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Scottish ultrarunner breaks 48-hour world record with 411.5 kilometres

In her first 48-hour race, Scottish ultrarunner Joasia Zakrzewski broke the world record

joasia Zakrzewski Photo by: Taiwan Ultrarunning Association

Last weekend at the Taipei Ultramarathon in Taiwan, Scottish ultrarunner Joasia Zakrzewski not only won the 48-hour race outright, but she did so in world-record fashion, running a mind-blowing 411.5 kilometres (255 miles).

Zakrzewski broke the previous world record of 403.32 kilometres (250.611 miles) set by Patrycja Bereznowska of Poland at Poland’s UltraPark Weekend 48-Hour race in May 2022. Her new record time added 8 km to the previous 48-hour mark.

According to iRunFar, Zakrzewski had never raced a 48-hour event, and had only run one 24-hour event before setting this world record. In her first 24-hour race, she set the U.K. record with 247 kilometres (154 miles).

To put her time in perspective, Zakrzewski averaged seven minutes per kilometre over a 0.6282 km lap of Huabo Freshman Park park in the Taiwanese capital. She completed the 628-metre loop 654 times. That’s over eight kilometres an hour for two days straight.

Joasia Zakrzewski
Joasia Zakrzewski ran a mind-blowing total of 411.5 kilometres in 48 hours at the 2023 Taipei Ultramarathon

Although she hasn’t dipped into the 24-hour plus races, Zakrzewski isn’t new to the ultramarathon scene. She has been racing ultramarathon events for 13 years and has landed on the podium twice at the IAU 50K World Championships (in 2011 and 2014), helping Team GB take home the team trophy in 2016 and 2019.

Zakrzewski also represented Scotland in the marathon at the 2014 Commonwealth Games in Glasgow. 

Taiwan will host the 24-Hour World Championships in December 2023.

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