Stefaan Engels (born 7 April 1961,
Ghent
Ghent ( nl, Gent ; french: Gand ; traditional English: Gaunt) is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, and the third largest in the country, exceeded in ...
,
Belgium
Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...
), also known as "marathon man", is a Belgian
marathon
The marathon is a long-distance foot race with a distance of , usually run as a road race, but the distance can be covered on trail routes. The marathon can be completed by running or with a run/walk strategy. There are also wheelchair div ...
er and
triathlete
A triathlon is an endurance multisport race consisting of swimming, cycling, and running over various distances. Triathletes compete for fastest overall completion time, racing each segment sequentially with the time transitioning between the d ...
, the first man to run the marathon distance 365 consecutive times in a single year. He previously held the record for the most Ironman Triathlons in a year with 20 over 2007 and 2008 - see
James Lawrence (triathlete)
Engels averaged around four hours to complete each marathon with the best time of 3 hours and 21 minutes. He ran during his marathons over 2010. Engels said that a slow pace was the key. Before him, the record was held
by
Ricardo Abad Martínez of Spain with 150 marathons in a row in 2009. Abad is the current world record holder.
Of his feats, Engels described: "I don't regard my marathon year as torture. It's more like a regular job...I am running just as Joe Average goes to work on Monday morning, whether or not he feels like it. I don't always feel like running, but when I am done, I take a shower, have some physiotherapy for an hour, and that wraps up my day."
Growing up Engels had asthma and was instructed to avoid activity.
See also
*
Serge Girard
Serge Girard is a French ultramarathon runner born in 1953. He fulfilled the challenge of running across the 5 continents without a single day off.
He is related to French hurdler Patricia Girard-Léno.
Runs achieved so far
* 1997: trans-Uni ...
, holder of the world record distance traveled on foot in one year ()
References
External links
* Officia
Marathon Man 365 website* UniversalSports.co
*
Watchmojo.com
WatchMojo is a private company in video producing, publishing and syndicator that is based in Canada. The company has created around 20,000 videos on YouTube, and 5,000 additional videos from other platforms. It primarily is known for their ...
br>
video interview and profile
1961 births
Living people
Belgian male long-distance runners
Belgian male marathon runners
Sportspeople from Ghent
Belgian male triathletes
{{Belgium-sport-bio-stub