In 1983,thousands of runners from all over the world gathered in Australia to take part in the West field Sydney-Melbourne Ultramarathon—a distance of 875 kilometers. The first man to win this race was 61-year-old potato farmer Cliff Young.
When Cliff showed up in the race, he stuck out like a sore thumb. While all the other participants wore professional running equipment, Cliff was dressed as if he had just retumed from the field. Wearing his everyday clothes and work boots, he quickly attracted the attention of reportlers present,
"I grew up on a farm where we couldn't afford horses or tractors(拖拉机).Whenever the storms would roll in, I'd have to go out and round up the sheep," Clif told reporters."Sometimes I'd have to run those 2,000 sheep on 2,000 acres for two or three days.It took a long time, but I'd always catch them. I believe I can run this race. "No one actually believed him. Most competitors were in their 20s and early 30s,with years of training and marathon experience.
On the first day, Cliff was left far behind. But he had one advantage that no one had expected. All the other runners had been training to run for 18 hours a day and then stop and sleep for the other six, but he didn't stop until he reached the finish line. Although running at a slow pace, he simply didn't stop running, which helped him maintain the lead for the whole five and a half day. Upon being handed a $10,000 check as a prize for winning the race, Clif decided to keep none of it for himself and instead divided it evenly among the other five runners, who eventually managed to finish the race.
Cliff continued to run. In 1997,he set out to raise funds for homeless kids by running all 16,000 kilometers of the Australian coastline. In 2000,Cliff achieved a world age record in a six-day race in Victoria