De Castella’s Indigenous mission in New York Marathon – The Sydney Morning Herald

“I’ve lost a few friends and family to suicide — it happens in our community,” Armstrong says. “Two years ago, I lost one of my friends, Ethan Kantawara. He missed the cut two years ago to be one of these runners. That’s the reason why I’m running: for him and the brothers that have passed — and also the ones still at home.”

De Castella established the foundation a decade ago after filmmaker Matt Long came up with the idea of plucking four Indigenous athletes from isolated communities to see if they had the natural talent to rival the Africans’ dominance of long-distance running.

The project culminated in the 2011 documentary film Running to America – but it gave de Castella a higher purpose.

“Just seeing how difficult life was for them, the circumstances they were up against, I was ashamed that we had such disadvantage and dysfunction in this country,” he says. “I’d travelled the planet and seen third world countries and to see situations that were as bad or worse in our own backyard was upsetting. What struck me the most, after spending time with those four men, was the shame and lack of self-worth and pride that underpinned that. When I saw those four fellas finish in Central Park, I saw the opposite.”

Since then, the foundation has produced 86 graduates, all of whom have competed in marathons in New York, Boston, Tokyo, London, Paris and Berlin.

“Everyone we’ve put on the start line has finished,” de Castella says.

Last Tuesday night, each of the nine members of this year’s squad — aged between 18 and 30 – shared their unique stories at an intimate gathering in Sydney before flying out for New York the next day. They universally spoke about wanting to be greater leaders within their community.

For some, it’s been a long journey. Wiradjuri man Travis Naden, 28, from Canberra, has been trying to qualify for the final squad — which this year had 190 applicants — for the past seven years.

For Keifer Yu, a 28-year-old Yawuru man from Broome, the running is the easy part. He played semi-professional footy in the Western Australia Football League, notching 103 matches for Claremont.

It’s the hours on the road, on his own, that’s the tough part.

“I’m very reserved, I don’t express my emotions — just ask my partner,” he says. “It’s very rare that I cry. When you’re running, there’s nowhere to hide.”

During his career, Yu had to deal with two serious cases of racial vilification that he called out on both occasions. The backlash was harsh, as was the WAFL’s backward conciliation process in which the victim must decide if he’s offended or not.

“You’re the perpetrator — not the victim,” Yu says. “I was the one at fault. It’s not the reason why I retired but that period was very hard for me.”

He admits he struggled to fill the void in his life post-footy, and was also devastated by the death of his six-year-old nephew, Eli, who was struck by a car.

“I’ll have his name on my hand,” Yu says. “I never healed from that. Being part of this, running on my own, has helped.”

Shane Cook, 27, grew up in Adelaide but his mother, Jackie, and grandmother, Doretta, hail from the Cherbourg Mission in Queensland.

He never identified as Aboriginal until he was badly burnt as a 12-year-old when he was splashed with petrol as another group of teens played with fire.

Cook suffered third-degree burns to 30 per cent of his body and was in an induced coma for eight months.

“When I was in recovery, Mum spent a lot of time with me, mostly drawing and speaking about Nanna, the history of Australia, the Stolen Generation and who I was,” Cook says.

When he recovered, he focussed on becoming an Indigenous artist and youth mentor. He’s designed boots for players from the Adelaide Crows and Port Adelaide to wear during the AFL’s Indigenous Round, as well as the shorts boxer Anthony Mundine wore in his bout against Jeff Horn.

The tragedy he suffered early in his life led him to his culture, and now it takes him to the start line in New York.

“It’s been my duty to get back to that,” Cook says. “Culture identity is why a lot of young people feel lost. It’s the key point in my life that made me feel good and confident. It gave me my identity. I feel so privileged to be a First Nations descendant.”

The burns, though, will present a challenge in the marathon.

“I have no sweat glands where I was burnt,” Cook says. “Under my arms, around my throat, chest, neck and hands. I have skin grafts on my legs as well. It means I have to stay hydrated.”

The other runners in the group are Taneshia Atkinson, 25, Kingscliff; Emily Broderick, 29, Perth; Sianna Catullo, 24, Melbourne; Narrinda Dempsey, 27, Toowoomba; Neil Sabatino, 29, Hammond Island, Torres Strait.

Just finishing in New York will have a ripple effect for years to come. It changes lives. De Castella knows it. He’s seen it.

Weeks after taking his first batch of runners to New York, he received a phone call at his Canberra office.

They plotted out a loop inside the walls of the prison. About 120 inmates started and about 30 of them finished a full marathon.

Robert de Castella

It was Nathan Brooks, a prison officer at the Banksia Hill Juvenile Detention Centre in Western Australia. Brooks explained how the detainees had closely followed the progress of one runner, Joseph Davies, who came from the Kimberley region.

They pinned newspaper articles about Davies to the walls of their cells and, when he completed the marathon, asked if they could start running, too.

De Castella sent Brooks detailed running programs so the detainees could start preparing for a marathon.

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“The following September, they plotted out a loop inside the walls of the prison,” de Castella says. “About 120 inmates started and about 30 of them finished a full marathon. One kid had been psychotic with a meth amphetamine addiction.

“He needed to be regularly sedated to calm him down but his whole personality changed when he started running. When another kid was released, one of his release orders was that he had to keep running … Running keeps you honest.”

Charlie Maher was also one of those first runners a decade ago, baffling his local community in the months before leaving for New York because he always seemed to be running. They just didn’t know where, and they didn’t know why.

One of those people was Jordan Armstrong. Maher is his uncle.

“He’d run past me and I’d say, ‘What’s he always running for?’” Armstrong smiles. “Now I know why.”