Japan’s Miho Nakata set a new world record of 167.996 miles on Saturday at the 2023 IAU 24-Hour World Championships in Taipei. Averaging a pace of 8:34 per mile, she surpassed Camille Herron’s previous record by 247 meters.
Nakata led for most of the race, and in the final few hours, it was clear that she was on pace to break the world record. It was just a matter of holding onto that pace till the very end, as the margin was so close.
The 34-year-old ultrarunner’s victory comes after weathering some injuries earlier in the year and follows some other top performances. Nakata took sixth last year at the IAU 100K World Championships with a time of 7:19, and finished 18th and 23rd at the 2022 and 2023 Tokyo Marathons, respectively. Her distance at the 24-Hour World Championships was only beaten by four of the athletes in the men’s race and increased her 24-hour personal best by 14K.
Herron, who was one of the favorites going into the race, was sitting in third at the five-hour mark, two minutes behind the lead. She dropped out after 142K, just under 12 hours into the competition, later saying that she hadn’t felt fully recovered from the effort of winning and breaking the course record at the Spartathlon in Greece. She congratulated Nakata on her gutsy performance, writing on social media that “records are meant to be broken” and that her accomplishment took “valiant effort and strength.”
According to runnersworld.com. Source of photos: internet
