中国的马拉松热

Every weekend morning, the 10-km track in the Olympic Forest Park in the north of Beijing comes alive with athletes and amateur joggers.

They embrace the refreshing, slightly chilly morning air and gamely ignore the capital's pollution in their quest for fitness.

The young could be said to race with a spring in their step, and some of the older enthusiasts stick to a more steady, stoical pace.

"There are so many people running here. I don't feel tired when we run together."

"I'm getting old, so I run slowly. I feel good after I've run a long distance and sweated a little. I seldom have to go to hospital and take medicines now."

While some prefer to run in the early morning, a significant number of others run in the evening after they finish a day's work.

Tian Jun is a regular night runner in Beijing. He explains how it first started:

"I started to run in 2008 for health reasons. I used to be overweight, I had high blood pressure and depression. I run to lose weight and to get rid of some of the stress from work."

Tian says he has been transformed from someone who could barely catch his breath after walking round the house to covering distances measuring many kilometers.

He adds that running is also a great way of making friends as it's easy to find like-minded people jogging along. Compared with team sports such as badminton or volleyball, running is easy to arrange and it doesn't need a gym or too much equipment.

Tian became so impassioned by his new interest that he began inviting friends to join him on his evening excursions.

"We run in a group of 40 to 50 people. It's fairly easy to organize a group of friends to jog along with me. We prefer to run at night because the air quality seems to be better in the evening. Most of all, after you've given your muscles a work-out, it feels so refreshing to take a shower. We also get the best sleep on those nights."

Thanks to his regular exercise, Tian has now been able to take part in two Marathons, the Beijing and Xiamen marathons. When he'd run both, Tian said he felt completely rejuvenated.

Like Tian Jun, a growing number of people in China's big cities enjoy running a marathon - but it's not just about finishing the race. Runners find many other sources of inspiration.

Li Ai is also a marathon fan and a runner. The young lady has a petite figure and used to enjoy an easy lifestyle.

"Through running, I get along with myself better, keep up with my life. It even helps me to realize how I'm feeling. A Marathon is a platform on which to show yourself, and to rediscover yourself, and also a place to meet fellow 'marathoners' and share your enjoyment with them. It's hard, it's tough, but it's awesome."

Li believes that while running is a sport, marathon running is an attitude. She says she has been inspired by the words of Andy Burfoot, a famous American Marathoner, who once said: "I have learned that there is no failure in running or in life as long as you keep moving. It's not about speed and gold medals. It's about refusing to be stopped."

So far, marathons have been held in all four Chinese municipalities - Beijing, Shanghai, Tianjin and Chongqing - and in 34 cities across 17 provinces and autonomous regions. In the past three years, the number of events has risen by around 10 percent a year.

And the phenomenon doesn't look as though it's going to run out of steam any time soon.

In 1981, the first International Beijing Marathon attracted a meager 188 participants, most of them Chinese full-time athletes. Thirty-two years later, the 2013 event boasted a field of 30,000, including about 1,000 non-Chinese, and all the race slots were filled just 13 hours after registration opened. Just 1 percent of the runners were professionals.

The response has been so positive over the past two years that the Chinese Athletic Association has announced plans to add further events to this year's schedule.

According to Zhang Tianwei, a senior media office worker, the Marathon has transformed from an elite sport into an activity of mass participation. And despite the growing number of races and runners, Zhang sees room for more.

"Compared with developed countries such as the United States and Japan, there are still fewer Chinese people running marathons. But more and more are taking part and enjoying the benefits of doing it. People are realizing that those who exercise every day are really different from those who don't. So in my opinion, there are bound to be more events in China in the future."

Statistics show that as many as 10 percent of Beijing's 21 million population are long-distance runners. So whatever the motivation, whether it's to improve one's physical or mental health, or both--it seems the Marathon trend is going to run... and run.