70-Year-Old Runs 7 Marathons In One Week On All 7 Continents [Watch]

To honor her seventieth birthday, this athlete accomplished what many might deem ‘impossible’.

Credit: Chau Smith

Jogging a 5k might seem like a grandiose feat to most people, but that’s nothing to seventy-year-old runner Chau Smith, who has completed over 70 marathons in her lifetime. Because her 70th birthday was approaching, the avid racer decided to do something extra special for her birthday: run 7 different marathons on all 7 continents in just 7 days.

CNN reports that the Smith embarked on the Triple 7 Quest, which took her to Perth, Australia; Singapore; Cairo; Amsterdam; Garden City, New York; Punta Arenas, Chile; and King George Island, Antarctica.

For an entire week, Smith would arrive at a new destination, run 26.2 miles, catch an airplane to the next destination, sleep some at a local hotel and then start another marathon when she awoke. At seventy-years-old, she accomplished what most people might deem to be ‘impossible’. 

The challenge wasn’t without its difficulties. For example, Smith suffered severe sunburn at one point. However, she persevered.

The months leading up to the daring adventure, Chau used every moment she wasn’t spending overseeing her dry-cleaning business to train. She commented,

“It took me eight months to really train. The last four months, I really put in long, long runs. Every week, I ran from 15 miles to 130 miles.”

In the future, Smith hopes to run the Triple 8 Quest (the same series of marathons, but includes the microcontinent Zealanda) with the running company Marathon Adventures. 

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