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Aaron Robinson is running a marathon a day with his two dogs. ‘In a strange kind of way, I’m enjoying it,’ he says
HUMAN( )RACE
‘THERE WAS A TIME when I thought about becoming a monk,’ says Aaron. ‘I’d love to be on my own in a little cell. That’s who I am, basically.’
What the 40-year-old Londoner is doing with his days instead isn’t exactly the next best thing, but it definitely qualifies as an ascetic lifestyle. Bed at 7pm, up at 3am, when he’ll have a bagel and a protein shake, run a marathon around Wanstead and then sit down to a full day’s work at home as an internal communications manager at the human trafficking charity Hope for Justice. ‘In a strange kind of way, I’m enjoying it,’ he says. ‘I like being by myself, just running and seeing the sun come up. It’s a beautiful part of the day for me.’
This has been his routine since 18 December 2022, when he set out in the east London snow with his two border collies, Inca and River, and announced he was aiming to break the world record for the most consecutive daily marathons. Whether he does it or not is a complicated thing. The official Guinness record for a man is 82 days, set by Devdutt Sharma of India when he finished in January 2023. That same month, Australia’s Erchana Murray-Bartlett set an official women’s record of 150 days. However, in March 2023, an American pastor called Malachi O’Brien stopped at an unofficial 153 days, and between 2010 and 2012 the Spanish ultrarunner Ricardo Abad, again unrecognised by Guinness, completed an extraordinary 607 consecutive marathons.
At the time of writing, Aaron was on his 390th marathon, but has also accepted that even if he gets into the 600s, it won’t be certified. Three of his runs have been in canicross races, where you’re attached to your dogs, so they would count as ‘assisted’. He also tried to get Guinness to certify Inca and River as record-breaking marathon dogs, but they wouldn’t bite. ‘I think the official line was that they couldn’t ascertain whether the dogs were doing it of their own free will, which is ironic as it was the dogs who submitted the application,’ he jokes. ‘They were also concerned that more people would try to do this with their dogs, and they didn’t want to encourage it.’
He has received criticism online for covering such distances with his pets, but insists he’s still a long way from finding their limits. ‘If you know these working breeds, they never get tired. When we get back they don’t sleep, they still want me to play withthem. And while I’m doing a marathon, they’re doing an ultramarathon every day because they’re sprinting back and forth, fetching sticks along the way.’ River (above, on the left), is more of a zigzagger, while Inca, the grey one with David Bowie eyes, occupies himself by finding things.
