How Mench Dizon conquered 7 world marathons in 7 days while juggling motherhood, her tech career
Mench Dizon made history by completing both the World Marathon Majors and, recently, the World Marathon Challenge, where she ran for seven days on seven continents—all while juggling her duties as a tech entrepreneur and as a mother.
Finishing a marathon is always an incredible feat as it requires both physical and mental strength, but conquering seven 42.2-kilometer marathons in different parts of the world in just a week is a phenomenal triumph.
Dizon got into running in 2008 when she was "voluntold" by her company to join the Ayala Olympics. At the time, she had just gotten married and was looking for something to do outside of work.
“[Everything] was just new and overwhelming. So I felt that I needed to do something that's not for anyone else but for myself,” she told PhilSTAR L!fe.
Dizon, who described herself as a late bloomer, shared that she did not play any sports growing up, as she was more focused on academics as a scholar.
“We were very poor. So there was really no extracurricular,” she shared. “Noong college, I was a full scholar. So there was really [no] extra time or resources growing up kaya it's just now that I'm really pursuing those interests,” she added.
She signed up for her first marathon in 2009 in Singapore. But just a month before D-day, she found out she was pregnant.
“The deal with my husband then was to make sure [my] doctor gives me clearance to [continue] my marathon. Good thing my doctor is quite progressive," she said.
"He gave me clearance with advice that I should be very sensitive to what's happening to my body, especially since it's the first time that I'm running a marathon and the first time that I'm running while pregnant, so that was quite an experience."
The first marathon further piqued her interest in long-distance runs. “On my second marathon, I was pregnant again. So my two kids were running marathons even before they could walk—or at least, [were] born.”
In 2012, she joined the Berlin Marathon, one of the biggest marathons in the world. It was also the time she learned about World Marathon Majors, which consists of the Boston Marathon, Berlin Marathon, Chicago Marathon, Tokyo Marathon, London Marathon, and New York City Marathon.
“When I went to the Berlin Marathon Expo, I immediately felt that this is something that I wanted to do,” she shared with L!fe. Dizon then dedicated the next five years of her life to completing the majors, which she achieved in 2017.
Amid her quest to finish the majors, she found out about the World Marathon Challenge in 2015. This marathon is a multi-event run where participants are challenged to complete seven marathons on seven continents in seven continuous days.
The challenging marathon stayed in the back of Dizon's mind for years; she would ask completers about their experiences and would message the organizer every other year to inquire if they had slots.
“I finished all of the six majors, but the desire to run in all continents [never] left my consciousness,” she said, adding that she wasn’t able to pursue it at the time due to her responsibilities in her career in tech and her growing family.
“The timing wasn't really right. I was still a startup entrepreneur. I have moved from corporate to startup life, so that's also more challenging. My kids were growing up,” she continued. “A lot of things were just happening."
It was in 2024 when she finally committed to taking on the challenge.
“It was a decade in the making. And I think it was just the right time because now, at least, I do have some flexibility in terms of time and finances. My kids are now teenagers, so they are not as dependent on mom,” Dizon said.
Juggling running and motherhood
Being an athlete and a mom, Dizon follows a “very strong morning routine” to manage her time and energy.
“Even as my kids were growing up, my morning routine was something that I really set, and it's a very [rigid] schedule where the most important things of my day are usually done in the morning," she told L!fe.
Dizon takes time in the morning to work out, make sure her kids are safe in school, and focus on important tasks at her job.
"Balance is such a myth," she said, adding that she takes one thing at a time.
“No such thing as balance. You try to balance, then you don't give the focus that each [task] deserves."
Conquering the seven marathons
When Dizon began preparing for the 2025 World Marathon Challenge, she found recovery and adjusting to different weather conditions the most challenging.
"I'm turning 45 and the recovery from a long run or a training block isn't as easy as if you were in your 20s or 30s," she shared.
“Ang sabi sa 'min, 'You need to prepare for temperatures that would range from negative 25 to upward positive 25.' So all that change in climate is very new to us... We don't really know how to deal with very cold weather, so I needed to find time to train for that as well,” she added.
She also noted that throughout the seven-day marathon, she kept a routine of increasing her mileage and time on her feet as well as being more conscious of her sleep and recovery time.
After running a total of 295 kilometers in seven days, Dizon realized the feats she was capable of.
“[I realized] I can really take on difficult things. I think more than anything it's additional self-confidence, kahit mahirap siya, I can figure it out,” she shared.
“The belief that you can figure things out is something also I'd like to pass on to my kids because if they know that regardless of what comes to them, they could figure things out, then they could take on anything,” she added.
For Dizon, the World Marathon Challenge was like a coming together of everything she learned as a runner.
"It takes some maturity to be patient to not run very fast at the start because you know you will have to do this for seven days."
Beyond the track
Dizon left her career for almost 15 years to venture into the world of technology and build startups. She currently serves as the Country Head of Yield Guild Games (YGG), a platform for Web3 gaming, and is now empowering the Metaverse Filipino Workers (MFW), a movement aiming to give flexible income and financial freedom using digital literacy.
“We're a community focused on upskilling our community members so that these committee members will be able to earn from digital gigs and digital work that we also bring to the Philippines through our partners,” Dizon explained. Under the community, they offer Metaversity, an online education platform where they teach courses on blockchain, Web3, and artificial intelligence, among others.
Her advocacy of bringing digital literacy to young learners is what became one of her driving forces to finish the prestigious marathon challenge.
Dubbed “Road 2 Seven,” Dizon is raising P7 million to support the construction of the Digital Transformation Center at the Sisters of Mary School, an institution that provides vocational training to underprivileged students aged 12 to 18.
It will offer digital courses and technical programs that aim to provide practical skills in programming, AI, and web3, among others, offering job opportunities even if they can’t afford to pursue college.
Despite her busy schedule, Dizon wants to train for speed again, as she has slowed down and been more of a "conservative" runner.
"My son is running as well and thinking of doing his first half marathon. I want to be fast enough to run beside him. Even if he doesn't like running with me, I just want to prove that I could go fast again," she said.
For those who want to pick up running a marathon, Dizon shared the key is to just start.
"Signing up for a race even before you're ready because it will force you to fix your schedule, fix your day, fix the way you structure your hours so that you have time to the run, because if you're not aiming for anything, it's just good for maintenance,” she said.
“But if you really want to finish, and you have a goal, it shapes the steps that you need to take to get there.”
