On Monday 19 May, Will Goodge finished a run at Sydney’s iconic Bondi Beach, located on the east coast of Australia – a spectacular place to stop your watch. However, what’s more incredible is that Goodge started this run at Cottesloe Beach in Perth, situated thousands of kilometres away on the other side of the country.
Goodge was on a mission to run the entire width of Australia, measuring more than 3,800km (2,361 miles), in a world record-breaking time. Having set off from his most westerly point in Perth on Tuesday 15 April, Goodge conquered the distance in just 35 days.
Although Goodge’s achievement is yet to be verified by Guinness World Records, his time betters the previous world record for the fastest run across Australia by four days, with Australian Chris Turnbull having traversed the country over the space of 39 days in 2023. Prior to that, in 2022, ultrarunner Nedd Brockmann – another Aussie – ran the point-to-point route of his home nation in 47 days.
What everyone's reading
Like Brockmann, 31-year-old Goodge took on the challenge to not only push his limits in extreme circumstances, but also to fundraise for good causes. Following the loss of his mother to cancer in 2018, Goodge has been running to raise money for cancer charities in the UK, US and Australia – and his run across Australia marked his most intense and meaningful fundraising effort to date.
‘Australia is a country that I’ve loved and dreamt of ever since I was a kid,’ Goodge told Runner’s World UK, in the days after making it to Sydney. ‘This challenge seemed like the perfect opportunity to explore the country and I thought the best way to do this would be how I do it best – by running.
‘Everything that I’ve done so far has helped to lay the foundations for this challenge,’ continued Goodge, who, during his 35-day countrywide run, reportedly suffered lost toenails, bone pain, disrupted sleep and, as a result, hallucinations. All the while, he endured sand storms, temperatures as high as 35°C and the notorious Nullarbor Plain – an immense, arid expanse that crosses from Western Australia to South Australia.
‘I didn’t just want to beat the world record by an hour or a day – I wanted to do it properly and be the best. Now I can say that I have done this – and becoming the fastest human ever to cross Australia on foot makes me so proud. It’s the wildest journey that I’ve ever been on and it makes me want to continue going even bigger and better.’
Goodge, who is a 247 athlete, did not take on Australia without prior experience, however. He has completed a marathon in every county in England and he also claims to be the fastest British man to have crossed the US on foot, having run from Los Angeles to New York in 55 days. That said, running across Australia was still, by far, his hardest and most ambitious endeavour to date.
‘I’ve run across the UK and the USA and I’ve run through deserts such as the Moab in Utah – but I’ve never been the ‘best’ at anything,’ says Goodge. ‘I wanted to change that.
‘I’ve done ultramarathons before, but I wanted this to be my biggest challenge yet – the kind of challenge that strips you back and shows you what you’re really made of,’ he adds. ‘It was relentless from start to finish – especially those first few days.
‘The Australian outback can be so unforgiving, so I think that it made me really knuckle down, focus on the challenge that lay ahead and remember why I started this in the first place, which was in memory of my mum. Thinking about her and everything that she went through really made me kick into gear and make it to the end. I think she’d be proud of everything that I’ve given in the last 35 days – it’s something that I’ll carry with my forever.’
