Fattest Man Ever to Run a Marathon

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/sport/athletics/american-sumo-a-marathon-heavyweight/story-e6frfgkx-1226024431470


Marathon monster: Sumo champ Kelly Gneiting, right, a 420-pound sumo wrestler, aims to become the heaviest marathon runner. Source: AP

Kelly Gneiting to go the distance
Herald-Sun
March 19, 2011

HE'S a sumo wrestler who proudly calls himself the Fat Man.

Clocking in at 405 pounds (184kg), Kelly Gneiting aims to enter the record books at Sunday's Los Angeles marathon as the heaviest competitor in history to go the distance.

"Big people," he says, "can do the unimaginable."

Gneiting, a three-time US national champion sumo wrestler, is six foot tall (182cm) with a five-foot (150cm) waist. Stamina is certainly a strong suit: the eastern Idaho native once ate eight Big Macs at a single sitting.

"In high school, I was 190 pounds (86kg), so I know what it is to be thin," he says.

"I married my wife at 205 pounds (92kg). Suddenly, jeez, I didn't need to attract anyone. I just kind of let myself go. "

Running 26.2 miles (42.1km) was an aspiration of Gneiting since grade school.

He actually achieved the feat at the 2008 Los Angeles marathon although the 12-hour ordeal left his feet purple with bruises - and worst of all, he failed to notify the record-keepers beforehand.

This time, he will lumber onto a weight scale just before the starter's gun and need photographic evidence and confirmation from race officials to satisfy the Guinness Book of Records that he has finished.

After that, his goal is to swim the English Channel and hike from the Dead Sea to Mt. Everest.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/19/kelly-gneiting-ex-sumo-wrestler_n_837967.html

Kelly Gneiting, Ex-Sumo Wrestler, Will Run The LA Marathon

Huffington Post
Posted: 03/19/11

A 405-pound ex-sumo wrestler has vowed to run the Los Angeles marathon on Sunday, which will earn him a place in the Guinness Book of World Records--if he finishes.

Kelly Gneiting of northeastern Arizona won three sumo wrestling National Championship titles in the US between 2005 and 2007, and even competed in Japan in 2006, where he placed 5th place in the World Sumo Championship.

But now he plans to conquer the challenge of marathon running.

"I honestly think I'm one of the best athletes in the world," he told the LA Times.

Gneiting finished the LA Marathon in 2008 in 11 hours and 52 minutes, but was not credited by Guinness since he was not weighed directly before and after the race, as Guinness requires, reports CBS Los Angeles.

Gneiting lives on a Navajo reservation in Arizona and has a waist that measures 60 inches. He worked previously as a long-haul trucker, but lost his job after an accident last November.

The LA Times reports that Gneiting's eating habits took off after he married his wife, Karen:

"I married my wife at 205 pounds," he says..."Suddenly, jeez, I didn't need to attract anyone. I kind of let myself go."

When the married couple landed in financial trouble, Gneiting found that eating made him feel better. But his weight made it tough to get a job, according to the LA Times:

"I would apply to jobs and people would see me and it was like they were wondering, 'Do we really want this monster walking around the office all day?' " he says. "Some people were just really shallow."

Gneiting was raised in eastern Idaho by his mother and his father, who was a banker, before going on a two year Mormon mission and enrolling in Ricks College, where he joined the wrestling team.

But his dreams go beyond running Sunday's marathon. One day, Gneiting promises, he will swim the English Channel, and he also has plans to hike from the Dead Sea to Mount Everest (a route that would take him through both Iran and Iraq.)

"Big people can do the unimaginable," he says.

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/sports_blog/2011/03/la-marathon-its-official-kelly-gneiting-sets-guiness-world-record-as-heaviest-man-.html

L.A. Marathon: It's official, Kelly Gneiting sets Guinness World Record as heaviest man to finish
By Melissa Rohlin
LA Times
20 March 2011

Kelly Gneiting, a 400-pound sumo wrestler, set a Guinness World Record as the heaviest man to complete a marathon, after finishing on Sunday in 9 hours 48 minutes 52 seconds.

Gneiting weighed 396.2 pounds after the marathon, smashing the past world record of 275 pounds and beating his 2008 marathon time of 11:52:11.

"I'd like to see the Kenyan improve his marathon time by two hours," he joked.

Gneiting jogged the first eight miles and walked the final 18, saying afterward that he lost track of where he was after mile 10 because he felt delirious.

Gneiting said he realized that he was at mile 15 only because his friend met him there with clean socks.

He finished the 26.2-mile race despite heavy rains and strong winds. For much of the race, he was also forced to obey traffic signals and walk on the sidewalk because he was walking far more slowly than the 13-minute-per-mile-pace used for calculating street reopenings.

"I was really struggling in the last five miles," he said, "but I said to myself, 'If I have to crawl, I will.'"