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Comment by ordersofmag | Hacker News Reader

7700/516 = just under 15 miles a day or around 100 miles per week. Typical mileage for any elite distance runner or even a decent D1 college runner (and low for an elite marathoner). But they often do it in one or two continuous sessions, often with significant intensity. The task of just covering the mileage in a day (without trying to do it in one go or trying do any of it fast) is nothing particularly exceptional. Heck as a slow 50-something dude I did 100 miles weeks during Covid when I had some free time. Health effects: assuming you were biomechanically inclined to do okay with lots of running and built up to it over a long enough time to avoid the usual overuse injuries it would almost certainly just make you healthier.

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PCT thru hikers do about 18 miles per day over mountainous terrain with a 25 lb pack. They're moving at a slower walking speed though.

Only on HN you'll see a comment like this downplaying the achievement. With Endurance sport, it's the lack of rest days that make it exponentially harder, you really can't compare with what you've.

15 miles a day is pretty tame for any long distance runner. Even without rest days. You're going to be doing 15 miles in ~3 hours. That's plenty of rest time.

I suspect this guy was actually running significantly more every day but also took some significant time off.

Russ Cook, who also ran the length of Africa, ran a route that was 2000 miles longer, in about 5 less months. He covered on average about 28 miles per day.

They're both very impressive accomplishments, but not as physically impressive as mentally, at least in my opinion.

15 miles a day every day for about 1.75 years.

Funny, you bring us Russ Cook, his body was literally breaking down. Again, 15 miles on average is tame for a long distance runner. It's starts to become exponentially harder when there are no rest days involved. Both of the achievements are nothing to scoff at.

> 15 miles a day is pretty tame for any long distance runner.

His Strava log clocks him at double that (34+ miles per day) over the last couple of days. So I'd say the average is not representative of his normal, on-the-road pace - which makes sense because he was detained for 3 weeks, visited extended family for part of the 517 days in addition to whatever breaks he took.

28 miles per day? That is 45 km. How is that possible? What would your feet look like? When I read about people who did immensely long walks, it is always your feet that give out.

I had several friends who ran 15-20 miles/day 7 days a week pre- and through- COVID.

At a slow enough pace (relative to the individual), 15-20 miles isn't a hard run for many distance runners. (For the BQers in the bunch, their recovery pace was faster than my race pace. However, their race paces would be considered recovery paces for professional marathoners.)

>7700/516 = just under 15 miles a day or around 100 miles per week.

Does your calculation factor in the lost time when he had to stop due to immigration, war zones, being jailed for weeks? IE. When he does run, he could be running 25 miles/day but on some days, he runs 0.

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