What do you do the day after running 140km from coast to coast across England on the longest day of the year? Go out for a 10-minute jog, of course.
That’s if you’re ultra-runner and content creator Jonny Davies, who achieved his ambitious “Race the Sun” challenge on June 21, the longest day of 2026 (and still went out for a jog the next day). On the summer solstice, Davies set off from Tynemouth Lighthouse at sunrise (4.26am) and spent almost 18 hours on his feet, crossing the country to arrive at Bowness-on-Solway at 9.54pm — just 30 seconds before sunset.
Davies grew up in Balham and was a rugby player for Wimbledon RFC before he transitioned to running in 2019. In 2023, he ran the length of the London Underground, covering 570km in 11 days; in 2024, he visited every capital city across the UK and Ireland on foot.
A few weeks before the Race the Sun challenge, Davies completed a “last man standing” ultra-marathon in Texas, which saw him staying awake to run for 30 hours straight and covering 192km.
“When you’ve been running for 14 hours straight, your mind starts to play tricks on you”
To prepare for these kinds of endurance events, Davies says it’s important to “get out the door, early doors” with enough carbs on board. He builds up to between 16 and 20 hours of training a week.
“The more you train, the more you’ve got to be conscious of nutrition and sleep,” he says. “For me, it’s a case of taking it one week at a time and running a little further each week.”
All that preparation meant he could go from Texas to the Race the Sun challenge in the space of a few weeks, via a trip to the Red Bull Athlete Performance Centre in Salzburg, Austria. Here, his entire body was tested and he received the green light to take on the next challenge.
“When I’m running these sort of challenges, I’m aiming to consume about 120 grams of carbohydrates an hour and around two litres of fluid per hour,” he says. “The problem was my body just wasn’t having it, and if I tried to take on too much, it would just reject it. So I had to really, really dial back on my fuelling, just so I could have something that stayed in the stomach.”
Davies uses a combination of sport nutrition gels and powders, including electrolytes and carbohydrate powder, which is easier to digest and, crucially, contains zero fibre. G1M Sport is a favourite, but post-challenge, he’s been enjoying green vegetables, salads and other fibrous staples. As well as the physical issues, there were also mental challenges to overcome.
“When you’ve been running for 14 hours straight, your mind starts to play tricks on you,” he says. “Your brain is not a truth-telling machine, your brain is a keeping-alive machine. You’ve got to ignore it and go, ‘I understand what you’re saying, but we’ve got a job to do and I’m going to keep pushing forward’, and eventually that negative voice in your head slides away.”
As for what’s replacing the sound of that negative voice, it’s rarely music or podcasts for this ultra-runner, partly for safety reasons if he’s on public roads and partly to unplug.
“I’m just listening to my own breathing and footsteps or the sounds of nature,” he says. “I try not to listen to too much music unless I really need it — it’s really helpful when I’m suffering.” On his occasional playlist are upbeat tracks, particularly Abba’s Dancing Queen.
Davies never used to like running. Why and how, then, did he get into it in such an extreme way?
“It was a case of, well, if I can become somewhat good at the thing I dislike the most, I’ve got no excuse for anything else going on in my life,” he says.
It’s valuable inspiration for us all, whether you’re contemplating a marathon or working up the courage to restart Couch to 5K. Again.
