Colin Scheyen
Hybrid live-action/animated film The Secret Marathon follows running mentor Martin Parnell and filmmaker Kate McKenzie carrying a torch for women s self-empowerment as part of the Marathon of Afghanistan.
Guinness endurance record-holder Martin Parnell, who ran 250 marathons in 2010 for a charity, recalls the moment he decided to run alongside pioneering women in Afghanistan defying insults and threats to run secret marathons for freedom.
It came in 2015 after Parnell suffered a life-threatening blood clot and facing dark despair one day read an article about Zainab, the first woman to run an official marathon in Afghanistan against local customs. I got frankly mad that a woman in Afghanistan can t run in the streets, which I take for granted, without being mistreated by men, Parnell tells