Sales & Deals 435.336 kilometers (270.5 miles) around a 400-meter track in Bruce, Australia.
The previous record, 411.5 kilometers (255 miles), was set by Jo Zakrzewski of Great Britain in February. Herron exceeded that by 15.5 miles. She bested the previous record about 45 hours into the event—and kept running for almost another 3 hours after that.
She averaged 10:39 per mile pace, which included at least one 40-minute nap, according to her Instagram, so her actual moving pace was faster.
She hit 148 miles for the first 24 hours, and 122.5 miles in the second day, as rain poured down on the runners. Only two men have ever run farther over 48 hours. She covered 1,088 laps of the track.
Herron, 41, ran marathons in the early part of her career, recording a personal best of 2:37:14 in 2012 in Houston. She began running ultra distances in 2015 and found immediate success. She won the 2017 Comrades Marathon in South Africa, and she’s also the world record holder for 100 miles, 12 hours, and 24 hours.
We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back Runner’s World before she left for Australia, Herron said she planned to take 6- to 8-minute power naps a couple of times in the first 24 hours. “A lot of 24-hour runners don’t sleep at all for 24 hours, but I found when I did that little bit of lying down and closing my eyes and meditating, it really helped me,” she said. “I was able to extend my 24-hour record by 5 miles.
“You hear about hallucinations with ultra runners,” she continued. “When I start to feel that happening with my brain is when I lie down.”
Earlier in her career she was sponsored by Nike and Hoka, but at the end of 2022 she left Hoka and signed a new deal with Lululemon.
Other elite runners weighed in on the snippets of video posted to Herron’s instagram Best Big City Marathons. Colleen Quigley, Keira D’Amato, and Zach Bitter were among those expressing their admiration for Herron’s feat.
Jeannie Rice Breaks Her Own World Record at London is a writer and editor living in Eugene, Oregon, and her stories about the sport, its trends, and fascinating individuals have appeared in Runner’s World Give A Gift, Run Your Butt Off! and Walk Your Butt Off!
