Sam Walton was an Olympian in this sense, a long-distance runner in the race for competitive ideas.

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Maybe if they win again, their victories will be something more than a sad trivia question: Who won the most celebrated race in long-distance running the year the results didn't matter?

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Jessica Ennis, the victorious, mixed-race heptathlete, and Mo Farah, the long-distance champion and Muslim who arrived from Somalia as a child (and who prayed on the track after he won the 10, 000 metres) may have some therapeutic influence on attitudes to race and immigration.

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As the London Olympics approached, Mr. Schwazer said he began to doubt whether he could withstand the physical demands of competing in two long-distance events the 20-kilometer and the 50-kilometer race walk.

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Which is why it is probably appropriate that Stream is held each year in Marathon - the little town outside Athens that knows all about the unchanging and challenging nature of the long distance race.

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