The last race

The beating of my heart in my chest was deafening. The anxiety was almost too much to bear. My eyes were closed and visualizing and imagining me crossing the finish line with a considerable lead from the guys behind me, just like all the other previous races. I once read all great runners did this. It helped them to prep themselves. But the blunt pain on my the right side on my stomach was bothering me, I had a bad cramp in my last race. I pushed the thoughts and the feelings of the pain away and went back to imagining me winning the race.
It was the last event for me, the final hurdle that I had to overcome to, the last race that stood in between me and my championship. 3000 meters, 15 rounds, 12 competitors, 1 goal.
I stood in the extreme left, everyone else towards my right were just as anxious as me, everyone was hoping to be the one to be the first to cross the finish line. I wished everyone of them ‘all the best’. It was a customary thing that I do. But in my heart I had no plans of letting any one of them win over me. Well it was a competition, what did they expect.
The referee just briefed us with the instructions and was ready to start the race. Just when I thought that my heart couldn’t beat any faster, it changed to high gear. He raised the gun, and uttered the words that everyone was waiting to hear. “On my mark”… “get set”… in my mind I counted 1001, 1002 and then the BANG!!!
The audience went in to frenzy, everyone cheered us, shouting and clapping. Every single one of the 12 competitors lurched forward. The race was on..
In long distance running it was not the fastest who wins, but the one with the most stamina and the will power to push oneself to the limits. And I was notorious for both.
I knew I had to take a lead and I had to do it fast, but I also knew that I should over exert myself that I’d end up wasting all my energy in it. Everyone knew this fact. The first 2 rounds everyone would try to take a lead, keep their ground. What mattered was not taking the lead, but who all could keep the lead.
I ran faster than the rest in the first 2 rounds taking a lead of 15 meters from the guy behind me. Throwing glances behind me now and then I made sure that I kept the lead, accelerating when I saw the guy behind me get closer. By the 4th round we all settled in a rhythm.
The rhythm was the most important thing. The proper breathing, the proper pace, the proper body moment. Every single thing counted. Running was a mind game as well as a test of strength. Everything depended on how you play out your next move. A small mistake and all could be lost.
By the end of the 4th round the blunt pain that I had pushed from my thoughts at the starting of the race had crept back in. I was finding it difficult to breath. And without proper breathing one can’t run. I knew I had to slow down, but I didn’t want to do that, for it would mean I would have to give up on my lead. But the pain started to get unbearable and I was forced to slow down.
In a matter of few moments my competitor that sensed my weakness started closing in. As soon as I saw him next to me I tried with all my might to maintain my pace. And for the first time the fear of losing the race swept in to me.
Slowly I had to lower my pace and my competition overtook me with ease, and now it was he, who kept a lead against me. I ran behind him trying hard not to let him take too much of a lead, but I was not very successful at it. My mind started racing, wondering how I cannot lose this race, how can I get rid of this pain.
At a point the pain was too much to bear that I had half the mind to quit running and forfeit the race. My teammates kept on cheering me, pleading me to keep running and not to give up. It was the 7th round and I was not sure I could push myself like this for another 8 more rounds. I had very little hope left. All my confidence had drained out of me. It was then suddenly that I remembered reading in a book, that squeezing the pain when you have a stomach cramp while running helps. I ran half a round across the track with my right hand squeezing the sides of my stomach and I found out I can run better almost like before.
But with one hand tucked beside my stomach restricted my hand moments and it made it awkward and uneasy for me to run. I yelled out to my team mate to get me a scarf or a long piece of cloth. Within moments my best friend, Naeem was running beside me handing me over a scarf.
I tied it tightly around my waist, to happily find out that I have managed to considerably reduce the pain. Reduce the pain enough to have the hopes of winning this race again.
As I looked ahead I found my competitor easily enjoying a lead of 60 meters. And I knew this wouldn’t be easy at all to overcome, but he was tiered from the running and has slowed down. I knew all I had was 6 rounds to catch up with him.
Once again I used one of the tactics in the books. Run faster in the curves and keep a normal pace on the straight track. This way I started to eat up the lead my competitor had so painfully built. I was pushing myself to my limits. But I had to do, I had to win this race. I had a championship trophy to hold and kiss.
By the end of the 12th round I was snapping at his heels. Seeing me right behind him, he picked up the pace. We were both running down the track. But with all the months of practice and anticipation I had no wishes of giving it up without a fight. Slowly and painfully I overtook him and kept a marginal lead against him.
On the 14th round I slowed down to catch my breath, for the grand finale. The poor guy must have thought that I was tiered and giving up. Not that I wasn’t, not that my heart wasn't beating like a wild horse and my legs weren't aching from the formation of the lattice acid in them, but I had to finish it style.
Anticipating for the last round as soon as I crossed the 14th lap mark I changed gears, it was the last lap, the last round that stood in mist of me and my so longed championship. I started to pick up pace, I started urging my legs to go faster and take longer strides. Slowly from mere running I broke in to a full sprint. I could hear to crowd cheering and screaming and going wild, I could hear the drum beats from my teammates like a jungle beat picking up as my pace picked up, all the more reason to give them a show. I started to run faster. My mind screaming at me ‘are you nuts’, my legs pleading ‘ I can’t go on any more’. Yet not yielding to any of their pleas, I gave the crowd something that they wanted. A sprinting finish in the last round of the 3000 meters race.
I looked back to find my competitor trying to catch up with me, but he was no match for me, he was too wasted. I came around the last corner running like a wild stallion galloping to the finish line, there was hardly 50 more meters of the race. Behind the finish line my friend Naeem urging me to finish it, to run faster he beckoned me. I kept trying to push myself faster all the while. In the last 10 meters when I knew that victory was mine I threw up my arms sideways, having a god like feeling, I won the race, I won the heart of all the audience, I was the king. The crowd cheered on.
I crossed the finish line, exhausted to more than I can bare. My feet gave up under me unable to take the beating any more. I collapsed, but Naeem was there to catch me. As I fell into his arms, his shouting “you won, YOU won” was slowly drowned by the same deafening heartbeat that I had in the start of the race. But only this time I had a smile on my face.