising given the insane way he pushed himself. There are still articles written about him in a "whatever happened to...?" kind of way, but I was certainly aware of him when I was growing up. He was a very tall guy for a marathoner and was famous mainly for smashing, nay
annihilating Abebe Bikila's world record by nearly
three minutes.
Clayton was one of these guys though who believed in doing all his training at race pace, and this of course did for him in the end. Major injuries destroyed his career, including of course the '68 Olympics where he should have been clear favourite to stop Bikila from getting his third Olympic marathon gold... ironic perhaps that injury did for both of them that year.
He was a three-fast-runs-a-day, 200-miles-per-week kind of runner. In other words, f*cking insane. Frankly, I can't be inspired by that kind of self-destructing mentality. Deek (Robert DeCastella) is much more my kind of role model. Yes he ran a lot too, but he believed in doing his long Sunday runs nice and slow. A good man is Robert, and he still shows up at races for a bit of a chat and to fire the starting gun. I think Clayton is an administrator somewhere. Maybe he can't stand the sight of mere fun runners, perhaps?
However my favourite photo that captures the idea of long distance running happens to be of Mr. Clayton - I like this a lot:
February 2012 - Base Camp
