Ultra-runner Russell involved in creating new World record

Meath ultra-runner Keith Russell was the second last man standing when he took part in the highly demanding, energy-sapping Race of Champions Backyard Masters event in Germany.

Participation for the gruelling, epic event was by invitation only, with Russell earning his place as a result of his victory in the Last One Standing event in Florida Manor, Co Down last year where his broke the Irish record.

He proved more than able for this extraordinary event that demands tremendous strength of mind and body - and Russell was not only a participant he was involved in the creation of a new world record.

The Race of Champions Backyard Masters race began last Saturday morning and participants had to complete a 6.7km lap every hour, running the event as fast or as slow as they wanted while ensuring they were back at the start line on the hour mark to begin again.

Any runner who failed to finish a lap recorded a DNF (did not finish).

Russell, who is from Navan, took part in the same event last year and completed 63 laps but this time Russell powered past the Irish record of 64 laps, with Belgian Merijn Geerts also in a strong position.

When Japanese runner Terumichi Morishita dropped out after 73 laps and 490km, it meant that just Russell and Geerts remained.

The pair broke the previous world record of 85 laps – set at the Backyard World Championships last year in Tennessee – as they set into a remarkable fourth night of running. It was an incredible feat of endurance and resilience.

In the early hours of this morning, Russell's race came to an end at 89 laps. After covering 597km in a time of 66 hours, 14 minutes and 22 seconds, it was then left for Geerts to complete one more lap for victory which he duly did, with an average lap time of 49.05, compared to Russell’s 44.39.

Last year in the Mount Florida event Co Down Russell ran over 425km in an event that started on a Saturday and finished the following Tuesday.

"It was very surreal. It is still very surreal. I broke the UK, Irish and European record in this type of race, for the hours covered," he told RTE after that event. "It means I’m pretty much classed as one of the top ten in the world. Things like this don’t happen to people like me. I’m just a runner, just an average person."

Incredibly he has bettered that now pushing himself beyond the endurance of most people.

Russell began his running career in earnest in 2016 with his daughter Alanna, who had spastic quadriplegia cerebral palsy, and ran the 2017 Dublin marathon, pushing Alanna in a special running chair.

The pair raised more than €60,000 for the Meadow's Children's Respite Centre in Navan.Tragically, Alanna passed away just weeks after the marathon.