Despite being in confinement, this man was able to run a marathon... on his balcony!

A marathon on his balcony

For some people in France, the news about the Paris marathon being postponed until October 2020 was heartbreaking. When the news was made official, people had already been preparing for it for eight weeks or more, looking forward to taking on the city of Paris and attempting to beat their best times. Whether they wanted to finish the race in under three hours or simply finish it, it looks like they’re just going to have to be patient for now.

Ever since Tuesday 17th March 2020 following the French president Emmanuel Macron’s speech, the people of France have been confined to their homes and are under strict orders to avoid leaving unless absolutely necessary. As a result, they are only allowed to go running within a few kilometres from their homes, but no more than that. Nothing could be worse for an avid runner, like this man for example, who decided he would still run the marathon, but on his 7-meter-long balcony instead. Elisha Nochomovitz, an extremely experienced runner, recently opened up about his wacky idea.

I have just finished running on my balcony measuring 7 meters long and 1 meter wide for almost 7 hours (more than 6000 round trips according to my calculations). We are still allowed to go out and run around my house, but if everyone thinks the same way and does the same thing, we’ll all find ourselves outside and that won’t help anything. The government has considered my job not essential for the public to continue during the confinement period, so the best way for me to not get discouraged is to continue doing sport.

I wanted to play down the confinement situation with a little bit of humour. We have to follow the instructions of the government and the caregivers who ask us to stay at home.

I'm writing this hot and sweaty after just finishing the 7 hours on my balcony… My head is scrambled and I want to vomit hahaha… But thank you all for your messages/support throughout the day. You really helped me get through it.

After 6 hours, 48 minutes and 36 seconds of running, Elisha Nochomovitz finally completed what people are now calling the ‘Balcony Marathon’. And although this probably wasn’t his intention, we bet lots of other people will now be following his example.