Epilogue – Oman Desert Marathon
After the race we were entertained on the beach by a robe wearing Omani band comprising two bongo drummers and a bad bag pipe player. Apparently the British introduced the bagpipes to Oman and its a big thing. The Omani men loved it and danced til the early hours – i.e. 6pm.
I slept really well on my last night in our tent and woke to the magical combination of the sound of crashing waves accompanied by 5:00am morning prayers. We then began the five hour bus journey back to our hotel which was close to the camel race track where the event began and where the closing ceremony would take place. I had to ask one of the locals to ask the driver to stop using social media whilst driving.
Originally I planned not to attend the finishers gala dinner as I knew it would be chaotic but then I thought I would go to see how bad it was – I was not disappointed.
The bus drivers drove us directly to the camel race track and we were ushered to our seats – women segregated into the cheap seats and the men into the VIP area. We sat around feeling hungry for an hour before we were asked to leave. We then stood by the buses for 20 minutes wondering what was going on before the drivers appeared and drove us around the corner to where the meal was – they had taken us to the wrong venue. The organizers were no where to be seen.
Dinner was served immediately. Huge plates of rice with a goat carcass on top – head’n all. As there were no serving implements we wondered what to do until the members of the local Omani army team showed us the way. They used their hands to tear the flesh of the carcass onto their plates and shovelled the rice on with another plate. It was medieval and resembled a pack of hyenas gorging themselves on a discarded recent kill. I got stuck in and it was delicious. Some were traumatized by the experience. Due to the earlier delay we had about 20 minutes to eat before being driven back to the stadium.
The ceremony consisted mainly of fawning to his excellency / highness / sultan and gifts for all the “organizers” followed by the presentation of gifts to his excellency. These included three oil paintings of race horses, each progressively worse than the last. They may race camels but they dream of horses. This was then followed by the best all male Omani dance troupe once again delivering the same shuffling routine before the band played a series of tunes including the one where you shout “tequila” at points during the song – a bizarre choice for a dry country. The evening finished with a pipe band which was actually surprisingly good. The runners were largely ignored. We returned to the hotel at 11pm and I set my alarm for the 3:45am to be ready for the 4:30am bus and the 2.5 hour transfer to Muscat airport.
Amazingly the bus left as scheduled which was impressive as they had to send a bell boy to wake up the driver. Apparently he had taken some runners to a secret bar that served alcohol and prostitutes in the bus and stayed with them until late. We were unsure as to whether he had partaken of either. We were bid goodbye from the Italian organizer and left alone with the driver who spoke no English. Fortunately they had made him put his phone in his pocket so he would not be distracted by his social media habit. I was in the front seat and quickly realized he was struggling to stay awake. When he put his head on the wheel we all shouted and I moved into the guide seat right at the front to watch him and make sure he stayed awake.
The national speed limit in Oman is 120kph and no doubt a lot slower for busses. On a number of occasions he exceeded 130kph setting off the alarm on his tacograph and he took the racing line through corners as I signaled to him to take his foot off the gas. I have never been more terrified in my life – it was like a bad remake of speed and I never took my eyes off him, shouting every time his blink rate slowed. Thankfully we arrived at the airport alive and in only 1.5 hours. A few of the runners shook my hand afterwards and thanked me for keeping him awake!
It’s been an interesting experience and I was happy with my result of 18th overall (results on the website were not accurate) – I learnt a lot and it’s built my confidence for MDS. Every aspect of the shared experience with strangers was incredible and I would recommend multi-stage event races, especially for friends or couples, but perhaps not this race unless the Swiss take responsibility for organisation.
Expeditions 