Humankind's eternal fascination with speed is, perhaps, as understandable as it is well-documented. Regardless of milieu, each milestone of achievement — be it the 4-minute mile, the 3:45 flight from Paris to New York, or the 5-minute search for parking at Costco — forces us to reconsider our presumed limits in time and space.

Yet, despite the steady march of technological progress and human evolution, there are some achievements, spontaneous in their appearance, that seem a quantum leap beyond reason.

Take for example the preternatural happenings at Kapi'olani Park this month.

Just last week, the fine men of the Hawai'i Premier League accomplished what many casual sports fans had assumed impossible: two complete cricket matches in a single afternoon.

It was, to American eyes at least, an accomplishment on the scale of a cinderblock beating Michael Phelps to the wall in a 100-meter freestyle sprint.

The inspired madness continues this Sunday as the league's inaugural 20/20 cricket tournament resumes with another pair of games featuring top cricket players from O'ahu and Maui.

"It's a nice way to draw more interest from the community and to inject some excitement into the sport in Hawai'i," said organizer Mark Berwick, a Punahou graduate who played cricket in San Francisco and England.

FAST-PACED GAME

The draw, of course, is the state's first look at 20/20 cricket, an accelerated, high-intensity variation of the traditional English sport that has rocked the established order with its broad appeal and money-generating potential.

Whereas the highest form of the sport, test cricket, may take five days to complete, a full game of 20/20 cricket can be played in about three hours, roughly the duration as a game of baseball or American football.

The basic difference is in the number of innings and "overs" (deliveries of six consecutive balls by a single pitcher). Test cricket games are composed of two innings and there is no limit on the number of overs. In 20/20 cricket, teams each have one innings (yes, with an "s") with a maximum of 20 overs.

Shortened versions of traditional cricket, called limited overs, have been around since the 1970s, but even these take between five and eight hours to complete.

The first official 20/20 game was played on June 13, 2003 as part of the Twenty20 Cup in England. Despite objections from purists who felt the traditions and rich strategic complexity of the sport were being compromised — "It was seen as butchering the game," Berwick said — 20/20 has proved highly attractive to players, marketers and promoters.

SHORTER CONTESTS

"It's a faster, more aggressive game," said Berwick, who scored 57 runs in the Spitting Cobras' 152-123 win over the Master Batters last week. "There is no time to Mickey Mouse around.

"Because the game is shorter, there is more opportunity to take the game global, particularly in Canada and the United States," he said. "It's equivalent to a baseball game, but with a lot more scoring."

For local cricketeer Owen O'Callaghan, the tighter format of 20/20 has advantages on and off the field.

"It's more aggressive and more exciting," O'Callaghan said. "In normal cricket, you have more time to pick and choose your pitches. You can avoid a stronger pitcher. With 20/20, you really have to get up and go for it because you're under pressure to score runs. It livens the game up."

O'Callaghan said the shorter games are also easier to accommodate for players with busy schedules.

"For married guys, it can be difficult to get a whole Sunday to play," he said.

O'Callaghan was born in Ireland and raised in Canada. He picked up the sport during a stint in Jamaica in the 1970s and '80s. He said 20/20 has a good chance of attracting new fans outside traditional cricket-playing nations.

"North Americans like exciting, fast-paced sports rather than sports that involve more strategizing," he said. "In that sense, 20/20 is more appealing."

While cricket has enjoyed steady if not overwhelming success in the United States, 20/20 has opened new doors for high-level players — most from the U.K., Australia, New Zealand, India, the West Indies and Jamaica — who travel from state to state for increasingly prosperous opportunities to compete. The buzz within international cricket circles this month is the $20 million, winners-take-all tournament between England and a team of Caribbean all-stars sponsored by Sir Allen Stanford.

"The sport has a big, big future," said Berwick, who works as a trade officer for the Australian Consulate in Honolulu.

ECONOMIC BOOST

In particular, Berwick said, 20/20 has the potential to grow into a solid contributor to the local economy. The Hawai'i Premier League plans to offer 20/20 tournaments twice a year and organizers hope to stage a 16-team tournament in 2010 with participants from South East Asia, Australia, New Zealand and India.

The league has been in contact with the Hawai'i Tourism Authority to plan the tournament for May 2010.

"May is a dead month for tourism and HTA wanted something like a commonwealth sporting event to promote inbound traffic from nontraditional areas like India, Singapore, Malaysia, Australia, and New Zealand," Berwick said.

In Hawai'i, most cricket activity has traditionally centered on the 115-year-old Honolulu Cricket Club, which lays claim to being the oldest sporting club in the Pacific. The club's current membership reflects the international reach of the sport, with recreational athletes hailing from India, England, the West Indies, Australia, New Zealand and Tonga, as well as few from Hawai'i.

"We've seen a lot of ups and downs over the years," said Bishnu Ramsarran, the longest standing member of the organization. "20/20 is exciting and new and it's attractive enough to get people excited about the sport. It changes the pace, and it changes the mentality you have in hitting and fielding. We've seen a lot of enthusiasm, especially from new players. Locally, it's attracting a lot of new players and older players are excited to be able to do something a little different."