By Ellen Hunter Gans ’05
“When was the last time your jaw dropped?”
It was a throwaway line in an audiobook; I don’t even remember which one.
My first thought was, When I discovered just how terrible a bag full of pre-teen boys’ athletic equipment can smell?
“I mean, real, true, jaw-dropping awe,” the book continued.
Oh. That. That’s harder to come by.
But there is a way I’ve been able to consistently experience real, true awe. It’s when I travel. When I get out of my house, and thus out of my comfort zone. When I change my location in order to change my perspective, my day, my life.
My parents used to save their pennies and take us on road trips that were low on budget (think tents and loaves of bread from the gas station) but high on educational value (my dad insisted on reading every single historical marker). As a result of their efforts, I made it to all 50 states, then set a goal of keeping up with my age in the number of countries I’ve been to.
Saint Ben’s further cultivated my love for travel. I trained for my first marathon while studying abroad in London and backpacking through Europe after the semester ended. I became enamored with seeing the world on foot, without windows or wheels separating me from the sights and scents and sounds.
In the years since, I’ve been humbled and awed over and over and over, staring down the Great Wall of China and the Pyramids in Giza, coming face to face with a lion in Tanzania, watching the fog lift off the Alps in Switzerland, riding in a 1950s convertible in Havana, waiting for boats to come and go from the Norwegian fjords, discovering the magic of Singaporean street food…awe at every turn.
I fell a little behind my country goal during the pandemic, so I found a very efficient way to get ahead again. All I needed to do was run seven marathons on seven continents in a single week.
To be clear, I have no business being a runner in general. Before that first marathon, I ran for one of two reasons: to chase the Link because of my poor time management skills, or to make it into St. Joe without a coat in January (IYKYK).
I ran one year of JV track in high school, but I was so bad, the coach never bothered to learn my name.
But once I realized that both endurance running and travel produce that magic, awe-struck bliss that can only come from novelty and discomfort, I was hooked.
That’s how, in November 2024, I found myself sitting on a charter plane. On my left sat my sister-in-law, an actual athlete whose high school and college coaches definitely knew her name. On my right sat my favorite Peloton instructor, known for her brutal running classes.
The four women assigned the seats closest to us were world-record-holders, Olympians or both. We were taking on the Great World Race, an endurance challenge so absurd that the language on the waivers was tantamount to, “You WILL die, and it’s not our fault.”
I didn’t belong there. There is no reason I should be one of only 130 women to have run a marathon on all seven continents, let alone in under seven days.
But you can’t belong anywhere you don’t go. So I went. And I ran.
• We ran 26.2 miles across a frozen ocean in Antarctica.
• A few hours later, we ran 26.2 more alongside the crashing ocean waves in Cape Town, South Africa.
• The next day, we ran 26.2 miles into a stunning sunset in Perth, Australia.
• The following night, we spent 26.2 miles weaving between very determined fishermen at 2 a.m. on the European side of the Bosporus Strait in Istanbul.
• The next morning, we ran 26.2 miles among hundreds of well-cared-for cats on the Asian side of the Bosporus Strait.
• The day after that, we slogged through 26.2 miles amid a 110-degree heat index in Cartagena, Colombia.
• And on the final day, we celebrated for 26.2 miles as we soaked up the energy of a wildly supportive crowd along the beach in Miami.
I finished all seven marathons with a silly, elated grin on my face. I did Justin Jefferson’s “griddy” across the final finish line in Miami, just to embarrass my sons. (Sorry, guys.) I emerged unscathed, aside from a small scar from the highly venomous spider bite I got somewhere between Australia and Turkey. (It hadn’t even occurred to my mom to worry about that.)
I keep getting the question, “Why?” I’d planned to wait until I was an empty nester to take on something of this scale. But I’ve been diagnosed with a connective tissue disorder, and I don’t know what my body will be able to do by then. And my sweet father started sliding toward what would eventually be Alzheimer’s Disease in his 50s. So, the time had to be now.
Experiencing all seven continents in under a week made the world feel smaller, in the best way possible. I’m keenly aware of the tremendous privilege inherent in getting to take on something like this, and I wish I could sprinkle some of that true awe on everyone reading this.
For me, the sense of awe hasn’t waned yet. I hope it never does. And with the lifelong friends I made during the race, I now have couches I can crash on all over the world. Maybe you want to come with me?
