"The first time I saw someone running cross country, I felt alive, Mr. Murillo said. I wanted to be like them. Hills. Mud. Rough terrain and something to jump over. Ideally, on a windy day in freezing rain. The conditions, as they get worse, the better it is, Mr. Murillo said. I love it. Cross country for me is a very primal, very wild, very natural, very pure way of running."
"The older I get, the more connected I feel to Van Cortlandt because it's the one time of year where I literally feel like I'm 14 years old again, he said."
"Once you start to race against the past, you're done, he said."
Anthony Ruiz, 64, has run cross-country races at Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx for 50 years and recently completed a 3.1-mile race on its hilly terrain. Leo Murillo, 71, first encountered cross country at age 10 at the South American Cross Country Championships in Colombia and ran his first Van Cortlandt race in 1971 after moving to the United States. Both men competed in college, continue to race at the club level in New York, and return annually for the familiar rush and connection to youth. Murillo prizes challenging conditions—hills, mud, rough terrain, obstacles, and harsh weather—as the essence of cross-country running.
Read at www.nytimes.com
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