Wade - Run the world: my 3,500-mile journey through running cultures around the globe

The Devil is in Derartu. Today very, very not strong.

Stretching at the base of Mount Entoto, 8,500 feet above sea level, I caught my breath after lagging behind Banchi and Meseret in that mornings hill workout. I had an excuse ready: Id arrived in Ethiopia only days before and would need several weeks to acclimate to the time zone and altitude. I longed to prove to these women that I was also a serious runner, having competed at the U.S. Olympic Trials and at the World Junior Track and Field Championship, but neither my language nor my lungs would let me. Id have to gasp my way through the girls easy runs, watch helplessly as they pulled away from me in workouts like this one, and grin with every shout of encouragement. Aizosh, Becky! Berta!

Derartu, though, was struggling. The twenty-two-year-old, born and raised in Sululta, a town ten kilometers outside Addis Ababa, could normally hold her own against the other two. Pound for pound, my five-foot friend was one of the stronger distance runners Id encountered, with the quads of a soccer player and the spring of an antelope. But youd never know it if you saw her that morning. As Banchi and Mesi bounded up the dirt road, Derartu lagged farther and farther behind. Glistening with sweat, a grimace on her face, she looked more like the local firewood carriers who piggybacked buffalo-size bundles up the mountain than she did her fleet-footed training partners.

In broken English and the same nonchalant tone she used to describe doro wat and shiro at dinner the night before, Banchi explained Derartus dilemma: The Devil was inside her, sapping her strength.

Ive never wished more than in that moment to understand a foreign tongue. But given the English-to-Amharic language gapnot to mention cultural chasmI had to rely on a bare-bones explanation and my own limited experience to make sense of what I had seen and heard.

I thought back to the blue Rice University track in Houston, Texas, where Id spent the past five years chasing faster times in the 10,000 meters, 5,000 meters, and 3,000-meter steeplechase, and tried to imagine the same conversation.

Sorry, Coach Bevan, but I cant finish the last mile repeat [hard interval] today.

Whats going on? Are you getting that weird sensation in your lower legs again? my coach of almost a decade, Jim Bevan, would ask, probably dreading the details about my latest injury.

No, its not that. Im not hurt. Its just that the Devil is inside me, and he wont let me finish the workout.

There was a long list of excuses that my forgiving coach would accept from his runnersa stomachache, a sleepless night, poor recovery from the last workout, even a recent breakupbut inhabitation by the Devil had no place in it.

Worlds away in Ethiopiathe cradle of humanity, and of many of the worlds best endurance athletesBanchis explanation wouldnt be given a second thought. In fact, it was one of the more acceptable reasons that Derartu, one of the most privileged runners in the area, would be too weak to complete a hill session. Along with Banchi and Mesi, she had raced her way to a scholarship that entitled her to four months of comfortable housing, balanced meals, English and career-skills lessons, and her first structured running environment.

The Yaya Girls, named after the Yaya Village hotel and training camp where I lived and volunteered for two months, were the envy of Sululta, living like royalty compared to most of their family members and neighbors, whose homes were typically shacks lacking electricity and running water. The girls were still learning how to reconcile this new, temporary existence and its many resources with the familiar, simpler one that awaited them at the end of the program. They slept two to a twin bed for comfort when there were enough beds for all and declined the pre-run breakfasts offered each morning. Clearly the lifestyle preferred by first-world runners was not universally considered ideal.

Less apparent was if and how, by exposing Banchi, Mesi, and Derartu to new elements such as a varied, meat-inclusive diet, a strength program, and fresh shoes, the Yaya Girls Program was tinkering with their potential as runners. Would such added comforts keep my friends healthier and more focused, or make them softer athletes, more likely to fold during key decision points in a race? Conversely, I wondered how adopting some rural Ethiopian practicesthe very ones which we were tweakingmight influence, even enhance, my own running. Would a huge leap in the distance I walked daily interfere with my training? Would treating every Sunday as a day of rest make me a more consistent runner, or less fit? And how would a nutrition plan that emphasized grains over fruits and vegetables, and little protein, affect my energy and ability to recover?

I had about eight weeks to find some answers. Then it would be time to pack up and start again in a new country. That morning, I accepted that Id probably never fully grasp Banchis reasoning about Derartu and the Devilwhich I later learned was a blend of Ethiopian Orthodoxy and religious superstition, both foreign to my Catholic upbringing. But I was committed to trying, as I remained open-minded to other cultural beliefs and practices that inform how communities like the Yaya Girls approach long-distance running. I was searching for meaning in the universal phenomenon of runningthe oldest, purest, and most global of all sportsand, just maybe, an edge on my competition down the road.

A YEAR EARLIER, Id stood firmly on the opposite side of the world. I had lived in Texas all twenty-two years of my life, other than a few summers spent training in Colorado, and I was anxious to flee the coop, to see what the wider world could teach me about living, connecting, and, naturally, running. A scholarship athlete at Rice University and a runner since the age of nine, I had engaged in the sport as it was dictated to me: practice schedules, track repeats, travel itineraries, and rehab plans. My goal the past five years had become sunup-to-sundown productivity, punctuated by two runs most days and peppered with naps, ice baths, and ample time to cook and eat, even as I streamlined my nutritional and social needs. When my graduation from Rice approached, I faced an open-ended running future for the first time, and I wasnt sure what to make of it.

The prospect of copious free time and a more active social life was attractive. Would my body finally learn to sleep past 6 A.M.? What would it feel like to eat a hamburger and fries at lunch, not having to hold back for a looming afternoon workout? How many beers would I have to consume to catch up to my twin brother, Luke?

But I also didnt feel quite ready to find out. I was wrapping up a fruitful career at Rice that included four NCAA Division I All-American Honors and two Olympic Trials qualifiers, and I was miles away from wanting to hang up my spikes. I felt shortchanged in my college career due to a string of injuries, and I was young and fresh by long-distance standards; Id mainly focused on the 300-meter hurdles until college, and female marathoners typically dont peak until their mid-thirtiesif they stick with it that long. Most important, I still had a deep, childlike love for running. Finding new routes, learning the nuances of my body, forming relationships on the move, and challenging myself at various distances still excited me, more than a decade after I first laced up a pair of Sambas and circled the block with my dad. I couldnt fathom a life without running as a huge part of it.