English comedian Eddie Izzard has accomplished a stunning feat of endurance the likes of which few athlete can match. In 27 days the 54-year-old Izzard ran 27 marathons in order to raise awareness for Sport Relief, a biennial charity event ran in association with Comic Relief and BBC Sport. On his last day he ran a staggering 54 miles in order to make sure he hit his distance mark for the challenge.
You can watch the BBC3 video covering Izzard’s last day of the 27 marathons in 27 days challenge here:
27 is the number of years that legendary South African Revolutionary Nelson Mandela spent in prison; Izzard chose to run 27 miles in 27 days in order to honor him, and you can see that he completed his challenge underneath a giant statue of the icon.
Putting Izzard’s accomplishment into perspective, the Premier League’s George Boyd covered an average distance of 12.006 km per game during the 14/15 season, more than any other Premier League player. But even his high mark only corresponds to 285 miles over the course of a 38 game season. Eddie Izzard’s 27 marathons corresponds to a final distance of 707 miles, so Izzard ran more in 27 days than a professional footballer runs in two full season’s worth of playing time. Astonishing.
Photo: @SiphoUganda | Twitter
Izzard’s efforts raised a staggering £1.35m, a substantial amount that contributes to the even more substantial total of £56,984,007 that 2016 Sport Relief has raised so far.
So not only has he ran further than most footballers run over the course of two seasons, he has made more in one month that a good portion of footballers make in a season as well. And he did it all for a good cause.
What have you done in 2016?
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