In partnership with

I’ve been travelling recently, this time for pleasure rather than work, so rather than a fully-fledged newsletter, this week I’ve got an update on my recent piece about Phil Gore and Project 168.

In case you’re new here, Phil is the backyard ultra (BYU) GOAT I wrote about after he ran more than 1,000k following the BYU formula of 6.7k per hour every hour on the hour back in August.

This wasn’t a formal backyard. Phil holds the world record for the format at 119 yards - that’s 119 consecutive hours running 6.7k. In an official race, the event ends when only one runner is left standing.

Even if that person is willing and able to keep running, there’s no-one to compete against, so the event is declared over and the last runner remaining is the winner.

Phil was fresh as a daisy when he set that world record at the Dead Cow Gully event in Queensland in 2025, which left him wondering how far he could go.

That thought led to Project 168 - Phil’s attempt to run for 168 hours, a full week, as a solo runner following the BYU rules. He made it a fundraiser for Telethon which raises money for kids living with illness, disability and disadvantage in WA, Phil’s home state.

Phil didn’t reach his target. But he did complete a jaw-dropping 152 loops before he reached his limit. That’s more than 1,000k across more than six days. In the end he couldn’t go on - a pain in his hip proved too much to handle. He’s also raised almost $300,000, which is just as jaw-dropping.

Unplanned hospital tour

Things haven’t exactly gone smoothly for Phil since then. The sore hip that left him hobbling like Pegleg the Pirate towards the end of Project 168 ended up landing him in hospital.

He was dianosed with a hematoma, which is essentially a bloody big, painful bruise - a localised pool of clotted or partially clotted blood that collects under the skin and is usually the most dramatic purple colour.

The doctors initially said this should resolve itself, so Phil headed home. But he didn’t feel right so he sought a second opinion from a sports doctor who, in attempting to aspirate the hematoma, discovered it was [weak stomach warning] pus rather than blood collected under the skin.

This meant an infection and a return to hospital for surgery to clean it out. Understandably, he hasn’t run since.

Phil’s done a couple of podcasts in the intervening period. It says a lot about his mentality that he’s found the positive in all this. In late September he told Zach Bitter’s Human Performance Outliers podcast he wouldn’t change anything.

“I always knew coming into it that I could run until I break myself, which is what I’ve done,” he says. “We go into these events because we want to find out what we can do. Sometimes there’s a price to pay for what we can do, but that’s all right.”

He has no regrets. “It just shows that I left it all out there. I can be satisfied knowing I pushed it to my absolute limit. I’m not sitting here thinking, ‘Well, maybe I could have got to 160.’

“I was like, ‘Well no. I had this infected hematoma. There’s no way I was going to get there.’”

What he’s basically saying is he’s glad he has evidence he didn’t wimp out. Hardly surprising given his leg was growing a pus-filled abscess. No wonder he’s on a different level!

Upcoming Events

There are way too many events for me to list everything that’s happening around the country, but here is a selection of upcoming races (with a bias towards South East Queensland).

The Running Calendar website is a great source if you want a comprehensive understanding of what’s available around the country.