Photo: Julian Herzog via Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped. This adapted image is also licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.

Damian Hall Wins the Northern Traverse and Lakeland 100 in the Same Year

The vegan ultrarunner, 49, wins the Lake District's 105-mile classic at his first attempt

Damian Hall has won the Montane Lakeland 100 in 19 hours, 33 minutes and 33 seconds, finishing on Saturday, July 26, 2025. It is his first time running the race, and he won by just over 30 minutes, Plant Based News reports.

The route covers more than 105 miles of Lake District fells and valleys with over 6,500 meters of climbing. Of the 721 who started this year, only 460 made it to the finish.

It completes a remarkable double. In April, Hall won the Northern Traverse, a 300km (186-mile) run across three national parks. He finished in 42:56:50, smashed the old course record of 44:24 and won by more than four and a half hours, Great Vegan Athletes reported.

He was typically understated about the Lakeland win:

I'm really chuffed with that. At 49, I cherish the fact I'm still able to be competitive at the UK's premier ultramarathons. Worked hard for it. But what a cracking event.

Hall went vegan after learning about the environmental impact of animal agriculture, and he co-founded The Green Runners to push the sport in a greener direction. He has always been clear that the records are a means to an end. "For each of those records I did them without animal products fuelling me. Also without creating any plastic waste, which is much more difficult actually," he said in 2021. Nearly 20 hours over the fells at 49, fueled by plants, says plenty about recovery.

Hall has been one of our favorite stories for years. In 2020 he smashed the Pennine Way record, 268 miles in 61.5 hours, the following year he broke a 30-year-old coast-to-coast record, and in 2023 he won the Winter Spine Race.