Robert Garside — The First Man to Run Around the World

Greenpeace Japan announced Garside's departure from Cape Noshappu near Wakkanai for a north-to-south crossing of Japan. Its contemporary release gives this stage unusually strong place-and-date documentation within a journey later argued over in public.

Osaka marked the end of Garside's Japanese leg in later route reconstructions. From here he flew to Perth, keeping ocean transfers separate from the running mileage.

Garside began the Nullarbor section from Balladonia. Critics argued that its heat, isolation and widely separated water points made his reported pace impossible; the later Runner's World re-investigation found that help from passing motorists could make his improvised water strategy workable.

Ceduna was the claimed end of the Nullarbor crossing less than four weeks after Balladonia. That speed became a central exhibit against Garside, making this not simply a milestone but the place where the run's achievement and its credibility became inseparable.

After crossing southern Australia from Perth, Garside reached Sydney and prepared for the Americas. A flight carried him to Chile; the running story resumed at the far south of the continent.

Punta Arenas became the southern anchor of a long, irregular northbound run through the Americas. The route was not a straight meridian: Garside zigzagged through South America before continuing through Central America, Mexico and the United States.

In Caracas, Garside changed both his personal life and his route: he met Endrina Perez, later his wife, and abandoned a planned passage through Colombia amid security concerns. He flew to Panama and resumed northward, an explicit discontinuity rather than a hidden claim of continuous footsteps.

Television crews recorded Garside crossing from Mexico into Southern California. Public documentation became especially important here: by then ultrarunning critics were actively challenging his records, methods and credibility.

With borders tightening after the September 11 attacks and money running out, Garside abandoned his preferred long African plan, flew to Morocco and crossed the Strait of Gibraltar. Guinness's criteria did not require him to run the full length of every continent, so he continued east along Mediterranean Europe.

Antalya ended a Mediterranean run through southern Europe, Italy, Greece and Turkey. Garside still wanted an African traverse, although it was voluntary under the record rules, and flew next to Egypt to try again.

After failed attempts from Egypt and Eritrea, Garside returned to the Mozambique–Malawi area and ran southeast to Beira. This allowed his African sections to form a transcontinental line on his map, even though they had not been completed as one continuous chronological leg.

Garside flew from Beira to India and travelled to Kanyakumari, the country's southern tip. From there he began the final running leg north through India toward the monument where the recognized attempt had started.