Madhupran Wolfgang Schwerk powered his way to 420 km (260 miles) by the end of Day 2 in the Loutraki 7 Day Race in Athens, Greece. 6 km short of the recent 48 hour record set 2 weeks ago by Tony Mangan, Schwerk looks likely to better Yiannis Kouros’s 72 hour performance in the 2005 Across The Years race in Arizona. Kouros set a new course record with 323.424 miles. World records aren’t kept for the 72 hour distance for some strange reason, probably because there are so few events at this distance. (But If we take a leaf out of Dean Karnazes’ book then we are at liberty to call it what we will).
Last year at the prestigous invitation only Surgères 48 hour, Madhupran ran 392 km to overaul the great Japanese runner, Sumie Inagaki and after his amazing performance in the Self-Transcendence 3100 mile race last year in which he lowered his own record by over a day averaging over 75 miles a day for 41 days, Schwerk is going from strength to strength.
The battle taking place behind him is an intense struggle between South Africa’s Eric Wright, Conny Bullig from Germany and Katsuhiro Tanaka from Japan, within a kilometer or so of each other. Frenchman Rene Heintz has moved into 5th spot ahead of Hiroko Okiyama.
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Well Done Wolfgang!! Powerful running. Good luck for the 72 hour and the rest of the race. Tony Mangan.