Another run across America underway - is it legit? Boots currently on the ground

Certainly an extra thing to think about and strikes one as a little convoluted. And all the talk about 400 lap days instantly out the window. Those laps in lane 8 will feel onerous.

Someone somewhere has thought it a good idea to start him off on 1:57 laps, and 3:22 marathon pace. 1.01.30 for the first 12.8k 'super' lap.

He should be finished inside 7 days.

Can’t wait for the dissection of this newly announced record attempt across Australia.

Awaiting the Will Cockerell analysis!

gonna be interesting to see how he goes across the nullarbor where there will be barely any support

He'll have a lot of very well paid support. Will have zero issues here.

Ambitious goal, but highly questionable. Reducing the record to 40 days at 75 miles daily seems unrealistic, yet skepticism is met with hostility. The fundraising keeps growing, and sponsors flock to the hype. Definitely one to watch!

I see Goodge has decided on a run across Japan in a week first as a "warm up" to his Oz run.

Maybe you can follow that one and let us know how the data works out?

Yes, it's an orgy of stats he is presenting us with, and ones from which he simply can't hide going into TrausAus.

His fade on Day 2 is pretty disastrous, 12:30 has become 14:03. It really shouldn't be this much of a grind to put together 67 mile days for a runner supposedly in the upper echelons.

His pulse has been perfect, no worries about honesty, but he simply can't find any pace now. He broke 6 minutes for the K 36 times on day 1, but just 9 on day 2.

If we compare 80-90 k on days 1 and 2, with Transcon on, say, day 39, we can clearly see the gratuitous, disgusting cheat that went down.

Osaka day 1 80-90 1:06 HR 130
Osaka day 2 80-90 1:12 HR 120
Transcon day 39 80-90 1:04 HR 111

So there it is - we're being asked to believe that he's defeating himself on day 39 on a Transcon for 80-90k vs day 1 of a simple 5 day challenge, with an HR some 20 bpm lower! And he's ripping 8 minutes out of himself compared to Osaka day 2 with a pulse of 111 vs 120.

All unthinkable of course and unprecedented in the history of the sport.

And it goes without saying these stats will only exacerbate as this run progresses. Will review it at the end.

WG Osaka to Tokyo report:

In short a mediocre, wan performance, which got worse and worse with a notable collapse on days 3 and 4, plus the classic complete crash of heart rate to 79-100bpm for over 60k on day 4. Whenever he has collapsed in the last 6 years, his heart has always, without fail, crashed like this. [But never, ever, does in his training or normal racing].

A small resurgence on day 5, but loads of fast running at 100-105 bpm, before he ran the last 15-20k back at 130bpm - funny that.

As ever, no rhyme or reason to his heart rate whatsoever. The only common factor and one you can always rely on [for Balenger at his Transcon, and WGs Jogle, 48/30, Transcon, Moab and now here] is when he gets tired, he doesn't have a human pulse.

To show just how badly he struggled in this, and how 67 mpd across Australia is such a ludicrous pipe-dream, these are his 40-80k splits on the first four days: 4:18, 4:36, 4:50, 5:18. It tells us all we need to know about how badly he struggles and fades, but he wants us all to believe that somehow at Moab, after an appalling first half, he somehow "found his legs" and zoomed from 32nd to 5th in the race, whilst also magically reducing his heart by 20bpm.

On day 5 here the high pulses are intertwined with an electrifying world class sequence in the middle of the day [39-46k] with physiologically impossible running like this:

6:29 105 bpm
6:59 106 bpm
6:17 109 bpm
6:12 105 bpm
6:15 107 bpm
6:01 105 bpm
6:18 105 bpm
6:35 101 bpm

Plenty of these miles were climbing and it's overall flat. No one in history has run so quick on a multiday on such a low pulse. If so, who?

This is an excerpt from Pete Kostelnick's Transcon's world record and how data is supposed to look:

5:52 138 bpm
6:55 138 bpm
6:10 135 bpm
5:57 138 bpm
5:32 137 bpm
6:04 132 bpm
5:41 135 bpm
7:49 129 bpm

On day 2 for WGs Osaka to Tokyo, a similar section looks like this:

6:36 135 bpm
6:21 126 bpm
7:46 127 bpm
6:28 126 bpm
7:18 127 bpm
6:17 124 bpm
6:43 121 bpm
7:00 122 bpm
8:07 111 bpm

As you can see, roughly speaking he is running a minute quicker for a pulse 20bpm lower. Ie 7:18 at 127 becomes 6:01 at 105 three days later. How on earth?

Anyway, the trip [which has clearly cost tens of thousands of dollars], will be portrayed as a roaring success, despite the actual athletics being wan, defensive and highly mediocre, with inter-galactic data anomalies. And crucially, the disgusting lie that he is, or will be, "the fastest human ever to ever cross Australia", has been massively exposed. Days of 67, 68, 65, 59 and 55 tell us nothing except that this is a bog-standard midpacker. Proper runners would have done 115, 88 & 103 and got out of there two days earlier. It's only a 310 mile challenge for goodness sake.

But his new big sponsors Cadence will be ecstatic, and ruse that this guy is somehow a good a notable and accomplished multidayer just rumbles on. Next stop Perth. Watch out for those accelerations when he gets tired off a collapsed heart rate.

As expected, this is the usual Will Cockerell drivel—completely unable to
actually analyse data, heavily biased, and at this point, clearly a personal
attack and vendetta against Will Goodge. Just so this doesn’t turn into a
Cockerell echo chamber, let’s take a neutral approach, break down his so-called
analysis, and give Goodge some well-deserved credit. The reality is, Cockerell
has no stake in this, no real experience in multi-day racing, and yet continues
to spout opinions as if he’s some kind of authority.

This critique is riddled with emotionally charged language, making it obvious
that it’s not an objective assessment but an attempt to discredit Goodge.
Describing his effort as "wank, defensive, and highly mediocre", or
calling him a "bog-standard midpacker", shows that this isn’t about
fair analysis—it’s about tearing someone down.

The claims about his heart rate being "physiologically impossible"
lack any actual evidence. Elite endurance athletes often have highly efficient
cardiovascular function, and HR variability is influenced by numerous
factors—fatigue, hydration, temperature, elevation, and individual physiology.
A lower HR at a faster pace isn’t suspicious; it’s often a sign of aerobic
efficiency. The comparison to Pete Kostelnick’s Transcon record is meaningless. Every
athlete has different pacing strategies, physiological responses, and
adaptation patterns. Expecting Goodge’s HR and pacing to mirror Kostelnick’s is
unrealistic and ignores the uniqueness of ultra-endurance events.

The suggestion that struggling early means someone can’t recover later is just
nonsense. Ultra-endurance events are unpredictable, and we’ve seen countless
examples of runners going through rough patches before bouncing back strong.
Finding a second wind after fatigue isn’t magic—it’s how endurance racing
works.

Cockerell also conveniently ignores key factors like terrain, weather, surface type, and fuelling, all of which drastically impact pace and HR. Selectively picking sections of data without considering these variables is misleading and deliberately distorts the narrative.
The idea that this run proves a Trans-Australia attempt is a "ludicrous pipe dream" is just another baseless claim. Athletes refine strategies, adapt, and improve. Writing off future attempts based on selective data is premature and short-sighted.

And of course, the unnecessary jabs at sponsorships. The comment about Cadence being "ecstatic" implies that marketing success somehow invalidates athletic performance. Sponsorship is a crucial part of professional endurance sports, and bringing it up as a criticism is just grasping at straws.

At the end of the day, this isn’t analysis—it’s an agenda.
Instead of cherry-picking data to fit a negative narrative, a more balanced
perspective would acknowledge Goodge’s endurance, the scale of the challenge,
and the reality of multi-day racing. Not every performance needs to be a world
record to be an impressive achievement.

He is claiming over all his literature, to be that fastest human ever to cross Australia, with zero evidence that it's possible.

It's all there on his Strava. 6 minute Ks at 130bpm, becoming 6 min Ks at 105 later in the piece. How? You provide no explanation.

To say that WG lowers his HR at a faster pace is because he is aerobically efficient, is the most pathetic bile of ignorant nonsense seen on these 200 pages. Even Goodge, Balenger and Roll say it's because Coros and Garmin make equipment that doesn't work. Right there you are contradicting the party line and saying Goodge is a freak of nature and the ONLY person in human history whose heart declines as he accelerates. Name another. We'll wait.

Are me and many like me angry that these influencers claim they're amazing when they're not? Of course. But we can clearly see this effort was a pretty major crash and burn and just as he got into big trouble, by the end of day 3, boom, the heart collapses to 100 on day 4. And not a shred of explanation, just that I have an "agenda".

I didn't call him wank, I called him wan. A perfectly apt description for a sub 60 mile day on a very short challenge. He is saying he's going to take 10% out of Turnbull on ZERO evidence, and you're just saying, "oooohh, you never know, maybe he is special," and maybe he operates at an HR of 105 and Kostelnick at 130. But we know, clearly, from the other 1,200 runs in his career that WG has an incredibly high, rock steady, pulsing jugular. But yet again you just ignore.

Show us the Whoop from Transcon. Show us how he possibly runs 1:32 for 15k stretches post 40 miles, on day 41 of a transcon, off an HR of 120. Never seen before. Nobody runs 60 mile splits for Moab of 17 27 15 24. Totally berserk. And the 15 hour stretch doesn't have a pulse. I call it out, and you say it's a personal agenda. But offer no defence, and certainly no precedent to a split like that occurring in running history - if so, where is it?

It's just the same old rubbish about "finding his legs".

Will Cockerell is probably right about everything.

I think I have run across America with the current Trans Australia record holder and I have run across Australia too. In summer by the way.

There is no way that Goodge has the ability to run 67 miles per day through Australia. And that nice exposure from Will at the Moab240 showed us that the only thing Goodge is good at is cheating.