How long does it take to run all the way around the world? It’s a 25,000-mile trip, so can you guess? Weeks? Months? Years? Kevin Carr of England ran around Earth in an amazing 621 days! (One year has 365 days.) The question is, what would be the absolute fastest time if a person could run without stopping? Remember, Kevin had to sleep, eat, and rest his feet. As we’ll find out below, skipping those would save a lot of time.
Lace up: If you run 4 miles and your dog runs 1 mile farther, how far does your dog run?
Jog: If you run 2 miles from home to the park, then 3 miles more to the ice cream shop, and finally 4 more miles home, how many miles do you run?
Sprint: If you’re trying to run 20 miles in 1 week and you’ve run 3 miles on each weekday – Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday – how many more miles do you need to run to reach 20?
Hurdle: If you could run 10 miles an hour for a whole 24-hour day, how many miles would you cover?
High Jump: If you could somehow run 10 miles every hour of the 24-hour day and never need to rest, *about* how many days would it take to run the 25,000 miles around our planet? Round your answer to the nearest tens place!
Pole Vault: If Kevin finished this 621-day run in April 2015, in about what month and year did he start? (You can assume 30 days per month, and count from end of April so the 21 days beyond 600 don’t carry you over another month).
Answers:
Lace up: 5 miles.
Jog: 9 miles.
Sprint: 5 more miles, because the weekday runs add up to 15, and 20 – 15 = 5.
Hurdle: 240 miles.
High Jump: About 100 days
Pole Vault: In August 2013. He took about 20 months from the beginning of April. 12 months takes us to the previous early April, in 2014, and 8 months before that brings us to the previous August.
