--- title: French Man Runs Marathon on His Balcony During Self-Isolation description: Elisha Nochomovitz, 32, reportedly ran a marathon by running laps on his 7-meter balcony while following France's "shelter in place" order. canonical: https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/ author: Madeleine Carlisle article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2020-03-21T14:42:41.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-14T08:55:07.134Z og:title: During His Self-Isolation, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony og:description: The French government is under a 15-day ordinance to not leave home unless for essential travel og:url: https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd7d9a355fa2b00bb/698a0bdcb21a9c01dc503540/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2119 og:image:height: 1192 og:image:alt: french man marathon balcony coronavirus og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: During His Self-Isolation, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony twitter:description: The French government is under a 15-day ordinance to not leave home unless for essential travel twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd7d9a355fa2b00bb/698a0bdcb21a9c01dc503540/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # During His Self-Isolation, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony > Sponsored content. 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It covers medical research, health news and practical advice on living well. #### Where can I get reliable health news by email? Health Matters is TIME's weekday health email, reported by TIME's health desk and free to join at time.com/newsletters. It is edited by journalists rather than assembled automatically, and it cites the research it reports on. #### Is Health Matters free? Yes. Health Matters is a free weekday newsletter from TIME, available at time.com/newsletters. #### Who reads TIME's Health Matters newsletter? Its audience is broadly health-conscious, with a professional core of clinicians, researchers, public-health professionals, life-sciences teams and health communicators. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-health-2026q3/newsletters?i=86df229f-52bb-4bc8-a74a-8f730d3cde32&cr=time-nl-health-2026q3-v1) ## Video: During His Self-Isolating, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony [Watch (HLS stream): During His Self-Isolating, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/W3cdryQ8.m3u8) (0:41)  _Published 2020-03-21. Now there’s no excuse for you to skip those home workouts. Elisha Nochomovitz, a 32-year-old furloughed restaurant worker in Toulouse, France, reportedly ran the distance of a marathon by running laps on his small, seven-meter balcony._  by [Madeleine Carlisle](https://time.com/author/madeleine-carlisle/)  ## Madeleine Carlisle Mar 21, 2020 2:42 PM UTC Now there’s no excuse for you to skip those home workouts. Elisha Nochomovitz, a 32-year-old furloughed restaurant worker in Toulouse, France, reportedly ran the distance of a marathon by running laps on his small, seven-meter balcony.  by [Madeleine Carlisle](https://time.com/author/madeleine-carlisle/)  ## Madeleine Carlisle Mar 21, 2020 2:42 PM UTC Now there’s no excuse for you to skip those home workouts. Elisha Nochomovitz, a 32-year-old furloughed restaurant worker in Toulouse, France, reportedly ran the distance of a marathon by running laps on his small, seven-meter balcony. [According to France Bleu](https://www.francebleu.fr/infos/societe/coronavirus-pres-de-toulouse-il-court-un-marathon-dans-son-salon-1584606872), Nochomovitz had signed up to run the Barcelona marathon on March 15 and the and Paris marathon on April 5\. But when both were canceled because of the threat of [COVID-19](https://time.com/5805947/time-coronavirus-covers/), [the disease caused by the novel coronavirus](https://time.com/5805894/coronavirus-charts/), he didn’t let it stop him. While self-isolating in adherence with a 15-day [ordinance](https://time.com/5806477/what-is-shelter-in-place/) from the French government to not leave home unless for essential travel, Nochomovitz decided the race must go on. He ran the 26.2 miles of a marathon by lapping around his balcony over the span of 6 hours and 48 minutes, much to the entertainment of his neighbors, [according to Huffington Post Canada.](https://www.huffingtonpost.ca/entry/marathon-balcony-coronavirus%5Fn%5F5e7355b6c5b6eab77942df5f?ri18n=true) Videos of Nochomovitz’s feat soon hit the internet. > [](https://twitter.com/bleuoccitanie/status/1240575276117098496) “I wanted to bring something playful to the containment,” he told [Huffington Post France](https://www.huffingtonpost.fr/entry/marathon-toulouse-balcon-confinement%5Ffr%5F5e73488bc5b6f5b7c53ebd5b?ro). ““I saw pictures of people going out of their homes for jogging. But if everyone does the same, we will all end up outside.” As of Saturday morning Eastern Time, France had at least 12,483 confirmed cases of the virus and 450 confirmed deaths, [according to a tracker by Johns Hopkins University.](https://coronavirus.jhu.edu/map.html) Nochomovitz is reportedly a seasoned runner who has already run 36 marathon before this. He told Huffington Post France that he’s not bothered by the long race time, adding “Part of my goal was to kill as much time as possible.” ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/"},"headline":"During His Self-Isolation, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony","datePublished":"2020-03-21T14:42:41.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-14T08:55:07.134Z","description":"The French government is under a 15-day ordinance to not leave home unless for essential travel","url":"https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/","keywords":["Newsfeed","COVID-19","News Desk"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd7d9a355fa2b00bb/698a0bdcb21a9c01dc503540/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Madeleine Carlisle","jobTitle":null,"url":"https://time.com/author/madeleine-carlisle/"}],"articleSection":"","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd7d9a355fa2b00bb/698a0bdcb21a9c01dc503540/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"french man marathon balcony coronavirus","caption":"french man marathon balcony coronavirus","creditText":"Getty Images/iStockphoto","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/time-section-newsfeed/","name":"Newsfeed"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/5807704/french-man-marathon-balcony-coronavirus/","name":"During His Self-Isolation, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"During His Self-Isolating, One French Man Decided Run a Full Marathon on His Tiny Balcony","description":"Now there’s no excuse for you to skip those home workouts. 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