Author: utpal

She is not just the leading woman in the 6 day race, Dipali Cunningham 51 from Melbourne Australia is the leader overall.  In so many ways it is this race that is the focus for her of an entire years worth of training.  Unlike many of the other  top runners, who test themselves at many different events during the year, this is it for her.  There may be a marathon here and there but in no way does any other event take center stage in her life quite like the Self Transcendence 6 day race.

One might think that this could cause undue pressure and tension in an elite athlete such as herself.  Just one single big race is a remarkably slender window of opportunity to perform at your peak in comparison to the great possibilities  of other competitions over an entire year.  Regardless, when ever she takes center stage in Flushing Meadow park she seems to always find just the right ingredients. Both inwardly and outwardly she somehow manages to offer up a memorable performance.  Her preparations seem perfect.

“Last year I had a grace race,” she says.  For those who were able to be here and watch the event unfold it was an extraordinary performance by Dipali, who set a world record, and by Pam Reed who set an America one.  The two women were intertwined for 6 long days in a epic battle in which there were no losers.  Instead each saw only admiration and appreciation of the other and with this inspiration it drew them both to new performance heights.  “I think between us both, as women, we pulled ourselves to the highest level of running,”she says.

She knows that Pam had come to Flushing Meadow in order to break her world record.  Regardless Pam was able to see first hand the stuff that Dipali was made of.  “She saw in me that even at 50, there is something in me that still wanted to transcend.”  This determination and strength she feels all comes from the influence and inspiration of her late spiritual teacher, Sri Chinmoy.

In the women’s competition this year she is alone.  I am curious how it is possible to come back here with the same enthusiasm as last year.  She says, “I came out here again with the same feeling of self transcendence.”  She is honest in that she would love to better her performance from last year.  She also is very aware that the numbers on the board adamantly refuse to bend. They are intractable and will only shift with each hard fought mile.   On her first day she reached 101 and knew she needed 105 or better to break the record.

This is her 31’st multi day race.  For her every race has had its own unique surprises and blessings.  “This race I feel like I am learning a lot more about humility.”  She is adamant in describing her achievements as not being due to her own efforts.  The credit she believes perhaps coming from something inner working through her.

At the end of our conversation she seems quite pleased that perhaps the boys in the race may be getting a little more inspiration from herself and Kaneenika (who is also leading the 10 day) than they expected.  “We will see what happens.”

Dipali Interview

Continue reading “A Grace Race”

When the sky is bright and the air is fresh and warm it easy to see how and perhaps why 68 runners would choose to be part of this amazing world of self-transcendence running.  I am at the race now though in the dwindling seconds of a Saturday night, which in moments, will stride into the even inkier dark wet blackness of a dismal Sunday.  There is a constant drizzle sweeping down across the course, which is making threats that it wants to escalate into something a whole lot more cantankerous.

The great percentage of the runners have slipped away.  They have been pulled away by schedules and fatigue and perhaps for some, just to escape so briefly the relentless torment of rain that pitter pats upon your head and discovers mischievous ways to seep beneath your most protective gear.

The malicious pleasure of moisture is that if it hasn’t got you on the way down, than it will seep up into your shoes and socks from dark puddles that pretend to be shallow but when you splash down upon them they belie their true damp soaking power.

Yet in the heart of the great night, as I look out across the fields, there are still runners making their way here and there around the loop.  They continue to persevere because it is in this effort they are finding a joy that is only to be found by a chosen few.  This experience is just for they alone, who felt the call from within, and had the courage to answer.

Continue reading “Courage to Answer”

He is the new kid on the 6 day block, but you would never know it.  He is moving easily here around the course on this gorgeous Saturday afternoon without any signs of wear and tear.  It is really hard to believe, as he runs so effortlessly now, that he has been at this for more than 24 hours.  As a new guy it would be easy to dismiss his speed during this still early times as reckless, but 45 year old Alex Swenson from Vashon Washington has tremendous experience in distance running and seems to have trained and planned to perfection for this race.

He has come a long way from the west coast to be here but Alex says, “there aren’t many 6 day races. That’s why I came.” He has done around a dozen 24 hour races and was eager to take on a new challenge.  As we pass the board he is currently in the lead with 124 miles.  He tells me that with a few laps more he will be entering into new territory in the mileage world.  His personal best over 24 hours is 146 miles.

He says that he has not done anything in particular to train for this race but admits, “I have always trained pretty hard. I can’t see training any harder.”  His belief is that the 6 day race will not be so much a challenge physically but rather one that mentally he will find new terrain to conquer.

“I think the most important thing I did on the advice of others is have a concrete plan how to go about running, as to, running until you feel tired.  I have been running 5 hour blocks with a specific running and walking strategy.  It’s been going really great.”

He has spent the last 5-6 years focusing on 24 hour races and he feels now that to make the move to 6 day running is a natural progression.  His feeling was that it was important to make the big jump to 6 days rather than try 2 or 3 days.  He says, “if it was rough I was afraid I might not have the guts to go up.”

As for his experience here so far he says, “the race is supremely well organized.  It has this great feeling of support, and I am terribly impressed.  And I think as I start to feel worse I am going be even more impressed by that support that is being offered in so many ways.”

His strategy at this point.  “Sticking to my plan.  The plan that I have in place and just having the courage to stick to it and ignore what other people are doing.”

Alex Swenson Interview

Continue reading “Experiences You Can’t Get Anywhere Else”

At noon time today, the second great wave of runners stepped off from the starting line in Flushing Meadow.  There were 40 in total and under bright sunny skies they set off on a journey that will not be completed until 144 hours have passed.  One might say that running for 6 days has to be one the most challenging running events in the world, with just 2 significant exceptions.

There is the obvious matter of course of the 29 runners who have already been here for the past 4 days, and each of whom has run nearly 200 miles or even much more. For them this influx of fresh legs is like an infusion of new energy and inspiration.  They are each moving now to a unique flow and rhythm that emanates from within.  They may have schedules and time tables but when you have been on your feet for such a long long time and have come so far you are not bound by so many of our seemingly important day to day concerns.

There is no boss to please, no assignment to be handed in, in fact there is no useful functional purpose to be here at all other than to please yourself.  To take pride in an achievement that few can even comprehend.

The 6 day race is long and hard.  It has been around in some shape or form since the middle of the 1800’s.  But yes there are harder things out there besides those beside you who have been here already for four days and will not reach the half way point of their paths for another 24 hours.  For a truly incomprehensible race one need only turn to the Self-Transcendence 3100 Mile race that is held nearby every June.

If you want to learn more about it you would only have to ask one of the 4 guys who have already run it many times before and are using the 6 day race to train.  You can recognize them because they are running as if there is no tomorrow.

Continue reading “Now is the Time to Love Yourself”

The very need to run is a primal aspect of our beings.  It hearkens back to a long ago ancient time when the ability to run was an integral part of our makeups.  Indeed necessary for our very survival.  It is buried, in plain view, within our genetic blueprint. We are built to run.

Perhaps not as swiftly as nearly all of nature’s other animal creations but nonetheless in the very design of of our beings it is embedded there.  Long long ago we needed to be able to run, both because of fear and because of hunger.  It is a foundation of our beings that has not disappeared or failed,  just because of the modern presence of fast cars and fast food.

Smarana Punigam 38 from Graz Austria showed up today and will start the 6 day race tomorrow.  He carries about himself a calm and gentle presence.  He has just brought his suitcase, and while there for a few hours, greets many of the friends he has met over the years.  What isn’t so easy to discern about him, and which is unique about Smarana, is that he has run more competitive miles here than anyone else.  He has completed the 3100 mile race 7 times along with a host of other multi day events and ultra races.

In the summer of 2008 he completed his 7th 3100 mile race and had not run another multi day, until that which he will start tomorrow.  He says, “I have been running since 1994 nearly every year a multi day race.  Last year I did not do any and I found that I was missing it.  So I am really happy to be here.  I really feel excited and I can’t wait to start tomorrow.”

He tells me that before coming he at first had a number of goals he wished to accomplish.  But now that he has arrived, and the atmosphere of the race and presence of all the 10 day runners envelops him you can see everything change.   “I just want to enjoy it and do my best.  I like to have intensity but still I want to enjoy it.  This is my real goal this time.”

When I suggest that for a man with all his running experience that the 6 day race could literally be a walk in the park he tells me that even a 100 meter race can be tough.  “You can never know what the outcome will be.” He describes for me an inner goal that he is striving for.  He wants to be able to apply all the intensity of his determination into the race, while at the same time fully enjoying the presence of his friends.  To accomplish, what is perhaps the most significant purpose of todays runner, to awaken and listen to the deepest inner part of our beings and express it joyously and purposefully in and through our running.

Smarana Interview

Continue reading “Just Keep Moving”

The race is heading into its 3rd day now and the sun bright weather of the past 2 days took a decidedly damp turn this afternoon.  It is not unexpected of course at this time of year.  The race always has a constant solution for not only the cold and damp but as well perhaps for a host of other ailments in a runner’s long long journey here.  The simple answer is often a warm and satisfying visit to the food tent, in which these 5 ladies work tirelessly from  the pre dawn darkness to well past the sleepy time of the sun.

Every volunteer here at the race has a crucial role to play, but without the tireless dedication of the cooks the fuel that fires the great running engine of the race would sputter out within a few hours.  The runners of course have their own particular stash of treats and concoctions on their tables but inevitably they will come in through the door of the food tent many times each day.  They may snatch a cookie or forage up a steaming plate, a cold drink or a hot brew, but there is more than calories to be found within its always open door.

There is a banquet of love and caring heaped here as well as food.  You can feel it energize you even as you walk by on the road outside whether or not you feel tempted to swerve off from the course and enter inside.  For many years Sushovita, holding Roxy, was the Queen of this realm throughout the great spectrum of the day.  Now she holds court just for breakfast and has handed over the rest of the day to Nandana and her crew.

Tomorrow a long hard job will become even more challenging.  The 6 day race starts at noon and this means there will be more than 40 more hungry bodies to feed and keep fueled.  Nandana and her helpers have performed so far to delicious fulfilling perfection.  They have demonstrated magnificently that their job isn’t about rolling out an endless assembly line of staggering calorie totals.  Rather they have made their food tasty and beautiful and the runner’s reviews are not just in their smiles as they leave, but also in the number of their miles on the board, climbing ever higher as they run by.

Continue reading “You Must Do Your Work Here”

I don’t know what you did last night but I have a good idea what 29 ten day runners in Flushing meadow did.  As the warm bright afternoon of their first day settled away and was replaced by a still cool night, the true enormity of their task truly opened up in front of them.

It is in the heart of the night, with its quiet black solitude, that the imposing challenge of how far they have to really journey becomes clear.  It is in the night with its solemn stillness that the reality of the great gulf of time  looming in front of them is revealed.

Sleep calls out enticingly.  Fatigue or the false specter of tiredness dances in front of you and it is so easy to slip away unnoticed in the dark and find your bed and surrender to dreams.

But that did not happen last night to 29 runners in Flushing Meadow.  Some or all of this enchantment called out and enveloped you and I but not them.  They ran on and on practically throughout  the entire dark night and the numbers beside their names today showed what great things happened to them while you and I dreamed our dreams.

Continue reading “I am all Happiness”

There are times when you just know that something special is happening.  The Self-Transcendence 6 and 10 day race is just a few hours old and already 36 year old Igor Mudryk from Vinnitsa Ukraine seems to be doing something above and beyond everyone else in the field.  The bow has been barely untied from this years running and yet, in just the few hours I was there, I felt I was witnessing from him, the early stages of a remarkable performance.

Last year he ran 712 miles which was a huge increase over his previous best, something in the order of 179 miles more.   Today the weather Gods are smiling on Flushing Meadow and perhaps the whole east coast of America.  The temperature is balmy and the winds are mild so at this point in the race everyone looks great.  There are no great struggles going on and the jabs of pain and the shackles of groaning fatigue have yet to be felt by anyone.  Unless perhaps it is the crew who have worked here for close to 5 days to make sure that all the bits of the great jig saw puzzle were neatly in place.

Continue reading “More than Miles”