A marathon year for Belgian amateur

And, as marathon races go, Dosogne was able to do the majority of hers on a flat loop around a stretch of water, just outside the university town of Ghent, where, apart from sometimes dreary Belgian weather, a strong headwind would be her toughest competitor.

Even there, she said, she would not take any statistical risks and instead of the 42.195 kilometers a day, she made sure her run stood at 42.5 km — just for safe measure with the Guinness administrators.

Dosogne wishes she could have stretched her days the same way though.

As a bioengineer at a chemical firm, she had to start her days early so she could squeeze in a marathon every afternoon. And because she could not run at top speed every single day, she stuck to an easy (for her)10 km/h pace, which also allowed friends and witnesses to run along.

Her husband is a marathon runner, and their four kids, in their teens and twenties, are into sports too, making the single-minded obsession easier to deal with.

The only time when her daughter Lucie felt she might not make it was the day Dosogne crashed after 27 km and had to be taken to the emergency ward with a dislocated finger. She spent too much time there to be allowed to finish the marathon as per the regulations.