Andrea Marcato triumphs in the 4,987 km ultramarathon: this is how he climbed “The Everest of the race”

The Italian Andrea Marcato triumphed in the “Sri Chinmoy Self-Transcendence 3100 Mile Race”, the longest certified road race in the world. Indicated in “yards” in the original name, the grueling course is equivalent to 4987 kilometers. To achieve the titanic feat, the 39-year-old Venetian ran for 42 days plus 17 hours, 38 minutes and 38 seconds, also establishing his personal best and the new Italian record. Not only that: Marcato became the third fastest human in the world to complete a 3,100-mile run, beating the time of Ukrainian Galya Volodymer Baltskyy by 1 minute and 21 seconds.

Not satisfied with the first position, Marcato – who in everyday life is an academic – pulled off a spectacular final sprint in the last two miles before exploding with joy in New York: “The feeling of profound satisfaction, inner peace and joy, which I perceived for a full month after finishing the 10 day races, it motivated me to run the longest certified road race in the world. A feeling that I didn’t feel after 24-hour races », declared Marcato. The athlete revealed that he maintained a superhuman lifestyle for over a month, eating around 10,000 calories a day in small portions while running or walking. During the 18 hours a day available for the race he did not even take a nap like other participants. From today, he declared, Marcato begins to aim for the next goal: 5000 kilometers.

Marcato’s words follow the philosophy behind the race, founded by the Indian spiritual master, athlete and musician Sri Chinmoy in 1997. Chinmoy, himself a participant in many marathons and ultra-marathons, described the benefit of running as an opportunity for ” self-transcendence, the only thing a human being needs to be truly happy ». «These races – adds Chinmoy – help the riders enormously, even if outwardly they go through such difficulties. In the end, when the race is over, they feel they have accomplished something very significant ».

To give a measure of the result, it is as if Marcato had run 118 marathons in succession. Not surprisingly, the race has been described as the «Mount Everest of ultra-running». However, more than 4,000 people have reached the summit of Everest since 1953. Only 49 have completed a 3,100-mile run in 24 years. The company, which has been around the world, has been taken up by some important international newspapers such as New York Times the Bbc.