This weekend 60 amateur runners will try to become the first to complete a marathon almost a mile underground in a Swedish mine. We spoke to one from the City of London to ask: why?
“I’ll try and show you what it’s like down here,” says the man in the video, his view of the inside of the pitch-black zinc mine illuminated only by a head torch. “What you can see if I turn my torch off is, kind of, nothing. And this tunnel just goes on and on… forever.”
That is the eerie scene that will greet 60 amateur runners from around the world, including the Square Mile, this weekend when they descend 1,302m to the Garpenberg mine in eastern Sweden for the first time to take on a unique sporting challenge.
The World’s Deepest Marathon is so called because no one has ever attempted a run of that distance at almost a mile underground before. To complete it they will have to cope with temperatures of up to 30C and sensory deprivation: silence and near total darkness.
“I keep being asked, ‘do you feel prepared for the running side?’ but I actually don’t think you can prepare,” says Henrietta Newman, a community support consultant at the World Gold Council, which is headquartered in the City of London.
“Having said that, I did go for an 11k run in my helmet, and I got some strange looks. I could go in a really hot room and run on a running machine but I don’t really have access to that, so I’m just winging it.
“I actually just feel quite excited. I do feel nervous and I imagine when we’re going down in those lifts for three minutes, and then you’re driven further into the mine, at that point I’ll be really worried. But to be honest, I think I’ll just be feeling like I want to start.”
Among those taking on the daunting subterranean route – along one long tunnel and back – are CEOs and others involved in mining, hardened runners and marathon first-timers, locals and visitors from Britain, India, Africa and America.
The Boliden zinc mine is in eastern Sweden (Pic: Boliden)
Bear Grylls and the World’s Deepest Marathon
Perhaps inevitably for a challenge this extreme, Bear Grylls is part of it. His company BecomingX and industry body the ICMM are organising the race, which is being hosted by mining giant Boliden, some of whose employees are taking part.
The world record attempt is aiming to raise £1m for two good causes, the BecomingX Foundation and animal welfare charity Wild At Heart. It is also a showcase for the safety advances that the mining industry has made.
“What will be really interesting is to shine the spotlight on how technologically advanced mining has become. The fact that you can have that many people down there running a marathon at that depth is quite insane,” Newman tells City AM.
“You’ve got people towards the end of their careers in mining versus people right at the beginning, where it’s really kind of cutting edge. And so it’s quite nice to bring together so many different people.
“In my mind, I’d always want to be sub-five [hours]. But they’ve been really clear – it isn’t about time. It’s a world record, so actually it’s about the number of us completing it.”
Newman is a regular at the Hackney half-marathon but, as the man in the video shot for participants – ultra-marathon coach Rory Coleman – makes clear, this is a challenge like no other. That singularity can, however, bring its own unique reward.
“I did the London Marathon in 2021, the first after Covid, and it was an amazing atmosphere. When I was training for that, they would talk a lot about how you never get that feeling again of doing your first marathon,” she says.
“I’ve been thinking about this marathon, and even though you’ve got really experienced ultra runners, people like me who run a bit, and then you’ve got people who are quite new to running, we’re all going to get that feeling of, like, literally no one’s done this.”
For more information or to donate, visit: https://www.worldsdeepestmarathon.com/