Along with the up-coming 11th year of running of Mario, it’d been the third time for him to attend the SUPERACE ultramarathon, Taiwan station. Except for running, he has joined also Spartan Races, road bike races, triathlon races, etc. He’s a sports lover, enthusiasm who is addicted to training, passionate in challenging, just like a real version of the Super Mario bros.

Mario and his wife, who also attends triathlon, are the best sports mates. They’ve joined triathlons, marathons and also the 2016 SUPERACE Taiwan station altogether. This year, he brought on the group called “噗嚨貢愚婦”(Pu-long-gong-yu-fu) composited by his friends to run together. The truth is, they’ve spent 3 years to team up, and finally, this is the time! Surprisingly some of the members are girls that have never run an ultramarathon before! How brave of them!

The goal of Mario in his first time joining the SUPERACE was to bring his wife to the end; at the second time, his ranking was only 5 minutes away from the 3rd place. In order to further advance this time, he had done many trail run trainings. “Keeping the willpower is the most difficult.” He said. “Especially when you run alone and feel lonely. But when you get used to the long distance, and way it is. A sense of ‘not-giving-up’ would appear and grow.” Also, with the supports from his wife and friends, Mario gets closer and closer to the finish line.

“Why do you sign up the SUPERACE Taiwan station for 3 years in a row?” We asked him. The course is challenging, the great medical group and passionate volunteers make the race really worthy. Maybe for many people, they rather use the bunch of money for signing up and the running gears for traveling abroad; but for him, challenging himself and go beyond the limit is much more meaningful than that.

Both good ranking and good performance require sufficient self-training or the equipment input. How does Mario pick his racing gears?

“Comfortable is especially important in long-distance run. “He said. “I’ve seen my friends ran till bleeding. Therefore, not just consider about the suitability for yourself, for running that can help you run faster, you also have to think about if it’s comfortable enough.”

For a runner who love racing like Mario, pursuing good ranking was his top goal in his young ages; but while he got mature and got married now, family is more important than anything in the world. He rather wakes up early in the morning for running, than sacrifice the time for his family.

We truly felt the love of Mario for his wife during the interview. We expect to see Mario again next year joining the SUPERACE Taiwan station with his wife together!