The Shrine

This is Cactus, a Moroccan runner who completed the grueling Marathon des Sables through the Sahara Desert earlier this week. He is talented and he is also a dog.



Cactus linked up with the race after Sunday’s opening 20-mile stage, sticking around for the next four stages and 120 miles of running. The Marathon des Sables is a famously difficult race, where competitors have to run an average of 23.5 miles per day for five days straight through the sand, sun, and wind of the unforgiving Sahara of southern Morocco.

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While the nearly 800 human runners were given 31 hours to complete Wednesday’s ultralong stage, Cactus needed only about 11 hours 15 minutes, some of it in a sandstorm, which would have put him 76th in the stage results. Then he ran a couple of extra miles to cool down.

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Cactus, who was eventually given his own tracking number and official race profile, finished the race yesterday and received a finisher’s medal.