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Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

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Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#21

Post by runjake »

wallflower wrote: post #18

Unfathomable, I have marathon friends who run a marathon every month. I thought that was crazy. Before this guy, I thought these monks were the ultimate in mind-and-spirit-and-body physical endurance: > Only 46 men have completed the 1,000-day challenge since 1885. It takes seven years to complete, as the monks must undergo other Buddhist training in meditation and calligraphy, and perform general duties within the t…

For a while, I was doing marathons or above every month. It kind of worked out perfectly with the healing/ready-for-the-next-one balance. I never did long runs (>22mi) for training unless I felt like it.

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#23

Post by wallflower »

prs wrote: post #6

Engels averaged around four hours to complete a marathon. He said his best time was 2 hours, 56 minutes.

The Boston Marathon is the most prestigious marathon. There are only a small amount of spots for charity runners, the rest are qualifiers.

At that phenomenal pace of 2 hrs 56 min, 49-year old Engels is beating the qualification straitjackets for elite (non-professional) runners in ALL age groups.

http://www.baa.org/Races/Boston-Marathon/Participant-Informa...

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#24

Post by kmfrk »

mingdingo wrote: post #9

He was 49 years old. Wouldn't this cause problems for his hips and knees? I'm all for pushing physical limits, but not to the point where it could backfire. Even 20 year-old professional footballers (soccer) are told to take 2 weeks complete rest at the end of a season, and during the season they only train maybe 3-4 days a week. I hope this guy doesn't regret doing this down the line, because right now it is very in…

I'd be more concerned about his heart. He's probably a genetic freak or someone conditioned in some unfathomable way.

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#25

Post by ehsanul »

rewind wrote: post #4

This is literally unfathomable to me. This guy has to be some sort of serious genetic freak. I workout regularly, but I think I just got chin splints just from reading that article. When you consider how even the most elite athletes fall victim to overtraining, I can't even imagine how his body was able to hold up to this. Truly amazing.

There's a theory from the latest TED talk that says our survival prior to inventing weapons (like spears) depended on running other animals to exhaustion.

http://www.youtube.com/user/tedtalksdirector#p/u/0/b-iGZPtWX...

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#27

Post by ojbyrne »

I'm actually kind of impressed by the scheduling and logistics of this over and above the physical aspect. How do you find 365 consecutive days with marathons, and figure out the schedule to do it, overcome travel delays, etc? Not to mention sleeping. It seems impossible.

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#28

Post by ojbyrne »

ojbyrne wrote: post #27

I'm actually kind of impressed by the scheduling and logistics of this over and above the physical aspect. How do you find 365 consecutive days with marathons, and figure out the schedule to do it, overcome travel delays, etc? Not to mention sleeping. It seems impossible.

This article suggests he's not actually running in organized races every day:

"He will do his 42km (26-mile) daily jogs at Battersea Park every day until Monday..."

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#29

Post by nightshowerer »

kmfrk wrote: post #24
mingdingo wrote: post #9

He was 49 years old. Wouldn't this cause problems for his hips and knees? I'm all for pushing physical limits, but not to the point where it could backfire. Even 20 year-old professional footballers (soccer) are told to take 2 weeks complete rest at the end of a season, and during the season they only train maybe 3-4 days a week. I hope this guy doesn't regret doing this down the line, because right now it is very in…

I'd be more concerned about his heart. He's probably a genetic freak or someone conditioned in some unfathomable way.

He says about his heart rate that it's "below 100 if I run 10 kilometers". That seems pretty amazing to me. I've been measuring my heart rate recently and mine's at about 150 bpm if I run at a medium pace.

Re: Belgian man completes 365 marathons in 365 consecutive days

#30

Post by nightshowerer »

albemuth wrote: post #14
solipsist wrote: post #7

" He said the key was a slow pace over the 26.2-miles. " " He ran every race, he never walked. He ran at a rate of 10 kilometers per hour " The man ran 6:13 miles[1]...in a marathon...each day, for 365 days in a row. And he calls that a slow pace ! [1] Update: It's actually 6.2 miles per hour (the equivalent of a 9:40 mile), - still not too slow. I apologize for confusing miles per hour with mile times].

At 9:40/mile my heartrate won't go below 180, I'm 27...

Exactly! I don't understand how his heart rate is below 100 when running 10 kilometers (he says).
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