‘Pushed Myself As Hard As I Can’ – Johan Ghazali’s First Marathon Was Painful, But Worth It
On the global stage of ONE Championship, Malaysian-American knockout artist Johan “Jojo” Ghazali thrives on explosive speed and sudden finality. Outside of the ring, however, he recently found out the hard way what happens when neither of those distinct advantages is on his side.
The teenage striking prodigy returns to action against Lebanese firecracker Ramadan “The Scorpion” Ondash in a high-stakes flyweight Muay Thai co-main event clash at The Inner Circle 24.
The blockbuster card goes down inside Bangkok’s legendary Lumpinee Stadium on Friday, July 31, broadcasting live in Asia primetime exclusively to subscribers at live.onefc.com.
But the most grueling lesson of his current training camp was actually learned well before fight week even began. And it happened far away from anything resembling a strike.
In between fight camps, the 19-year-old phenom boldly laced up for his first-ever official marathon, trading the violent, fast-twitch nature of his day job for more than three relentless hours of an entirely different kind of physical test.
Minimal Miles, Maximum Grit
Johan Ghazali received a marathon entry from one of his sponsors just ahead of his hard-fought clash against Shimon Yoshinari at ONE SAMURAI 1 this past April.
The Sanlam Cape Town Marathon 2026 in South Africa took place on May 24, slightly less than a month after that grueling battle. This meant he would be lacing up for a punishing 42.2 kilometers directly in between two intense fight camps, with barely any real recovery time to show for it.
Cardio is a fighter’s ultimate currency, and for an elite Muay Thai striker, few things matter more than a well-conditioned engine. But his turbulent road to the starting line in Cape Town was anything but smooth.
He shared:
“My leg was [injured] from my Shimon fight, and I couldn’t really walk for like two weeks. And then on the third week, I ran the marathon. I didn’t do anything for three weeks, then I decided, ‘F**k it, let’s just enjoy it.’
“I used to have very high mileage, after all. I used to run about 100 kilometers plus a week. Honestly, I was running so much. So I just thought, why not give it a go, you know.”
Despite the glaring lack of specific preparation, “Jojo” went out and completed his mission, crossing the finish line in 3 hours, 32 minutes, and 53 seconds — a highly impressive time given he had barely trained or conditioned his legs over the previous three weeks.
Ghazali had never officially run a marathon before Cape Town, with his only prior experience over the distance being a random 42.2-kilometer run he simply woke up one day and decided to tackle back home in Sarawak, Malaysia.
Lingering injuries and a lack of training aside, the grueling African experience left a lasting impression on the young striker.
The 19-year-old recalled:
“I loved it, honestly. It was like a holiday for me. I was in Cape Town for a week, and it is a beautiful city.
“I was shocked that a bunch of people knew me all the way out in South Africa, and they were locals as well. They were around the marathon, supporting me and screaming out my name. That was something cool.”
Full Speed, Then Full Stop
Arriving at the starting line under less-than-ideal conditions — carrying nagging injuries and with zero real marathon conditioning behind him — forced Ghazali to tap into his competitive instincts from the very first kilometer.
The Malaysian-American star held a 4-minute-50-second to 5-minute-per-kilometer pace throughout the first three-quarters of the race. It is a blistering clip for almost anyone, let alone a combat sports athlete running his very first official marathon.
He told onefc.com:
“Yeah, it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t easy because I was pushing quite hard. My initial plan was to maintain a 5-minute 45-second pace per kilometer for the whole marathon. But then after 5k, I was like, ‘You know what, I’m gonna just go as fast as I can.’
“I just stopped looking at my pace, and I just pushed myself as hard as I can. So I ended up maintaining a 4-minute-ish pace. So I was en route to doing it in under 3 hours 30 minutes. That was my plan.”
The ambitious plan, however, did not survive the unforgiving back half of the race. Most elite runners hit a massive mental and physical wall somewhere around the 30-kilometer mark, and Ghazali’s sheer inexperience over the brutal distance made him no exception.
Still, he stubbornly pushed through the suffocating fatigue, even catching a surreal glimpse of marathon legend and former world record holder Eliud Kipchoge along one of the stretches.
But the final kilometer or so ultimately proved to be the great equalizer.
“Jojo” recalled:
“In the last kilometer, my whole body shut down. I started to cramp. I reached my limit, basically. I could think clearly, my heart rate was still very low, and everything was fine.
“But my muscles weren’t trained for it. My legs weren’t trained for it. Yeah, everything was perfect up until the last 1km or 1500 meters. Then I just kind of wobbled to the finish line.”
Chasing The Next Finish Line
Despite the agonizing final stretch, Johan Ghazali proudly rates crossing that Cape Town finish line among the biggest personal moments of his entire athletic life.
World Title gold in ONE remains his ultimate, driving goal, and his blistering 16-second knockout in his promotional debut still stands out as a defining career highlight, but the marathon definitively carved out its own special place in his memory.
The Rentap Muaythai Gym and Superbon Training Camp representative continued:
“I think completing a marathon is not that hard. But I’m looking at the timing. I think I could’ve done better, but I wasn’t properly conditioned.
“That said, I would say doing a marathon is easily in the list of top five things I’ve done.”
Naturally, the conversation immediately turns to whether he will ever subject himself to it again, and Ghazali does not hesitate for a second on the matter. But the ultra-competitive fighter doesn’t just want to participate for the simple sake of crossing the endpoint.
He now has his ambitious sights set on accomplishing a sub-3-hour marathon. It is widely considered the ultimate gold standard among amateur and semi-competitive runners, representing a grueling benchmark that only a tiny percentage of finishers worldwide ever successfully reach.
His athletic dreams stretch even further beyond the 42.2-kilometer distance, though:
“I would want to do one in sub-3. That’ll need a proper plan, but I’ll be committed to that when the day comes. I also want to do an Ironman triathlon – that’s one of my dreams. Also, maybe a 100km ultramarathon.
“But I think that will take some time. That’ll take some training. So maybe after I’m done fighting. Also, I really want to run a 100 km. I think I can do it, but it’s probably gonna be very painful. So I’ll wait till I’m done with fighting.”
