The Joy of Six: sporting beauty

Beauty is a subjective impression, but after a point, it becomes objective fact. John Steinbeck's writing, Mozart's music, Etta James' singing; beautiful. Similarly, anyone claiming indifference towards the Taj Mahal, Mona Lisa or St Paul's Cathedral is most likely seeking attention, because of the spectacular manner in which they capture aspects that somehow please our senses and soul: symmetry, cleanness, curvature and flow.

And David Rudisha is their athletic equivalent; to watch him run is to understand perfection, a genre of beauty characterised by its natural, effortless expression. "I first saw him in primary school, I saw him running," recalls his coach, Brother Colm O'Connell. "I saw his physical size, I saw his stride pattern, I saw his relaxation … you know, not stressed, not really flailing, somebody who was running in a controlled way." So it makes sense that the skill that validates his talent was imperceptibly learned as a kid chasing cattle barefoot. "You have a nice feeling with the ground," Rudisha explains.

The upshot is a rhythmic, hypnotic form, like Subterranean Homesick Blues on loop but without the earworm. His strides are tall, long and bouncy, arms somehow both angular and ergonomic, torso straight, head still; everything right, everything in its right place. Beautiful if you break it down, beautiful if you leave it for your instinct to assess.

But Rudisha is also special because he is so much more than an aesthetic, the definition of what the Talmud calls tachlis. In 2010, he broke Wilson Kipketer's 13-year-old 800m world record – and within a week had done it again. Then, in the trials for the London Olympics – at altitude in Nairobi – he ran the 14th fastest race in history, describing it as