Rajat Khurana knows what it takes to run 52 half-marathons in 52 weeks

Over the past decade, marathons have become rather trendy in the fitness community. Thousands of runners at peak physical fitness take to the streets every year for the Mumbai marathon. But there is a significant difference between running one half-marathon twice or thrice a year and running a half-marathon every week. The latter demands a whole new level of peak fitness and mental fortitude.

It’s this combination of physical training, metal preparation and the right gear that pushed Rajat Khurana, managing director, ASICS India, to attempt and complete the ambitious challenge between 16th September 2018 and 18th September 2019.

“I used to do two to three half-marathons a year and in 2018, I decided to challenge myself and run 25 half-marathons. Once I completed 23 half-marathons, I realized I could do this and decided to push myself further and extend it to 52.”

Listen to your body
“It’s definitely not easy running week-on-week. You need a lot of preparation, both mental and physical, before you commit to a challenge like this” cautions the MD. “Your body has to be adapted for doing these half-marathons. You have to understand your age and what your body demands. You need to take all that into account before you (even) start. After that, it’s a lot of self-determination.”


Don’t let the weather play spoilsport
Another factor that Khurana believes runners should be mentally prepared for is the weather. “Three months out of the year, it’s cold and you will have to be up before dawn on a lot of days to run. Even a practice run would take two hours and most of that time, you’re running before the sun is up.”

Khurana, who used to run 10 kms a day thrice a week to prepare for the weekend half-marathon, used to begin his practice runs at 5 am so that he could finish by 7 am.