Efficiency is a battle waged against time. The runner's only enemy is time, and his only tactic against time is perpetual onward movement. The legendary nineteenth-century pedestrian, Mensen Ernst, who reportedly ran 5,000 miles from Constantinople to Calcutta (and back), offered this: "To move is to live, to stand still is to die." Faithful to his mantra, during a run from Cairo to Capetown, he propped himself against a palm tree and put a handkerchief over his eyes. He was found dead the next day.
— Anelise Chen, so many Olympic exertions, p55
