Hash House Harriers: "athletes' who take short-cuts to the beer

Press, 18 January 1986, Page 19

Hash House Harriers: "athletes ' who take short-cuts to the beer

By

GARRY ARTHUR

/ New Zealand’s least dedicated Ithletes set off on their national -contest from the Summit Road this pnoming. Mostly unfit and comJfiletely unprepared, they are the 'Hash House Harriers — the unre- . pentant slobs of the physical fitness movement, the kind of contestants ‘who give heart to the world’s -Seven-stone weaklings and 10-tonne ’’Tillies.

- Hashers, as they call themselves, ■ have incorporated into their sport ■'such rare qualities as cheating, short cuts, lying about their ’performance, creating diversions, ’•and a complete disdain for train•tog. “Most of us are only running to •build up a thirst for the beer,” ’-■explains Dag Guest, an exuberant 'Yorkshireman who has been •felected joint master of the Garden "City Hash, one of two Christchurch - clubs. The other is the Christchurch ’Hash House Harriers, or (Ch)2H3 for short.

Hash House Harriers have a long and not especially respectable history. The movement began in 1938 when most of the Far East was still British red on the map, and ,His Majesty’s representatives in "'Kuala Lumpur, Malaya, were still fat on curry and sundown- ■ ‘ers. One, A.A. Gispert, decided to 2 try jogging around a park to ■'reduce his burgeoning beer belly. After one circuit he collapsed -under a shade tree and was revived with local food and beer proffered by a Chinese street vendor.

Other Britishers joined him on his runs, and always the street vendor was waiting to feed and water them. Bored with the park, they discussed holding a proper paper-chase, hare and hounds style, out in the bush. The resourceful Chinese entrepreneur listened, and was waiting at the finish when the run was over, with curry and beer for all.

That began the now hallowed tradition of getting the obligatory run over as quickly as possible and concentrating on the food, drink and socialising. As the group grew larger, the solitary street vendor was abandoned in favour of the Hash House restaurant and bar at the Selangor Club — hence the name.

Dag Guest’s formal description of Hash House Harriers is: “A completely social non-competitive jogging club in which the emphasis is on social fun.”

Runs are ingeniously devised so that the fitter joggers and the completely unfit can finish together. A trail is laid, as in a

paper-chase, using flour or sawdust to mark the way. “We follow the trail, shouting ‘On, on!’ and blowing a bugle,” explains Mr Guest. (His bugle is a cheapskate affair made of a bit of garden hose with a bugle mouthpiece at one end and a funnel at the other.) “The trail ends in a circle which is called a check.

“When you reach the circle you shout ‘Checking!’ which means that you are looking for where the new trail starts. It will be somewhere within a 100 metre radius, but there are also false trails. You may find three trails, of which only one is true.”

That is where the unique Hash House system comes into its own. The keener, faster runners cast about energetically, looking for the one true path, and that gives the slow ones time to catch up. The sound of the bugles lets the slow pack know what is happening at the front, and they look for shortcuts to get themselves into the lead.

Hashers are roughly and rudely divided into two classes — S.C.B.S (short-cutting bastards) and F.R.B.S (front-running bastards), and the totally unfit S.C.B.s often do little more than stagger or waddle down to the first corner lamp-post and go back to “on on,” which is what they call the social gathering held after the alleged run. That is the main event — drinking, eating, horseplay, and awards for true or imagined deeds performed in the course of the run.

Dag Guest admits reluctantly that some Hashers use the weekly run for training for more serious sport, but points out that anyone showing excessive keenness will be fined just as heavily as a runner of exceeding wimpiness. Hashers are a sub-culture with nicknames as exotic as any dished out by the Chicago Mob. There’s Daggy himself (nothing to do with rattling as he runs — it’s an acronym from his initials); and there are Sewage, Nana, Rocketman, Boy George, Great Uncle Bulgaria, Cami-knickers, Blackadder, Hot Lips, Buttocks, Orange Roughy, Lusty, and some even worse.

Ken LeComte, grand master of Hash for all 34 New Zealand clubs, is known as Le Human Dynamo for his unvarying practice of sprinting for the first 100 metres of any run, then walking sedately the rest of the way. Fun is the name of their game, not winning, or even completing the course. To provide more excuses for socialising, they keep

count of all runs by clubs and individuals and hold special celebratory runs to mark the high points. T-shirts, often decorated with bawdy illustrations, are issued at the slightest excuse, together with badges, inscribed drinking equipment, and drip-catcher bibs. Hash runs are held wet or fine, and Dag Guest says they have never cancelled one yet. “The worst I remember is one winter when it was so wet that one guy turned up wearing full snorkelling gear.” Runs are usually devised in such a way that the tired, lazy, and infirm can take plenty of shortcuts, but sometimes there are traps. “I once set a run in which I had to ferry them all across the Heathcote River, six by six,” sayss Dag Guest. “That was designed to catch the blatant short-cutters.” Hash House Harriers are found all over the world, forming a kind of freemasonry of kindred spirits who consult their international directories to find the nearest Hash wherever they are in the world. “Lots of businessmen, particularly in the Far East and Europe, use it as a non-work-oriented social outlet, where they can mix with local people of all walks of life,” says Dag Guest. Even Moscow and Peking have their Hash House Harriers. In Saudi Arabia, where alcohol is forbidden, Hashers drive miles out into the desert to hold week-end Hashes and drink their own illegal bath-tub brews. Riyadh’s three Hashes have a substantial relief fund for bailing members out of jail.

About 130 Hashers from all over New Zealand, plus six Australians, are expected to start in today’s Canterbury Nash Hash ’B6, which is being sponsored by U.D.C. Endeavour. The “run” starts downhill from near Cooper’s Knob on the Summit Road this morning and ends at a secret location where the “on on” will take the form of a barbecue put on by the Halswell Lions’ Club. Later they will hold the Hash Olympics — athletic events such as seeing how far you can slide on your belly across a mess of jelly on a plastic surface. A “recovery run” is planned for tomorrow. Although there are no written rules for Hash House Harriers, and no club headquarters anywhere, Kuala Lumpur is considered the “mother Hash” because that is where it all began. It is hoped to hold the 1988 biennial international Hash there to celebrate 50 years of the most non-serious sporting organisation in the world.