2 min read- NASCAR champion Jimmie Johnson announced that he will be running the Boston Marathon this year.
- It will be his first marathon, though he’s run distances from 5Ks to half marathons previously.
NASCAR driver Jimmie Johnson is taking a step off the racetrack and on to the marathon course this April.
On Tuesday, the seven-time NASCAR Cup Series champion announced his plans to run this year’s Boston Marathon. It will be his first time taking on 26.2, according to a press release from his sponsor, Gatorade Endurance.
The marathon, which will take place on April 15, comes just two days after the Toyota Owners 400 at the Richmond Raceway.
Currently, Johnson is hitting about 70 miles a week, and plans to get up to about 100 before the race—which he hopes to finish under three hours, according to Sporting News.
Johnson, like many NASCAR athletes, is no stranger to endurance sports. An avid cyclist, he regularly competes in Ironman triathlons, and also runs for training, too. Most recently, he finished the Daytona Beach Half Marathon in 1:33, one week before the Daytona 500 this weekend. He completed this race for the first time back in 2013.
The NASCAR legend has traditionally run for his foundation, the Jimmie Johnson Foundation, which also hosts a 5K run to raise money for funding K-12 public education. In 2016, Johnson took on fellow NASCAR driver Matt Kenseth in the foundation’s 5K.
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And Johnson isn’t the only NASCAR athlete who pushes his endurance in other sports. Driver Jamie McMurray, who incorporates cycling into his training, has also gone the marathon route, too.
Drew covers a variety of subjects for Runner’s World and Bicycling, and he specializes in writing and editing human interest pieces while also covering health, wellness, gear, and fitness for the brand. His work has previously been published in Men’s Health.
