Lance Siebler has run dozens of marathons in his life — almost all of them in Portland.
The certified accountant from Tigard, Oregon, will be one of nearly 10,000 participants in this year’s Portland Marathon on Sunday. He’s run in every version of the race since 1986.
It began as a way to bond with his father, himself a marathon runner, and the pair participated in Siebler’s first few races together.
“(Running) made him a lot happier and healthier, and it was kind of a labor or love,” Siebler said. “Once you start running regularly and then don’t, you start to miss it.”
Lance Siebler running in the Portland Marathon in 1988. He has participated in every race since 1986.
Courtesy of Lance Siebler
Soon, it became an obsession of his own. He trained around the clock, estimating that at one point he spent 3% of his time in the late 1980s running. His best times at the Portland Marathon timed in under three hours.
“I found it addictive enough to keep coming back year after year,” he said.
Over the years, the marathon became less about his finishing time and more about continuing his decades-long streak. Siebler would spend time with other longtime marathon runners, and realized no one else had completed as many consecutive races as him.
“I’ve heard from the marathon committee that there is somebody who claims to have completed every Portland marathon going back farther than myself,” he said. “I’d like to think that I hold the record. I’ve got pretty much everything I need to prove that.”
That includes medals, shirts and certificates from every race he’s finished.
He doesn’t train as rigorously as he used to. His finishing times are closer to six hours total, and he now walks parts of the course.
Some years, Siebler wouldn’t train at all between marathons, and pay the price with sore feet afterwards.
“There are a lot of people out there that did a whole lot more training than I did,” he said. “So I kind of feel like an imposter out there sometimes.”
But he has no plans of stopping anytime soon. He plans on completing 50 consecutive marathons in his lifetime by the year 2036 — when he’s well into his 70s.
And what advice does Siebler have for aspiring marathon runners? Start slow, he says, and work your way to averaging 10 miles per run. Once you master that, the other 16 miles become a lot easier.