Helen Ryvar goes through the same routine every night.
She checks the weather forecast, lays out her running clothes, puts her running shoes by the front door, charges her cell phone and flashlight, and sets the alarm for 4 a.m.
The following morning, she’s out of the door by 4:15 a.m.—rain or shine.
“I’m just an ordinary person doing extraordinary things,” said Ms. Ryvar, a single mother of three who runs her own cleaning business in normal daytime hours and pounds the streets, paths, and trails of North Wales, UK, at a time when the rest of the world would typically be asleep.
The 43-year-old took up running in 2020, just before Britain went into pandemic lockdown and after being told her ex-husband had died following a mental health battle.
Four years later, she is a world record holder for consecutive half-marathons—her day-on-day tally, featured in the Guinness World Records book, reached 743 this past weekend. She’s an inspiration to many as she continues to raise money for different charities.
“The runs have become the easy part—it’s juggling life that has become the daily ongoing task,” said Ms. Ryvar, who has a 17-year-old and 15-year-old twins.
Ms. Ryvar calls herself a “mediocre runner” and says that at school she was never really into sports. Even now, she doesn’t have all the latest running gear, doesn’t follow any special diet—just three balanced meals a day—and doesn’t really care about her speed when she runs.
It is more about building a strong mindset and getting to know her body.
“I found doing it every day, you just get used to it,” she said. “Your body and mind just get used to the routine, and you turn off that pity party that you had with yourself and get on with it.
“It is just flicking that switch in your head and say, ‘We’re doing this.’”
The essential elements of Ms. Ryvar’s strategy are:
1. Running at the same time every day—in her case, before her kids wake up.
2. Fitting some sort of exercise somewhere into the structure of your daily schedule. Essentially, “not giving yourself a chance to mess up,” as she puts it.
And, experts seem to agree.
“The key is to find some protected time, so it is just part of the routine,” said Dr. Michael J. Joyner, an expert on human performance and exercise at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. “This is why many habitual exercisers go first thing in the morning.”
In nearly two years of running a half-marathon each day, Ms. Ryvar says she has only had one injury—and that was when she changed running shoes, which triggered an old glute injury.
She has three simple pieces of advice for those who are interested in following her lifestyle:
1. Drink plenty of water.
2. Have a balanced diet and early nights.
3. Try out magnesium salt baths. “They are key,” she said. “When I don’t have them, I notice.”
Dr. Joyner said the main risks of an exercise workload such as Ms. Ryvar’s are orthopedic aches and pains and more severe things like stress fractures.
“So you have to build light days into your program,” he advised. “Usually, light days are about less total distance, but they can also be about a less intense effort.”
However, for Ms. Ryvar the most important thing has been learning to understand her own body and staying active, even if that means simply walking down the street on a regular basis.
“Keep accountable somehow—you’ll build up confidence in yourself and you’ll want to push more,” she said. “Form a habit. If you’re not comfortable doing it by yourself, join a group. There are loads of Facebook groups or join a park run. Sign up for a race and commit. When you have a goal, it makes a massive difference.”
Ms. Ryvar’s goal is to reach 1,000 consecutive half-marathons, which would be a feat considering the previous record for officially timed half-marathons was 75. She believes she'll be able to achieve that milestone by Jan. 24, 2025—a date she has circled on her calendar.
In the meantime, she is just happy to have that “nice fuzzy feeling inside” whenever she goes running and to be changing people’s lives with the money she raises for Cancer Research UK and a local charity in Wrexham, Nightingale House Hospice.
Her hobby is also allowing her to see the world, she’s taken trips in recent months to Jordan, Miami, Turkey, and Malta—where she made it to national television.
“I’m definitely riding a wave and getting a lot of support,” Ms. Ryvar said “It’s something you can’t buy. It’s such a sense of satisfaction.”
